Gangre, Kenya ? The women of this village call Francise Akacha “the terrorist.” His breath fumes with the local alcoholic brew. Greasy food droppings hang off his mustache and stain his oily pants and torn shirt.

He’s always the first one in line for the village feast, tucking into a buffet carefully prepared by the women of the village like he’s diving into the ocean, no restraint. He’s too skinny and has, the women point out, terrible taste in clothes.

But for all of his undesirable traits, Akacha has a surprisingly desirable job: He’s paid to have sexual relations with the widows and unmarried women of this village. He’s known as “the cleanser,” one of hundreds of thousands of men in rural villages across Africa who sleep with women after their husbands die to dispel what villagers believe are evil spirits.

As tradition holds, they must sleep with the cleanser to be allowed to attend their husbands’ funerals or be inherited by their husbands’ brother or relative, another controversial custom that aid workers said was causing the spread of HIV-AIDS. Unmarried women who lose a parent or child must also sleep with the ritual cleanser.

The custom has always been unpopular among women. But amid an AIDS pandemic, which has led to the deaths of 19.6 million people in sub-Saharan Africa, it has become more than just a painful ritual. Cleansers are now spreading HIV at explosive rates in such villages as Gangre, where one in every three people is infected.

Areas still practicing the tradition have the highest infection rates, and health workers say the custom must be stopped. It’s a striking example of how HIV-AIDS is forcing Africans to question and change traditions.

“We don’t want it, and we won’t accept it anymore,” said Margaret Auma Odhiambo, as women ululated in agreement in her village, a lush rural farming community about a nine-hour drive northwest of the capital, Nairobi. “I refused it once, and I will keep refusing it.”

Twenty years ago, women — even when they formed social clubs that frequently started projects to sell goods — often could not question customs like cleansing, for fear of being beaten.

The cleanser

Francise Akacha is one of thousands of men in rural villages across Africa called cleansers who sleep with women after their husbands die to dispel what villagers believe are evil spirits. The custom has always been unpopular among women but, amid an AIDS pandemic, it has become more than just a painful ritual.

A cleanser is typically the village drunkard or someone considered not very bright. The job is seen as low class but essential, and is paid in cows, crops and cash. Village elders say the custom must be carried out or the entire community will be cursed with bad crops.

Odhiambo, a friendly woman with curly black hair and shiny black skin, recently stood with her group discussing the issue as the warm smells of a feast of fish, vegetables and maize meal wafted through the village.

As predictable as the rising sun, the cleanser popped by, bottle of local brew in hand.

Odhiambo watched as Akacha served himself some of the food. Then she started talking to him about finding a job.

“How many women have you slept with?” she asked, smiling and trying to prod the information out of him.

“I can’t know,” he sniffed. “I don’t want to know.”

“Do you know your HIV status?” she asked. “That one I don’t want to know,” he said.

“Today, you sleep with this one, the next day another, the next day someone else,” Odhiambo said, sitting next to him and trying to convince him of the danger. “Do you use a condom?”

“Never,” he responded. “They won’t be really cleansed if the condom was there.”

Deadly customs

In Africa, women are six times as likely to contract HIV as men, mostly because of rape and customs like cleansing, in which one man can spread the disease to hundreds of women.

The tradition dates back centuries and is rooted in a belief that a woman is haunted by spirits after her husband dies. She is also thought to be unholy and “disturbed” if she is unmarried and abstains from sex. She must be cleansed, therefore, to attend funerals or remarry.