The thirst for influence and power drives people to do the craziest of things. Money rituals are common around the world, however, it is a bit more specific in Malawi.
People who have albinism, a condition that makes him a valuable commodity in parts of eastern and southern Africa. Like elephants and rhino, they are hunted and killed for their body parts, which can fetch thousands of dollars and are often trafficked across borders.
Slayings of people with albinism are common in Tanzania, Malawi and Mozambique, where body parts are used in witchcraft rituals because of superstitions that they can bring riches, success, power or sexual conquest. Children are especially vulnerable.
There is also the belief that certain body parts of albinistic people can transmit magical powers. Such superstition has been promulgated and exploited by witch doctors and others who use such body parts as ingredients in rituals, concoctions and potions with the claim that their magic will bring prosperity to the user.
As a result, people with albinism have been persecuted, killed and dismembered, and graves of albinos dug up and desecrated.
At the same time, people with albinism have also been ostracised and even killed for exactly the opposite reason, because they are presumed to be cursed and bring bad luck.
The persecutions of people with albinism take place mostly in Sub-Saharan African communities, especially among East Africans.
At least 20 Malawians with albinism have been killed for their body parts since November 2014, according to Amnesty International. But the number could be higher, with many other people with albinism having disappeared. In Tanzania, at least 75 have been killed since 2000.
The danger has become so significant that the United Nations refugee organization has recently begun relocating families of people with albinism in Malawi to Canada and other countries.
