Fake Witches Steal Cars in Namibia

There's more fake witchcraft going on in the African nation of Namibia. The good news is that this is not another case of an angry mob murdering alleged witches, but the bad news is that a number of people have been defrauded out of their cars by criminals claiming to be traditional healers.

Fraudsters convince the owners that they can "clean vehicles from evil deeds", it was explained.

To carry this out, the supposed traditional healers however require the car owners to provide both their vehicle and the relevant documents for the vehicle to them.

What then happens, though, is that the vehicle gets sold and its ownership registration changed without the owner knowing of this.

I always hate it when con artists exploit belief in spiritual practices to make money, and as far as I'm concerned these car thieves fall into the same category as fraudulent mediums and psychics over here in the states. Nonetheless, part of me does wonder what sort of "evil deeds" might require cleansing so badly that the owners are willing to take such a big chance with their vehicles.

The big problem is not that people believe in magical practices, but that they are at the same time ignorant of how they work. There is no reason in the world that I would need any sort of legal paperwork on a vehicle in order to banish malevolent influences from it. The influences would be linked to the vehicle, not the corresponding legal title which from a magical perspective is just a piece of paper.

Similarly, there are a lot of people who go to mediums and have no idea how difficult it is to conjure up spirits that have been dead longer than a month or so. It's not always impossible, but it requires a serious and well-designed ceremony, not the freeform wandering-mind technique that many psychics claim to use. Even then, it will fail way too often to pay the rent.