Don’t give poachers muti says chief traditional healer
Traditional healers are working together with the Kruger National Park to prevent healers from giving muti to criminals.
SKUKUZA – A successful campaign was launched by the president of the Unified Ancestors Traditional Healers and Practitioners of South Africa (UATHPSA) to get the message across to traditional healers that it is wrong to supply poachers with muti.
“Syndicates go to bottle stores and find drunken youths to do the poaching. They get muti to help them from the traditional healers. I told the healers that perhaps six of these poachers go in to the Kruger National Park (KNP). Four perhaps get killed. The other two is going to come back and look for you to kill you. This made a change.”
He explained that muti is used by the poachers for various reasons.
READ about how vultures are poisoned for muti ingredients
Hlati said that traditional muti is powerful. Poachers use it to make themselves brave, to make animals less aggressive and to make magistrates fall asleep so they cannot sentence poachers.
It is not only the anti-poaching message that is important to Hlati. He also wants to protect animals against poaching. He invites healers to come to the association to find their ingredients for muti.
“We say to them: don’t jump the Kruger fence. Stay away from the animals. Come to our office. We will get you what you want from Kruger sourced from the dead animals.”
He pointed out that animal fat, blood and bones are often used in a muti mix. Rhino horn is not used, just perhaps the skin and blood.
