The sangoma sessions — on WhatsApp
● Traditional healer Elliot Ndlovu was given specific instructions by the ancestors when he received his training — make traditional medicine modern and accessible.
Then he heeded another call — that he should use modern technology to consult clients.
Now, in between his personal consultations, the sangoma, herbalist and ethnobotanist consults with clients over Skype.
He is among a growing number of traditional healers who are using technology including WhatsApp, e-mail, cellphones and laptops to consult.
“I am a modern healer and it makes me happy that most of my clients are Western because my ancestors wanted me to make the traditional healing more accessible and more modern,” he said.
Zukiswa Mvoko, traditional healer and a member of the African National Healers Association (ANHA), consults from her home in Midrand, but is also embracing the use of phones, e-mails and WhatsApp with clients who cannot visit her in person.
But just not Skype, she says, as her ancestors do not come to her through the video chat app.
“It depends on your ancestors. For me I can’t connect over Skype. I can connect with people writing letters, it’s the old methods but in the modern age.”
The use of technology allows Mvoko to consult with patients as far away as Canada and Australia.
“My name is registered with [ANHA] so clients can find me online. Some people say you aren’t the real makoya if you use modern technology to communicate, but my gift is my passion and that’s what’s important to me.
“When I consult with a person I give them my time completely, there are no queues. I need to make sure they are comfortable.”
Mvoko said society was plagued by a misalignment between modern religious beliefs and traditional beliefs. It causes imbalances. “My job is to clear the negative energies or aura.”
It is not only through technology that the face of traditional healing is changing.
Like many modern healers, Vella Maseko wears different skins. She works as both a clinical psychologist and a sangoma.
“I can be clinical with my patients, but every issue impacts us spiritually. Our issues make us question the existential issues we face and being a traditional healer makes my job as a psychologist easier.
“When I am seeing a patient in practice [as a psychologist] and something comes up [the spiritual world contacts the patient via the sangoma] I always get a person’s permission to do a reading. It would be unethical for me to divulge something without a patient’s permission — that’s the same in psychology and traditional medicine."
Maseko graduated as a sangoma at the same time as she graduated from Wits in 2005.
Traditional healer Mthandazo Khumalo, who trains healers for the Traditional Healers Organisation, said he still believed the best way to consult was face to face.