The Satanic panic is a moral panic about alleged widespread Satanic ritual abuse which originated around the 1980s in the United States, peaking in the early 1990s, before waning as a result of the scepticism of academics and law enforcement agencies who ultimately debunked the claims. The phenomenon spread from the United States to other countries, including South Africa, where it is still evident periodically. South Africa was particularly associated with the Satanic panic because of the creation of the Occult Related Crimes Unit in 1992, described as the "world's only 'ritual murder' task force". According to anthropologist Annika Teppo, this was linked with powerful conservative Christian forces within the then-dominant white community in the last years of apartheid. Christian belief is a prerequisite to serve in the unit. The concern with the alleged presence of Satanism and occult practices has continued into the post-apartheid era.
The local context The long-term focus in a South African context has not been on claims of child abuse by Satanic cults and the psychiatric community has not played a significant role, as was the case in other countries. The local phenomenon is characterised by Christian evangelism and the scapegoating of Satanism for crime and societal problems. In his 1997 PhD thesis, psychologist Gavin Ivey attributes the local phenomenon to an increase in Christian fundamentalism coupled with a perceived Satanic threat in the social context of the contemporary occult revival:
Ivey states "All monotheistic religions are forced to account for the presence of evil in a world where everything is created by God, who in theory should be able to vanquish all forms of evil but seems incapable to do so." He compares the importance of Satan in the only two contemporary major religions with a personified principle of evil in opposition to a single omnipotent deity who is unambiguously good, namely Satan in Christianity, whose identity evolved in the New Testament, and Satan in Islam. He notes the greater significance of Satan in Christianity, as Satan emerged as a less threatening figure in Islam and "Because it embraces a fundamental dualism, the Christian spiritual world is seen as a battleground between God and the personification of evil, the Devil." However, members of the relatively small Muslim community in South Africa have also been outspoken about the alleged dangers of Satanism.
In her 2012 MA thesis, Danielle Dunbar argues that while influenced by the international Satanism scare, past periods of Satanic panic in South Africa reflected localised periods of political upheaval and social anxiety. While in the past Dunbar and other academics have associated the South African phenomenon with the white population group in particular, some more specifically with Calvinist Afrikaners, the racial divide is disappearing. According to American sociologist Jeffrey Victor, With reference to this quote, academic Nicky Falkof states in a South African context "alongside this, the figure of the Satanist provides an object for the displacement of anxiety and the concurrent cohesion of nationalistic sentiment."
Apart from religious groups, the media and the government have aggravated the local phenomenon. In 2007 Afrikaans-language newspaper Rapport dismissed journalist Deon Maas, who had advocated religious tolerance in his new column, to protect its commercial interests. According to Nicky Falkof, the English and Afrikaans media have not differed materially in their treatment of the subject: "The paranoia, sensationalism or occasional scepticism with which stories were reported generally had more to do with the class or locality of the audience than with their language group." The mainstream media in general persists in sensationalistic reporting regarding Satanism and the occult, especially regarding criminal cases with any suggestion of Satanic involvement.
The phenomenon is also evident in South Africa's neighbouring countries. In March 2013, Zimbabwe's national police spokesperson Charity Charamba said media reports about Satanic incidents were unfounded and were causing unnecessary panic.
The role of the government The Satanic Bible authored by Anton LaVey and published in the United States in 1969, which contains the main principles of atheistic LaVeyan Satanism, was banned during apartheid in South Africa from 1973 to 1993 for moral reasons. In 1974 South Africa's then Minister of Justice, Jimmy Kruger, reported widespread media coverage of a vast secret network of Satanists in the country was based on books published on the subject and not actual Satanic events. The government also disputed claims of widespread Satanism in a 1978 Dutch Reformed Church report. However, elements within the South African government continue to play a role in propagating the panic despite the constitutional right to religious freedom in post-apartheid South Africa.
SAPS Occult Related Crimes Unit The SAPS Occult Related Crimes Unit was established in 1992 during the final years of apartheid by born-again Christian Kobus Jonker, prompted by former Minister of Law and Order Adriaan Vlok. Jonker joined the SAP in 1969 and was previously head of the Port Elizabeth Murder and Robbery Unit. During his policing career he earned the nicknames "Donker Jonker", "The Hound of God" and "God's Detective".The South African Police (SAP) was renamed the South African Police Service (SAPS) in post-apartheid South Africa.The Afrikaans word donker means "dark".
