White magic practitioner summoned after possibly cursed coconut found in the Maldives

Police summoned a white magic practitioner to evaluate a young coconut believed to have been cursed by a black magic spell, after it was found near the Guraidhoo Island presidential election polling station in Kaafu Atoll. Police said they took the coconut into their possession at around 7:05am on Tuesday after receiving a report that the suspicious ‘kihah’ (immature coconut) was located near the Guraidhoo Island School – the island’s polling station for the September 7 presidential election.

The coconut was discovered near the school where the polling station is to be set up, Island Council Vice President Abdul Latheef Ahmed said. “The police brought a ‘ruqyah’ practitioner (white magician) to examine the coconut, who said it was a fake,” a police source said. “Because it’s a fake the police are not worried,” the source added. No arrests have been made in the case.

“The four-inch coconut had a Sura [Qur'anic verse] written in Arabic and was lying on the ground near the school, easy for the public to see,” said a source from Guraidhoo with knowledge of the incident. “When school students saw the coconut they called the principal, who then contacted the police,” he continued. “It was not really ‘fanditha’ (black magic) on the coconut. If it was fanditha, there would have been Arabic letters and numbers written, not a Sura,” he explained.

“It seems like it was a joke, just a prank, so that people will become aware, learn the moral, and not do it again,” he noted, suggesting the coconut was a lesson for islanders not to practice black magic in an attempt to influence voting, and that the polling area would be closely monitored to prevent such activities from occurring. “Now the police and school officials are more aware and police are patrolling the school at night, so magicians can’t practice real black magic at the school,” said the Guraidhoo source. On Wednesday a second possibly cursed coconut was found. Currently nine police are stationed on Guraidhoo for the upcoming election. Normally only five officers are present.