Eduardo was born and raised in a fishing village on Lake Tanganyika. He was the fifth child of an ordinary family of Tanzanian fishermen, foraging in the lake waters. He himself, like his parents, brothers and sisters, was a typical Tanzanian - dark-skinned with black curly hair.
When the time came, he married a neighbor, a pretty Negro woman Maria, whom he had been looking at as a teenager. The young people settled in a separate hut. Eduardo adored his wife and was in seventh heaven when she got pregnant
The family idyll ended as soon as Eduardo looked at the newborn - a white-skinned girl with a whitish fluff on her head. The husband in a rage showered his wife with a hail of reproaches, accusing him of all mortal sins: she supposedly got involved with evil spirits, a family curse gravitates over her, and the gods sent her "zeru" ("ghost" in the local dialect) as punishment. To complete the scandal, Eduardo severely beat Maria and threw her and the child out of the house, depriving her of all help and support.
The parents did not accept the unfortunate woman either. Only her 70-year-old grandfather, who lived in a shabby shack on the outskirts of the village, took pity on her.
Maria had a hard time. The villagers shied away from her as from the plague. She somehow got herself and her daughter Louise food by hard day work, and the whole day the baby remained under the supervision of her grandfather.
When Luisa was eight months old, Eduardo burst into the hut with three accomplices. Everyone was very drunk. In front of the grandfather, numb with horror, they cut the girl's throat, drained the blood out of her into a wineskin, pulled out her tongue, cut off her arms and legs …
Further dismemberment was prevented by the terrible cry of Mary returning from work. The woman fainted. And the criminals, grabbing a wineskin with blood and severed body parts, rushed away.
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Louise's remains were buried right there in the hut so that other albino hunters would not encroach on her bones.
Africa is hell for the "colorless"
Unfortunately, this tragedy is typical for the countries of Southeast Africa. The percentage of albinos is abnormally high here - people with a congenital absence of pigment in the skin, hair and iris of the eyes. If in Europe and North America there is one albino per 20 thousand people, then in Tanzania this ratio is 1: 1400, in Kenya and Burundi - 1: 5000.
It is believed that this disease is caused by a genetic defect leading to the absence (or blockage) of the enzyme tyrosinase, which is necessary for the normal synthesis of melanin, a special substance on which tissue color depends. In addition, scientists argue that an albino child can be born only when both parents have the gene for this abnormality.
In Tanzania and other East African countries, albinos are outcasts and are forced to marry only among themselves. This could be considered the main reason for the high proportion of albinos among the local population, because in such families usually little white children appear.
However, they are often born in families where there has not been a single albino in the whole chain of generations. So science shrugs its shoulders in powerlessness to explain the reason for such a high percentage of albinism in these territories.
Africa is a living hell for albinos. The burning rays of the tropical sun are destructive for them. Their skin and eyes are especially susceptible to ultraviolet radiation, practically not protected from it, and therefore, by the age of 16-18, albinos lose their eyesight by 60-80%, and by the age of 30 with a probability of 60% they will develop skin cancer. 90% of these people do not live to be 50. And in addition to all the misfortunes, a real hunt has been declared for them.
Crime and Punishment
Why did their white-skinned brethren not please black Africans? Not knowing the true nature of this genetic abnormality, the locals, most of whom cannot read or write, explain the appearance of an albino child with a generic curse, damage or God's punishment for the sins of their parents.
For example, the natives believe that only an evil spirit can be the father of such a child. One of the albinos says so:
- I'm not from the human world. I am part of the spirit world.
According to another version prevailing in African society, albinos are born because their parents had sex during the period when the woman was menstruating, or during the full moon, or it happened in broad daylight, which is strictly prohibited by local rules.
And therefore, some village sorcerers, who still enjoy great authority among the population, consider albinos cursed, carrying the evil of the other world, and therefore subject to destruction. Others, on the contrary, argue that the flesh of albinos is healing, there is something in their blood and hair that brings wealth, power and happiness.
And therefore, healers and sorcerers pay big money to albino hunters. They know that if you sell the victim's body in parts - tongue, eyes, limbs, etc. - you can earn up to 100 thousand dollars. This is the average Tanzanian's earnings in 25-50 years. Therefore, it is not surprising that the "colorless" are ruthlessly exterminated.
Since 2006, about a hundred albinos have died in Tanzania. They were killed, dismembered and sold to sorcerers.
Until recently, hunting albinos was almost not punished - the system of mutual guarantee led to the fact that the community basically declared them “missing”. This created a sense of impunity in the hunters, and they behaved like real bloodthirsty savages.
So, in Burundi, they broke into the clay hut of the widow Genorose Nizigiyiman. The hunters grabbed her six-year-old son and dragged him out into the street.
Right in the yard, having shot the boy, the hunters skinned him in front of his mother, who was struggling in hysterics. Taking away the "most valuable": tongue, penis, arms and legs, the bandits threw the disfigured corpse of a child and disappeared. None of the local residents helped the mother, as almost everyone considered her cursed.
Sometimes the killing of the victim occurs with the consent of the relatives. So, Salma, the mother of a seven-year-old girl, was ordered by the family to dress her daughter in black and leave her alone in the hut. The woman, suspecting nothing, did as ordered. But I decided to hide and see what happens next.
Several hours later, unknown men entered the hut. With the help of a machete, they cut off the girl's legs. Then they cut her throat, drained the blood into a vessel and drank.
The list of such atrocities is very long. But the Western public, outraged by the brutal practices in Tanzania, forced the local authorities to take up the search and punishment of cannibals.
In 2009, the first trial of albino killers took place in Tanzania. Three men killed a 14-year-old teenager and hacked him to pieces to sell to sorcerers. The court sentenced the villains to death by hanging.
Eduardo, whose crime was described at the beginning of this article, was subjected to the same punishment. His accomplices were sentenced to life imprisonment.
After several such ships, hunters became more inventive. They stopped killing albinos, but only cripple them by cutting off their limbs. Now, even if the criminals are caught, they will be able to escape the death penalty, and will receive only 5-8 years for grievous bodily harm. Over the past three years, almost a hundred albinos have had their arms or legs cut off, three have died as a result of such "operations."
The African Fund for Albinos, funded by Europeans, the Red Cross Society and other Western public organizations are trying to provide all possible assistance to these unfortunate people. They are placed in special boarding schools, they are given medicines, sunscreens, dark glasses …
In these establishments, behind high walls and heavily guarded, "colorless" are isolated from the dangers of the outside world. But in Tanzania alone, there are about 370,000 albinos. You can't hide everyone in the boarding schools.
Nikolay VALENTINOV, magazine "Secrets of the XX century" No. 13, 2017