A New Case on 5 May 2010, 12-year-old boy

Another mutilation in Mozambique. We are receiving more than one report per month. This time a 12 year old boy was attacked on 5 May 2010. His genitals and eyes were removed. Amazingly...he survived and is in hospital after lying bleeding for 24 hours. One of the attackers confessed to our researcher, we hope to visit the boy in hospital later this week.

We have an interview confession from the person who attacked the 12 year old boy. He describes how he was approached by someone wanting him to assist in this mutilation. "He told me he wanted to work with me on cutting some parts from a child, indicating the size (of the child ed.). He promised that after I took the package and came back (...) he would pay me ($266 ed.). I knew about the existence of a child with those characteristics and I also wanted the money, I did not hesitate". He goes on to say "he said we should avoid killing, the body parts have to be extracted from a living person". The picture above was taken a few weeks ago.

More from the interview confession. He "threw a big stone at the child's chest to make him faint and so that we could work freely. Next, (name removed) gives me the knife and tells me to cut and remove the eyes, threatening me not to give up or fear, for me not to think as a human being and not to see the child as a person in that moment". He goes on "first he removed the eyes of the child, I removed the entire package of the genital organ of the child with the same knife. (...) then he placed the body parts in a plastic bag and he handed it to me sending me to go the the other side, to Malawi". One of our team is hoping to visit this 12 year old boy in hospital in the next few days.

Still about the 10-year-old girl

We've received an interview with the police chief for the case of the 10-year-old girl. He confirmed they killed the girl and then removed her genital organs, her tongue and her teeth. He then said "After they murdered they threw her in the well that had water, the relatives started looking but they didn’t know that she was right there in the well of their house, they even kept drinking the water from that well even after the child was inside it".

10-year-old girl murdered for her body parts

We've received an interview from the father of a 10 year old girl who was murdered for her body parts a few weeks ago in Mozambique, her body was dumped in the family's well. The father believes the bodyparts were to be used for Muti to increase business at the local mill. Here is what he said. "She was 10 years old. They killed her here in the house and then they went to cut her there in the bush. I saw the body, when we took it out from the well. My daughter was cut in this lower part (referring to her genitalia ed.), they removed the tongue and the teeth. They are going to take them to a traditional healer that will make a treatment to have a lot of deals in the grinding (referring to the local mill ed.)"

The case of a boy who survived a mutilation attack

On 5 December 2009, a case was aired by Mozambican National Television (TVM) about a 16 year old boy, in Niassa (northern Mozambique), who, on 26 November 2009, was attacked by three men who cut off his genital organs. Our team started an investigation and this is what we have discovered from several first hand Interviews.

The boy, who was 13 years old at the time of the attack, had been grazing goats when the three men approached the boy saying they would help him search for a goat he had lost. The boy explained, “they began hitting me, pulling me and I started screaming for help, but nobody showed up, they cut me in the head with a knife and I passed out. They took my pants off, they tied my hands and legs and put mud in my nostrils and mouth, They cut my genitals, they wrapped the organs and put them in a bag and ran away. A lot of blood was coming out of my head and nobody was coming to help me. So I stayed there for 2 days without eating anything and then I crawled to the road”.

The three men left him there to bleed to death. The boy lay in the field for two days, after which time he crawled to the nearest road (thought to be almost 1km away) and was found by the police and taken to the Provincial Hospital of Lichinga.

According to the doctor “the genitals were completely removed, it was a clean cut and they took all the genitals using a big knife, with one cut. This area was completely infected. It must have been someone very well trained or someone who is used to doing this kind of thing. Even a health professional would not be able to make such a clean cut without training”.

Two men have been arrested in connection with this case, they both claim they are innocent despite being identified by the victim. The boy says the men were guards from a kindergarten and he would normally see them when he went grazing the goats. The investigation is ongoing.

In January 2010, the boy was transferred to the Central Hospital of Maputo, where he is receiving medical attention. The Mozambican Human Rights League has been helping the boy with few basic needs such as food, clothes and some emotional support.

It is important to say that several child rights were violated in this short period. When TVM aired the news, they exposed the boy without his permission. They even showed the disturbing images of his wound. The boy also stated in the interview: “I even appeared in TVM and I didn’t like that”.

It seems unimaginable how someone can perform this gruesome act on a person, especially a child. However, in our project we have seen more cases like this one and it is evident that this is a frequent practice in the country, in which the body parts removed from the bodies are used by so called witchdoctors in several treatments allegedly to improve life conditions. The victim even stated: “They sell it to have money and cars, and they get rich”.