As late as 2006 SAPS defined occult-related crime on the Occult Related page of their website as follows:
According to Ivey, the special crime unit was formed "to investigate and prosecute Satanic crime". Theodore Petrus, Senior Lecturer in Anthropology at Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University, states the main focus of the unit is Satanism in his 2009 doctoral thesis on crime related to "witchcraft" in a traditional African context. SAPS has been criticised for neglecting the more serious criminal problems of witch-hunts and medicine murders.The colonial term witchcraft used by Petrus in a traditional African context has strong negative connotations and relates to a belief in harmful magic. Danielle Dunbar refers to the SAPS definition of occult-related crime in her 2012 MA thesis:
Ivey notes that everything occult is considered evil from a fundamentalist Christian perspective, and "the term Satanism is commonly understood in Christian societies to include a wide range of unconventional or occult beliefs and activities". The SAPS website also listed 41 "warning signs of possible destructive occult-related discourse", including "gender confusion", playing fantasy games which lack boundaries, an interest in computers, an excessive interest in horror movies and heavy metal music, depression and various stereotypical elements of Gothic fashion. Dale Wallace, Honorary Senior Lecturer in Religion Studies at the University of KwaZulu-Natal, comments on this thinking in her 2006 doctoral thesis:
Anthropologist Annika Teppo writes about the unit and a research informant's experience with the unit in an academic publication published in 2009:
While SAPS removed the Occult Related page from their website in 2006 after the South African Pagan Rights Alliance requested the removal of discriminatory material, its content is still available via the official SAPS community magazine SERVAMUS. An article titled Breaking the Circle in a SERVAMUS Special Community Edition Drugs and Occult-Related Crime: The Facts, The Answers published in 2000 lists "Animosity towards Christianity, the church and Jesus Christ" as one of many warning signs of Satanic involvement. This SERVAMUS Special Community Edition was still being sold in May 2013. In an article written by Jonker and published in SERVAMUS, he says there are three Satanic movements (Brotherhood of Ram, Order of Darkness and Sons of Satan) and four types of Satanist (generational Satanists, organised Satanists i.e. LaVeyan Satanists, self-styled Satanists and dabblers) in South Africa. He also authored and co-authored several books on Satanism during his policing career which Dunbar describes as alarmist anti-Satanist literature, including Youth and Satanism Exposed (1990), Satanism Exposed (1992) and Satanism in South Africa (2000). Wallace notes the conflation of Paganism and Satanism in this literature, despite disclaimers to the contrary, and Jonker's failure "to distinguish between actual Satanic activity and purely criminal acts" in the media:
Christianity is a prerequisite to serve in the unit. An article titled Warriors against Evil, first published in the November 1998 issue of SERVAMUS and later published in the 2000 SERVAMUS Special Community Edition, states: The article also lists "Deliverance through pastoral guidance" within the scope of the unit. Jonker elaborated on this in an interview with Sarah Duguid: "The ordinary guy cannot investigate occult crimes. There are things you see and experiences you have as a result of the supernatural. You must be strong in faith to be in the occult unit." He believes Satan is a literal being. In the April 1997 issue of SERVAMUS, he writes "I believe the devil exists because I have seen things happen. I have seen a woman being attacked right in my presence by a demonic being".
Some senior SAPS officers have attempted to have the unit disbanded. An internal SAPS document dated October 1998 expressed concern about the policing of religious activities due to "constitutional restraints", and Jonker's public addresses on the dangers of Satanism to schoolchildren, community policing forums and church seminars at the state's expense were curtailed.
Jonker left the police force after suffering a heart attack in 2000 and subsequently practised as a pastoral counsellor. He has been a director of the Act-Up Support Christian prayer ministry since 2002 and has worked as a consultant for the SAPS Detective Academy in Hammanskraal since his retirement. Other former members of the unit became involved in Christian deliverance ministry and therapy, including former Eastern Cape coordinator of the unit James Lottering (Warfare Ministries in Port Elizabeth) and former Free State coordinator of the unit Johan de Beer (Auksano Trauma Therapy Centre in Bloemfontein). Lottering left SAPS at the end of 1997. De Beer founded Auksano in 1998 while working for SAPS and resigned from SAPS in 2002. FH Havinga, a specialist reservist for the unit, is also a Christian pastoral counsellor and founder of the ASERAC centre for trauma victims of drug, occult, alcohol and sexual abuse in Kempton Park.
Attie Lamprecht was appointed head of the unit in 2000. He is also a registered counsellor and as late as 2010 was listed as a member of Act-Up Support's advisory board. Lamprecht has stated that, unlike Satanism in other countries which is predominantly about self-worship, "Satanism in South Africa is characteristically against Jesus Christ. Therefore, it is against all that is good." He believes Satanism is "a belief system that leads to crime", stating "It starts with white magic. It goes to gateway religious systems and then to destructive religions." Official statements that the unit had been disbanded were dismissed by Lamprecht, who in 2006 said the unit had been absorbed into other units, and later said it had been removed from the public eye and renamed the SAPS Harmful Religious Practices Unit.
Psychologist Gavin Ivey said the unit is "a waste of taxpayers' money", and psychoanalyst Véronique Faure states: