James Hall

MBABANE, Mar 11 (IPS) - Lwazi Dlamini, sports writer for the Times of Swaziland, feels so-called witchcraft practised in African soccer to ensure good performance for a favoured side and bad luck for opponents is ''primarily psychological''.

But he says it is effective, nonetheless.

Soccer officials throughout Africa are becoming less tolerant toward the use of alleged magic on the soccer pitch. For this year's 'African Cup of Nations' competition in Mali, the high point on the continent's annual football playing calendar, and second in prestige only to the World Cup, officials banned traditional healers from associating with teams.

Even traditional healers who provide therapeutic assistance with herbal potions and time-tested remedies were forbidden.

''If a regular team doctor wants to use a traditional medicine, he is free to obtain one, but the days of witchdoctors in locker rooms are over, as far as the African Cup is concerned,'' says a tournament official.

The ban on ''witchdoctors'' - the word is considered offensive to legitimate practitioners of African medicine - was effective at the African World Cup, but will do little to end the role superstitious beliefs have in African soccer, according to sports authorities.

Maswazi Simelane, Director of Sports and Culture in Swaziland, feels the reason for the continuing presence of tinyanga (traditional healers) in soccer has to do with both areas of his responsibility: sports and culture. ''Teams and players feel better when they have the protection and guidance of the ancestors,'' he says.

There are many ways a traditional healer may legitimately assist a soccer player, says Amos Pfumo, a healer from the Maputo Province in southern Mozambique. ''There are herbs that can make an athlete perform better, but there is also the 'strengthening' that comes from bringing to him the power of the ancestors.''

In a rite called ''kucinisa'' (''to make straight''), Pfumo treats an athlete with a routine of medicines and prayer sessions. The player's body is pricked at strategic points, particularly around the legs, with the sharp point of a porcupine quill, and a powdery medicine is rubbed into the bloodstream through these pin-prick wounds. The herbs not only fortify the player physically, but also act as communication tools to bring the ancestral spirits to the athlete.

''The spirits will guide him, make him do his best. They cannot give him abilities he does not ordinarily have, but they will see he makes best use of his skills, and endow him with good luck,'' says Pfumo.

Pfumo says the ancestors are pleased when they are properly petitioned, and as a reward they offer ''guidance'' to players during matches.

Bongani Mngomezulu, the coach of a local soccer team, the Black Mambas, outside Durban, South Africa, says, ''Many soccer coaches have mixed feelings about the 'ancestors', but the truth is we will use traditional healers to 'straighten' our players because of the psychological boost it gives them. If you believe you have the ancestral spirits on your side, you can play like you are inspired.''

Less sanguine is the flip side to the curative and strengthening part of traditional medicine: dirty tricks and witchcraft.

Sports writer Dlamini says, ''It is common to see teams slaughter a goat right on the sidelines before a match. This is done they say to honour the ancestors. But then they take the goat's blood and gall bladder, and pour it on the ground where the opposing team has to step over it.''

''The other players naturally think they are being bewitched. They're afraid they will break their legs, or go blind. I've seen games forfeited because players refuse to go through a stadium tunnel if they think spells have been cast there,'' he says..

It was to avoid just such distractions that traditional healers were excluded from the African Cup.

''This did not keep the healers away from the teams, but it meant they sat in the bleachers instead of on the sidelines,'' says a Nigerian coach who prefers not to give his name, although he says he does not employ a healer for his team.

Dlamini says, ''There are reasons why traditional healers are part of sports, because Africans rely on our healers. But the dirty tricks that are done to 'psyche out' opponents are giving us a bad name.''

Dlamini feels that the last thing Africa needs is reinforcement of the bigoted notion that the continent is a place where superstition thrives.

''Belief in our ancestors does not make us primitives,'' Swazi soccer player Vusi Malambe says. ''But practising black magic, using mutsi (bewitchment medicine) is regressive.''

Malambe feels that as standards of soccer improve in Africa, players will feel less vulnerable to black magic. ''We'll have the confidence that we are so good, a spell can't stop us,'' he says.

Improvement of sports facilities is on the agenda of every African nation, no matter how poor. Soccer is the favourite game of the continent because it requires no expenditure other than a ball. ''Barefoot boys and girls compete on dirt pitches with goal posts made of tree branches and maize sacks,'' says Malambe.

He feels that in time conditions will improve, and attitudes toward beating opponents through witchcraft will change, and become obsolete.(END/2002)