2 June 2012 Last updated at 01:31 CET

Tanzania President Is Worried Over Suspected 500 Witches Lynched Every Year

By Francis Tawiah (Duisburg - Germany)

President of Tanzania Jakaya Kikwete

Over 3,000 people suspected to be witchcrafts, mainly old women, were lynched in Tanzania between 2005 and 2011, reported a leading local Tanzanian rights group. The old women were lynched by frightened neighbours who thought they were witches, the Legal and Human Rights Centre (LHRC) said in a report.
A average of 500 people particularly old women with red eyes, are just killed every year in Tanzania because they are suspected of being witches according to the report. The provinces which are hardest hit are Mwanza and Shinyanga in the north of the country, according to the report of the LHRC.
In Shinyanga province for example 242 people were killed because of local beliefs in witchcraft between January 2010 and January 2011 alone, it said. The rights group explained that red eyes are feared as a sign of witchcraft, even if they in fact often result from the use of cow dung as cooking fuel in most impoverished communities.
The the Legal and Human Rights Centre said that many local people believe that witchcraft is behind every misfortune from infertility, poverty, failure in business, famine and earthquakes.
FRANCIS TAWIAH (Duisburg - Germany)