Despite R100k, Ricoffy and a black snake, sangoma fails to bring back lost lover

A Pretoria man who would have done anything for love, from paying sangomas millions to praying to the
devil to return the love of his life, has been left broke and broken. Leon Barnard was left devastated after his partner of 30 years packed up and left in late 2019.

“He just came home one Friday night and said he was done. After 30 years he walked out that night with three bags,” Barnard said.

Barnard said he felt like he stopped existing after the breakup. Two weeks after Barnard’s lover left, he Googled how to get his ex-lover back and clicked on a link that led him to the first sangoma. The sangoma invited him to come see her the following day at a house in Menlo Park for a consultation.

“We can help you, someone stole your lover from you, we can break the chain,” the sangoma told Barnard.

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After paying the sangoma the first R6,000 for medicine, he got a call back to inform him the ancestors wanted to speak to him.

“The deep manly voice told me when I meet my ex-lover I must wear pangolin skin,” he said.

The sangoma allegedly found him the pangolin skin in China Town in Johannesburg for R100,000. Not long after Barnard paid the sangoma the R100,000, she was allegedly robbed on the way. This was just the start of many transactions to come.

“She then told me it was my fault because I was cursed,” he said.

The sangoma told him to buy a tin of Ricoffy and to carry it around with him while chanting out his fears.

“She came to my house in a limo. During the ceremony she made me take off my clothes and told me to open the tin of coffee. When I opened the seal a black snake came out of it,” he said.

The sangoma told him the snake was his evil spirit.

Psychologist Lloyd Bemelman said sometimes people do this type of thing to increase their chances of success. In this case it was a lost lover.

“This is ego-orientated, which means it was the ego and not the real you. Some would take out big loans to impress others to make themselves feel better, but it doesn’t help,” he said.

Prof Jaco Barkhuizen, head of the department of criminology at the University of Limpopo, said unfortunately this story wasn’t unique or isolated.

“People are desperate. Get rich quick and get your lover back schemes increase as people get more desperate,” he said.

“The exploiter will first ask for a small amount of money and then more and more. The vulnerable person gets to a point where he cannot stop giving money because he has already invested so much of his time and finances, that he realises he has to put in more, or this might be a scam,” he added.

– marizkac@citizen.co.za