A Complete Set Of Albino Body Parts – Including All Four Limbs, Genitals, Ears, Tongue and Nose – Can Fetch Up To $75 000 In Tanzania

“This is possibly the worst time to be a person with albinism in Tanzania,” says Amir Manento.
In October, citizens will go to the polls to vote in presidential and parliamentary elections.
“Every election period brings with it a new cycle of killings. In between we have smaller elections translating to more abductions, more killings,” said Manento, a retired judge and human rights activist, who for decades has been at the forefront of campaigning for the rights of people living with albinism.
“We see an increase of witchcraft and the use of human body parts, particularly albino body parts,
in the run-up to the general elections.”
Albino body parts are associated with good luck and, as the country gears up for the elections, the demand for good luck charms goes up. Sacrifices are thought by some to be a sure way of guaranteeing victory in the polls.
Tanzania is thought to have one of the world’s largest populations of people with albinism, a congenital disorder that robs skin, eyes and hair of pigment. This community of about 30 000 has existed under the threat of abductions and ritual
killings; in recent years the situation appears to have worsened.
A complete set of albino body parts – including all four limbs, genitals, ears, tongue and nose – can fetch up to $75 000, according to a report by the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies.
Intimate crimes
The Tanzanian Albinism Society says it is almost impossible to know how many have been abducted or killed since the beginning of the year.
But they say the number of victims will be higher than the two cases that made it into police records in 2013. “Even last year the numbers might have been higher because these crimes are very intimate.
Mostly, a close family member, even a father, is involved in the killings and abductions. In such cases silence wins; his wife will probably be an accomplice in the crime. Nothing will be said of the matter again and the police will have no
chance of prosecuting anyone,” says Severin Edward, programme co-ordinator for the Tanzanian Albinism Society.
A total of 155 cases of violation of albino rights have been reported to Tanzanian authorities since
2009, according to a study released in March by Under the Same Sun (UTSS), a non governmental
organisation working to combat discrimination against people with albinism.
“Of these cases, 75 were deaths. We have also received 18 reports of grave violations,” said Don Sawatzky, director of operations for UTSS. The study, which gathered data from 25 countries in Africa, found reports of 145 albino killings and 226 cases of violations that include mutilations and kidnappings.
UTSS has been pushing the United Nations for key resolutions aimed at ending all forms of discrimination against people with albinism.
Sawatzky argues that to describe the killings as a phenomenon propelled by recent economic
hardship would be “to accept the easy answer”.
“Nobody really knows the origin of the killings, since documentation in Africa is not common other than through oral tradition. All we know for sure is that albinism has been ‘mythologised’ since time beyond memory. Muti murders, or ‘medicine’ killings, have a deep, long-standing
history and are a familiar concept to most Africans,” he says.
Culled from Guardian News & Media