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Gender Forum Ruth Butaumocho
For the past few weeks, Zimbabweans across the social divide have been mesmerised by the story of two women currently in custody after being arrested as ‘‘witches’’ in Harare’s high density suburb of Budiriro.
The two later confessed in court that they were merely play-acting after being promised a Nissan Navara by a self-styled prophet, who wanted people to believe his ‘‘powers’’ had caused the  ‘‘witching’’ pair to crash-land at his shrine naked.
According to the two, they initially lied about their true identities after the self-styled prophet promised to pay them back once he becomes a high flyer soothsayer boasting of a huge clientele portfolio.

Seeing the picture of the two for the first time – and like any other reader, confronted with such a shocking revelation, I was equally shocked that our society still believe that people can still turn to voodoo for development when other nations have gone beyond launching space ships and other highly innovative gadgets.

But as the story unfolded after the two had revealed that it was an act, my shock turned to outrage. I was outraged by the revelation of the women and also at the role played by the media in publicising the pictures of the two while leaving out the picture of the self-styled prophet who masterminded the charade.

One doesn’t need to be a rocket scientist to explain that media houses found it easier to use pictures of the two women and ignore that of the self-styled prophet premised on the notion that people wanted to see the pictures of the two women.

This is so because women are inherently evil and witchcraft world over is associated with women.
That perception is not only held in Zimbabwe alone but is a global phenomenon which can be linked Biblically.
Since time immemorial, myths have been written and rewritten to explain women’s basic nature as inherently evil.

This perception is even most explicit in the Biblical story of Adam and Eve, in which it is said that Eve appeared before Adam, having born from his rib, and she became a subject to him, though the two were informed by different ideologies.

Because of Eve’s surrender to the serpent, it is said that she is responsible for all the evil in the world, that have seen men “sweat for a living” while women endure excruciating pain during child birth.

According to one witch hunters’ guidebook, “the biblical scriptures have much that is evil to say about women, and this is because of the first temptress, Eve and her imitators. From the time of Eve, the serpent became certainly a powerful symbol and was directly responsible for the fall of human kind from grace. In all the pictures and sculptures that I have come across, the serpent has the face of a woman.”
Even in Greek mythology, the blame was placed on Pandora, the beautiful woman who released all evil into the world from a jar.

According to one scholar, Richard Cavendish, Pandora’s name may mean “all giving” and was perhaps originally a title of the Earth of the Goddess.

And all this do support the perpetuating theory of women as evil and capable of doing all sorts.
Zimbabweans are no exception to these theories and now also believe that there are more women than men found with the heresy of witchcraft.

It is even said a woman by nature is quicker to waver in her faith and consequently quicker to abjure the faith, which is the root of witchcraft.

Looking at the Budiriro incident, especially after the two confessed that they were not “witches” media has been perpetuating the archaic and retrogressive perception that women are evil by continuing to publish their pictures in semi-nudity.

Instead of carrying out an investigative piece, well before the two had gone to court, every media house chose to run with the story that the two were witches, whose mission had gone wrong.

Even after the two had indicated that the act was master-minded by the self-styled prophet, no journalist to date has looked for him to get his side of the story and worse still, get his picture.

Does that mean that the media is blind to the role that the self-styled prophet played in targeting women to fulfil his self-aggrandisement while pawning the lives of two hapless women?

The two could have been beaten to death, had the police not intervened to stop the agitated crowd that was baying for their blood.
On the other hand, I also apportion the blame on the two women, who chose to agree to the conman’s trick because they wanted to make a quick buck.

Women would need to do away with the dependency syndrome, desist from engaging in heinous and illegal activities and just work hard for their self-sustenance.

Zimbabwe is coming out of an economic crisis that crippled most services and is in the process of rebuilding.
As a result unemployment is still very high.

However there are other low lying opportunities such as farming, vending, small scale mining and other menial jobs that unemployed women can take up to sustain themselves and their families.

Gone are the days when women would patronise bars from sunset to morning while engaging in prostitution.
They should start looking around for good business opportunities within their communities that they can take up and develop themselves further.

Rather than look for quick returns in such shoddy deals, women need to hold their heads high and engage in other less demeaning activities for the good of our nation.