Albinos in Tanzania

I recently mentioned that I briefly worked with two albino girls at the orphanage in Dar and I was told that these two girls were excelling in school because they were sent to a next door private school. This was to protect them from being kidnapped and sold to local medicine men. I know I have heard about this before so I wanted to check this up a little more.

Apparently the belief is that body parts from albinistic people have magical power. This is a superstition which exists in some parts of East Africa and the witch doctors would use the body parts to make potions. This has lead to the persecution, killings and dismembering of albinos. Tanzania have a very large albino community with over 150.000 members, possibly even the largest in Africa and many seek refuge in Dar es Salaam which is deemed safer. In the past 5 years laws have been created to protect the rights of albinos and President Kikwete even had to publicly condemn the acts committed against albinos. Still over 50 murders took place between March 2007- October 2008. Eventually, in 2009, Tanzania saw the first conviction of three men for murdering and mutilating a 14-yr-old albino boy. However, there are still 52 families still waiting for trials to begin.