The threat of witchcraft has scared looters into returning goods they stole during unrest which followed last month’s disputed Kenyan elections.

TV stations broadcast pictures of people returning to places they robbed in the coastal city of Mombasa carrying beds, sofas and other items.

A police commander confirmed the reports and said the rumours of witchcraft had made his job “easy”.

One woman said the curse had prevented people from going to the toilet.

“I am telling the truth. I am not lying. There are some people who are not able to pass urine nor faeces,” she told Kenyan broadcaster NTV.

Other looters attributed “mystery” illnesses to the curse.

Violence & Looting In Kenya (DEC. 2007)
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Whether ghosts exist or not, our work has been made easy – Mombasa police commander

Widespread looting followed a breakdown in law and order after President Mwai Kibaki was sworn in after being declared the winner of the disputed poll.

But word spread around Mombasa that a timber merchant had brought in a community elder to place a curse on the thieves.

“He gave us 10 days to return the timber. I will return them at night because people really laugh at us when we do so during the day,” an unidentified man told the TV station.

Other victims of looters have also reportedly followed suit.

John Joash confessed to stealing a bed during the mayhem.

Images of Nairobi, Kenya
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“I am fearful for my life because of the ghosts, that is why I decided to return the property,” the AFP news agency quotes him as saying.

A local police commander welcomed the looters’ second thoughts.

“Whether ghosts exist or not, our work has been made easy. I wish there were ghosts all over the country,” he said.

The BBC’s Odhiambo Joseph in Mombasa says people turned to witchcraft when they realised the police were powerless to prevent their livelihoods being destroyed.

Story from BBC NEWS

Book Description: How does democracy fare when the people governed insist they live in a world with witches? If the government of a people afflicted by witchcraft refuses to punish witches, how does it avoid becoming alienated from the perceived needs of its people or, worse, seen as being in league with witches? In Soweto, South Africa, the constant threat of violent crime, the increase in black socio-economic inequality, the AIDS pandemic, and a widespread fear of witchcraft have converged to create a pervasive sense of insecurity among citizens and a unique public policy problem for government. In Witchcraft, Violence, and Democracy in South Africa, Adam Ashforth examines how people in Soweto and other parts of post-apartheid South Africa manage their fear of ‘evil forces’ such as witchcraft. Ashforth examines the dynamics of insecurity in the everyday life of Soweto at the turn of the twenty-first century. He develops a new framework for understanding occult violence as a form of spiritual insecurity and documents new patterns of interpretation attributing agency to evil forces. Finally, he analyzes the response of post-apartheid governments to issues of spiritual insecurity and suggests how these matters pose severe long-term challenges to the legitimacy of the democratic state.