HOW WITCHCRAFT DESTROYS AFRICAN SOCCER

By Daniel Mbega, Dar es Salaam

THE stadium was packed and tension griped the air as nine minutes had elapsed since the referee blew the whistle for the second half. Simba players had not shown up while their opponents and arch-rivals, Yanga, were taking sprints in the field.

It was a 2002 Premier League first leg between the two Tanzania soccer giants and the first half had a barren draw, though Yanga had taken much possession.

This reporter happened to pass across Simba’s dressing room while going to the latrines and found the door ajar, and outside stood a famous club member with three coconuts and a small pot in his hands, listening to instructions from inside, trying to cast a spell on their opponent.

“Vunja!” Meaning ‘Break it!’ Someone shouted from inside, and the man broke one coconut after another. The instructions for the third delayed, and it looked as if the fifteen waiting minutes would be over. Yanga fans were chanting thinking Simba had boycotted and so their team was going home with three points.

The man with the coconut became worried. “Vunja!!” there came a sound from inside and the man used all his powers to break the coconut, and the pot. As the pot broke, all Simba players came out from the offside door and went to the pitch. The whole National Stadium was full of noises and whistles from Simba fans, while Yanga fans kept quiet for a while.

That was the miracle for the Msimbazi Reds, as they managed to get the lead in the 65^th minutes through Madaraka Selemani, and all of a sudden the game became tough for Yanga whose players looked like they had been paralyzed.

But they fought tooth and nail and lucky was on their side as they managed to equalize in the 87^th minutes through a spot kick taken by Sekilojo Chambua. The game ended on one-all-draw.

This spectacle is synonymous at many domestic league games in Tanzania and other African countries as superstition and other forms of religious rituals form part of African football, especially in Sub-Saharan Africa.
In Tanzania, the rains have something to do with a win for Simba. When the heavens cry, it is believed that victory must come. Superstition has eaten deep into domestic football and it has been accepted as the norm. It is an open secret no player or club official will be happy to accept.

 "It's just a tradition, sometimes, such kind of superstitious practices spice up the match. It is like salt in stew," Yanga fan Juma Magoma told our reporter in an exclusive interview recently.

On 28 September 2003, Simba players cast strange powder and broke eggs on the pitch before the game, while two Yanga players attempted to counteract by urinating on the field. Most of the footballers then entered the stadium with their backs to the pitch. But in the end, their powers were evenly matched in a 2-2 draw.

Once again on 29 October 2006 before their derby, Yanga and Simba had performed various witchcraft rituals. Investigative journalists from a national newspaper had published photographs showing fans of each team burying unknown substances in the pitch on the eve of the game. Other rituals found the players using the spectator's entrances before the game rather than the stadium's main gate - for fear of passing through an area they believe may have been tainted by witchcraft.  The match ended on a barren draw.

“There are many incidents, you can’t count them. The two clubs happen to have talisman throughout the country and it depends on who is the best. This is our tradition, African tradition,” says Magoma.

However, former Tanzania national team player Douglas Muhani admitted that juju or ndumba in Swahili, does exist. “Yes, as a player during my heydays in clubs and the national team, I have witnessed so many witchcraft practices. I don’t believe in juju, but being part of the team, you can’t refuse to perform rituals, otherwise you’ll be regarded a traitor, and if a team happens to lose a game, you take the blame.

“I remember in 1978 when I was playing for Sigara FC, before our league game with Yanga in Mwanza, we slept the whole night in cemetery casting rituals with our talisman, one named Maalim Hassan from Tanga. He told us that the game would be tough and that one of our fellows would faint while playing, but we shouldn’t touch him because he would die. Sure, before we scored a goal, one of our players, John Mlebo, collapsed. We just watched until he was taken on stretchers. We scored, and when we thought the game was all ours, Omar Hussein equalized for Yanga with eight minutes to go,” he remembers.

Muhani, a former centre-back who plied his trade with various clubs in Tanzania like Sigara, Coastal Union, Bandari Mtwara, Maji Maji and the National Team (Taifa Stars), says rubbing palm oil on the ankles, jumping over a bonfire, cutting the ankles with a razor blade and rubbing black powder into wounds, were some of the practices they did, and are done as prescribed by the witchdoctors in every team.

“Sometimes you’re told not to shake hands with anybody before the game, or you must enter the field by walking backwards. All this are psychological beliefs that try to give you encouragement,” he says.

However, Muhani says the only spell that could make a team win is good preparations with a strong team full of talented and committed players.

“Most African teams lose a lot of money employing witches to help them win games. It’s absurd. If the money could only be used for preparation of the team, it could deliver positively.”

He adds: “Witchcraft in football is given only 2%. It is psychological phenomenal and depends on one’s belief. In order to win a game, you need to have a strong team with talented and committed players. You need a well trained football coach, the players and the technical staff must be paid accordingly and the preparation atmosphere should be conducive. That is 98% of performance.

“What is done by the traditional healers is playing with your psychology. They encourage you by making spells, letting you know that you are going to win the game because your opponents have been bewitched. But you play hard enough to make it happen, thanks if a team is well prepared, but for a squad whose preparations have been doubtful, the witches can’t deliver a thing.”

African football legend Abedi Pele once admitted that witchcraft exists in football. “As for juju, I have been in it many times because in the Black Stars they were bringing us things to wash, things to drink and bathe with,” the former Ghana captain revealed to GMS Press. “In your own local clubs you were introduced to so many of them.”

NB: Tomorrow: “Sorcery, rituals are part of the game in Africa”: A confession from a traditional healer.