Roaring ‘demon’ drama at Havana 6

A SHACK at Havana Extension 6 was the centre of attention of a 200-strong crowd on Tuesday, after a woman was allegedly witnessed to have turned into a lion from the chest upwards.

When The Namibian arrived at the scene, no Panthera leo – or anything resembling one – was in sight, but another, equally perplexing spectacle unfolded.The said woman, known as Hendrina Ndemumana, was standing in the entrance of a shack, repeatedly shouting ‘fire, fire, fire’ while pointing to the ground, and then splashing water from a small container at the crowd gathered around her. Outside the shack, another woman, Aili Mushoko, had a Bible in hand and was speaking to Ndemumana in tongues incomprehensible to those around, but which she said were ‘from the Bible’, adding that the ‘demon’ possessing the alleged catwoman would understand.After a lengthy drama of water throwing, screaming and Biblereading that drew reactions of shock, laughter, awe, fear, hysteria, compassion and just plain confusion from the crowd, the City Police arrived at the scene and took Ndemumana to the mental health facility at the Katutura Hospital.But some of the onlookers were adamant that Ndemumana was not ‘crazy’. ‘She’s not crazy, she’s fine. These people are just trying to pray because she has demons in her,’ said one onlooker, who told The Namibian that she too had seen Ndemumona in feline form.According to members of the Havana 6 community, strange things have been happening since the woman arrived in the area recently to stay with her friend.The community members report occurrences such as ‘cuts appearing on people’s arms’, ‘children ending up sleeping outside or far away from where they had been put to sleep’, and ‘a patch of hair suddenly missing’ from someone’s head.Another witness to the spectacle says that Ndemumana is going through ‘spiritual warfare’ and should not be judged harshly as a nutcase.’She’s demon possessed and she just needs reverence. She’s also trying hard to fight the demon that’s in her. That has been her testimony. I’m born again and I know how demons operate. The demon is using her and it doesn’t want her to be redeemed,’ she said.Ndemumana’s friend whom she had been visiting at Havana, and who asked not to be named, agreed that Ndemumana was going through a hard time, and that ‘before she joined the church, had been to see a witchdoctor’. Onlookers opined that this may have been the root of the problem.According to Aili Mushoko, the main witness of Ndemumana’s catty transformation, Ndemumana arrived at her home in another part of Havana in the wee hours of Tuesday morning, claiming she needed someone to talk to but no one wanted to open their doors to her.’Because it was so early, around 04h00, and she felt cold, I started to put on a small fire to make some coffee. As I was firing up the stove, she started turning into a lion from the chest up, with her tongue hanging out and making strange noises. Later, after praying, she turned into a human being again.’Mushoko said Ndemumana had told her that she’d been sent to kill her, but because Mushoko’s faith was so strong, she couldn’t hurt her.Mushoko told The Namibian that when Ndemumana started to take the form of a lion ‘I was not scared at all. I just started praying, because if I’d started running, it would have given her strength to chase and eat me.’Asked whether she felt her praying and speaking in tongues had cast the demon from Ndemumana, Mushoko responded: ‘I don’t have the power. Only God has the power. I believe that when I prayed the demon came out of her, but her spirit can only return to normal if she opens her heart to God.’According to Ndemumana’s daughter, her mother has been battling the demon – which they believe to have been cast on her by an elderly relative – for a long time. She said things of this nature had happened before, though she had never seen her mother take on animal form, as claimed by several members of the Havana 6 community.nangula@namibian.com.na