Transcript
Photo: 123 RF
ANTON LUTZ: All of a sudden we have a perfect storm where lack of adequate medical education, lack of adequate science education, as well as these other belief systems I guess, all come together and all of a sudden they think that the reason this small boy has died is probably not for a natural cause like choking but because a evil spirit lives inside of a woman and has come out and consumed his heart and she should therefore be tortured so that she will give it back. And suddenly that all makes sense somehow because of all these multiple factors that are coming together.
DOMINIC GODFREY: So how are these women chosen? They often seem to be women that are blamed for these elements of sorcery. Why these specific women?
AL: In the case at Pompabus, as I understand it the woman who was killed, and I'm not sure of her name yet, was having lunch with the mother of the small boy. And after lunch they parted ways, and as the mother took charge of her young son, all of a sudden her young son died. So she cried out in anguish and the local boys ran to her to find out what the problem was and she pointed to the child and said he's dead. And they said 'well who was just here?' and all of a sudden her name came up and they chased her down as she was returning to her own home completely oblivious as to what had just happened behind her. So when they caught her they then found another woman who was standing in the near vicinity and they asked her what was going on, and she said something like 'well this woman owes me something and so I'm here to collect on that'. They assumed that what she was talking about was that she had given this other woman a human heart in some form in the past and was now going to be repaid by a heart which this woman had stolen from the child. And so they were in collusion in the death and so on so they grabbed the two of them and began torturing them and tortured all day Saturday and finally on Sunday one was dead and the other was rescued by police and defence force.
DG: How can the police deal with this problem when clearly people aren't going to be coming forward for fear of reprisal, as witnesses and so on?
AL: Exactly. It's extremely difficult for the police to do anything. In the most recent case at Pompabus the police were not even made aware of the situation until I managed to call them late on Saturday night, and they told me at that time that they had not even heard of the case yet. And I had just called a number of other people in the district and they had all heard of it and they said 'oh yeah, we're sitting around talking about it right now' but I said 'well have you called the police?' 'Oh no we haven't done that.' People seem hesitant to contact the police even if they're not involved whatsoever. And it doesn't seem to occur to them that the correct response is to get armed personnel in there to stop the torture and rescue the victims and get them to safety. That doesn't seem to occur to people very quickly and it's often fallen to me to be the first person to contact the police and say hey this is going on, what are you doing about it? And then the police are constrained by a lack of resources, lack of man power and poor cell phone coverage and all kinds of different factors that affect all of us working here in the Highlands.
Anton Lutz said the Sorcery National Action Plan is continuing to gain momentum in curbing sorcery related violence but it needs further endorsement from the new national government.
He said PNG leaders need to stand up and say this is not the way to behave.
