A Zambian court has sentenced two men to two years in prison after finding them guilty of attempting to use witchcraft to kill President Hakainde Hichilema.
Leonard Phiri, a Zambian, and Jasten Mabulesse Candunde, a Mozambican, were convicted under Zambia’s Witchcraft Act after being arrested in December 2024 with charms in their possession, including a live chameleon, the court heard. Magistrate Fine Mayambu said in his ruling that the convicts were not only "the enemy of the head of state but were also enemies of all Zambians."
Prosecutors alleged the two men had been hired by a fugitive former member of parliament to bewitch the president. The defendants denied wrongdoing and told the court they were bona fide traditional healers, but the magistrate found them guilty on two counts under the Witchcraft Act. The court heard evidence that Phiri had demonstrated how pricking the chameleon’s tail and using it in a ritual would cause death within five days.
The men were sentenced to two years for "professing" witchcraft and to an additional six months for possessing charms; the sentences will run concurrently, meaning they will serve two years in total, effective from their December 2024 arrest. Their defence lawyer, Agrippa Malando, told the court his clients were first-time offenders and asked for leniency in the form of a fine, a request the magistrate rejected.
The case has drawn close attention in Zambia because it is the first time anyone has been tried for attempting to use witchcraft against a sitting president. Magistrate Mayambu noted that many people in Zambia and elsewhere in the region believe in witchcraft, but said the law is aimed at protecting society from the fear and harm caused by individuals who represent themselves as having supernatural powers. "The question is not whether the accused are wizards or actually possess supernatural powers. It is whether they represented themselves as such, and the evidence clearly shows they did," he said.
Legal commentators say prosecutions under the Witchcraft Act are uncommon. Lawyer Dickson Jere noted the law dates back to colonial rule, having been passed in 1914, and that it has at times been used to protect vulnerable people, such as elderly women who face mob justice in rural communities after being accused of causing deaths through sorcery.
Witchcraft and accusations of occult activity have also appeared in other recent public disputes in Zambia. Conversations about alleged occult motives surfaced during a prolonged disagreement between the government and the family of the late President Edgar Lungu over his funeral and burial arrangements. Lungu, who died in South Africa in June, remains in a morgue there amid unresolved differences over whether he should be buried in Zambia, and some commentators have suggested occult reasons for the disagreement; the government has denied such claims.
President Hichilema has previously said he does not believe in witchcraft and has not publicly commented on the convictions.
The convictions and sentencing mark a rare application of the colonial-era statute in a politically sensitive case, underscoring how traditional beliefs and modern law continue to intersect in Zambia’s legal and public life.