Ever vigilant, blooger LarryD has posted a story which he discovered on The Daily Mail where the government of Malawi plan to punish persistent offenders 'who foul the air' in a bid to 'mould responsible and disciplined citizens.'In other words, the Malawai government will make it illegal to.....how shall I say it.......fart in public.
The original article makes reference to the website Africanews.com , so, intrepid reporter I am (and not to be outdone by LarryD) I went to Africanews.com to get to the source of the story. Unfortunately, I could not find the story of the Malawian anti-fart law on the website, but I was able to find other stories pertaining to the African nation that are just as - if not more - bizarre.
In one story [Malawi: Villagers stop officials from hunting hyenas] villagers in a district in central Malawi have asked police and game rangers to stop hunting wild, marauding hyenas that have seriously injured at least two villagers. According to villagers, these hyenas are "man-made" - that is, the product of witchcraft and "meant to harass or eliminate some people [and] as such there is nothing the police can do." Police Spokesperson, Kondwani Kandiado, confirmed that there had been no sign of the hyenas since the police arrived, ergo, the creatures were the product of witchcraft.
In a second story [Malawi: Witchcraft fracas lands 16 in court] we read that "sixteen parents will answer charges of malicious damage after razing down houses belonging to three alleged witchcraft teachers". An unreported number of children told their parents that the three had taught them all witchcraft and "flying lessons to steer the aircraft". I'm not sure what that means.
According to the story, witchcraft is not recognized as a punishable offense in Malawi, though The Witchcraft Act makes it a crime to accuse someone of practicing witchcraft.
The third story from the website is, I'm sure, the strangest of all. The title says it all ......Malawi: Man cuts off testicles for sale.
22-year-old Pilirani Lazarous was in need of money to buy fertilizer for his farm and having heard rumors that there was a market for testicles in Malawi's capital city, Lilongwe, Lazarous attempted to - as the story says - make ends meet. Lazarous said, "The first people I tried to market them reported me to police”. Police took him to the hospital where he will undergo psychiatric evaluation.
1 comment:
Thanks for clearing the air on Malawi, Robert. Gotta hand it to ya, you certainly have the cajones to go around digging up those stories.
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