23 WITCHCRAFT ALLEGATIONS AGAINST ZION PRIEST

MAKHWEKHWETI - A Zion church priest has been called to answer regarding 23 witchcraft-related allegations levelled against him. 

The priest, whose name is known to this publication, but will not be revealed as he has not been found guilty of any wrongdoing, leads one of the Zion churches under Sithobelweni Inkhundla. 

On Saturday, he was called to a community meeting by Nkonjwa Royal Kraal to provide answers on the witchcraft-related allegations levelled against him by Xhoza Mamba, who is representing the Mambas in the area. The incidents are alleged to have taken place between 2014 and 2020.

In the first incident, it was alleged that the priest, who is related to the Mambas, was found by three men (family members) in one Mamba homestead at night carrying a spear and he ran away after realising that some people had seen him.  

As a result, the Mambas submitted that the family members, who allegedly spotted him, without knowing that the person they saw was the priest, ran after him and also set dogs on him. They alleged that before this incident, they had seen a person in the homestead at night at the same spot, but the person ran away before they could ascertain his/her identity and that was why on this particular day, they decided to chase him.

Catching

They claimed that the dogs caught him after he was blocked by a fence. Upon catching him, they alleged that he asked them; “Ningibulalelani (why are you killing me?)’’.

“When we heard his voice, we realised it was the priest and we were shocked,” they alleged.

Thereafter, they claimed they apologised for setting the dogs on him and they used a cellphone light to inspect the injuries he had sustained as his trouser was blood-soaked. They alleged that it was then that they verified that indeed he was carrying a spear.

In their claims, they added that they also found that he had lost his right shoe while running away and they assisted him to search for it. As they looked for the shoe, they claimed that they asked him what he was doing at their home at night. “He said he had come to perform a ritual on one of the graves at the homestead’s graveyard, as per a prophecy he had,” the Mambas claimed.

However, they claimed that when he arrived at his church on the same night wearing the same trouser, which was covered in blood, he allegedly told the church members that he got injured while chasing a witch.

This incident, according to the Mambas, allegedly took place in 2014. Again, they alleged later on, he put black wool (insontfo) around the same homestead.  “He also took a spear belonging to a dead senior member of the Mamba family,” they alleged.

Again, they claimed that some stones from certain tombs in the Mamba family were exchanged. They also claimed that one stone from the family’s tomb was exchanged with one from another family grave. “The priest was also assisted by a senior member of the family to place money on a tomb of a female family member,” alleged a member of the Mamba clan.

Once more, they alleged that some of his church members dug one of the family members’ tombs at night. They also alleged that shirts belonging to some of the Mamba senior members were taken by a senior member of the Mamba family, supposedly under the instructions of the priest and he took them to church and one of the shirts was never returned. They claimed that this was after the member of the family had passed on.

Theft

Thereafter, they alleged that the same priest was implicated in the theft of cow dung from one of the Mamba homesteads, supposedly under the pretence that it was a prophecy. “The priest also took underwears of young girls and ordered them to sleep naked in the church. Thereafter, the girls were given clothes from the priest’s family to cover their bodies while asleep,” they alleged.

The Mambas also claimed that the Zion priest was implicated in the stealing of hair from one of the wives of a senior member of the Mamba family. The priest, according to the allegations, was also implicated in the stealing of various forms of dirt derived from Mamba family members, including children.

Another allegation was that the Zion priest was implicated in an act whereby members of his church allegedly made a woman from the Mamba family carry an unknown animal on her back to one of the rivers in the area.

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