Thursday, July 24, 2025

March 1, 2011

Petition Against Thieving Tokoloshes Submitted

A traditional healer is currently being accused of murder in Pietermaritzburg. But the local community alleges that he is about to employ the services of tokoloshes to tamper with or steal his court dockets.

An artist’s sketch of the mysterious creature known as the tokoloshe

Mduduzi Manqele, described as a “wealthy” traditional healer is currently awaiting trial in Pietermaritzburg. He told a guy that if said guy put his girlfriend’s head in a freezer he would become rich. No, that’s not why he is in jail. He is in jail because they actually did this. FYI, they also found a snake in the freezer.

Wow.

The community, understandably, was rather upset about the incident and set fire to his house and tuckshop. Yes, Manqele the traditional healer also owned a tuckshop. Even after this, the community felt more action was needed and a group of them traveled 45km yesterday to hand over a petition to the Pietermaritzburg Magistrate’s Court. The petition alleged that Manqele is “well-known for keeping tokoloshes which collect dockets from court”.

The only known picture taken of an infamous tokoloshe

Most of the comments underneath the piece are lame, but these three piqued my interest:

  • “Do these tokoloshes have blue uniforms and accept payment?”
  • “We need to exclude ALL stone age thinking persons from public service employment.”
  • “These tokoloshes have been stealing money in government too”

[Source: News24]