Witchcraft among Muslims

It’s a disturbing factor when newspapers advertise adverts from people with ill repute, offering services ranging from “‘ bringing lost lovers back, winning the lottery, family problems etc”. Many Muslims (particularly young Muslim women, married and single ones) are frequenting these people who claim to have a cure for whatever ails that person. Those who frequent the people of ill repute pay huge sums of money and some are put in a trance so that the male witchdoctor takes advantage of them. The problem starts when a woman tells others that she had a marriage problem and after she went to one of the witch doctors, her problem was solved. Those listening multiply in their minds their problems, 10 times, get the details of the witchdoctor and seek help from the witchdoctor, instead of seeking professional help from older family members or the Imams or a legitimate society that can help you. I am not saying that there are no problems. Yes, there are those rotten husbands, who probably had bad childhoods, grew up insecure, or are following their uneducated fathers, in beating their wives.
It would be better if Muslim women and men join groups which tell them about God and the Prophet, instead of indulging in idle gossips and exchanging stories about boyfriends, girlfriends and husbands, and how a certain witch man or woman, helped them with their problems.My appeal is to stop this practice of visiting these witchcraft workers.
Yunus Patel, ypatel@nwpg.gov.za