A Zambian court sentenced two men to two years in prison after convicting them of attempting to use witchcraft to kill President Hakainde Hichilema. Leonard Phiri of Zambia and Jasten Mabulesse Candunde of Mozambique were found guilty under the Witchcraft Act after their arrest in December with charms, including a live chameleon.
Magistrate Fine Mayambu, who delivered the ruling, said the pair had posed a threat not only to the head of state but to the nation as a whole. “It is my considered view that the convicts were not only the enemy of the head of state but were also enemies of all Zambians,” he said.
The case, which drew wide public interest, was the first in Zambia where individuals were put on trial for attempting to use witchcraft against a sitting president. Prosecutors alleged that Phiri and Candunde had been hired by a fugitive former Member of Parliament to bewitch Hichilema.
During the trial, the two men maintained that they were traditional healers, not sorcerers. However, the court found them guilty on two counts after they admitted owning the charms. Phiri reportedly explained in court that pricking the chameleon’s tail and using it in a ritual would cause death within five days.
Their lawyer, Agrippa Malando, asked the court to impose a fine instead of a custodial sentence, arguing that the men were first-time offenders. The request was denied. Magistrate Mayambu stressed that the law exists to protect the public from fear and harm caused by claims of witchcraft.
“The question is not whether the accused are wizards or actually possess supernatural powers. It is whether they represented themselves as such, and the evidence clearly shows they did,” Magistrate Mayambu said.
In addition to the two-year jail term for professing witchcraft, both men received a further six-month sentence for possession of charms. However, the sentences will run concurrently, meaning they will serve only two years from the date of their arrest in December 2024.
President Hichilema has previously stated that he does not believe in witchcraft and has not commented on the case. Legal experts noted that Zambia’s Witchcraft Act, passed in 1914 during colonial rule, is rarely enforced. Lawyer Dickson Jere explained that while prosecutions are uncommon, the law helps protect vulnerable people, especially elderly women, from mob violence in rural areas.
The debate over witchcraft has also extended into national discussions around the burial of former President Edgar Lungu, who died in South Africa in June. Some have accused the government of occult motives for insisting he be buried in Zambia, contrary to his family’s wishes. The government has denied the claims, but the body remains in a morgue pending resolution of the dispute.
