Roberto Calderoli with 6 foot snake found in his home

An Italian politician is convinced that he's been cursed by the father of a woman he once publicly disparaged and is threatening to call the Pope directly to demand an exorcism to be free of the hex.

The Telegraph is reporting on the case of Roberto Calderoli, a former ministry official who caused an uproar last year after saying that Italy's first black minister, Cecile Kyenge, reminded him of an orangutan. He eventually apologized but is now claiming that a series of mishaps proves that the Congolese woman's father put a curse on him.

These suspicions stem from a ceremony attended by Miss Kyenge's father, Clement Kikoko Kyenge in his village in the Republic of Congo when a picture of Calderoli was placed on an altar and a prayer was said asking God to free him from the kind of evil thoughts that prompted him to speak so unkindly about his daughter. The photo was then placed on an altar dedicated to the ancestors of the village where the same request was made.

Since that time, Calderoli says he has suffered a series of misfortunes including six surgeries, the death of his mother, two broken fingers, and two broken vertebrae. To top it off, he tweeted a photo of himself holing a six foot-long snake he caught and killed at his home in Italy.

In addition, he recently told the Italian magazine, Oggi, that a good luck charm he received from friends in Naples mysteriously broke in half a day after he received it. Calderoli also claims that a mystic told him that had "a tremendous force" around him.

"I don't know if I should put an advert in the paper or call (Pope Francis) directly," Calderoli recently tweeted, "but I must absolutely find an exorcist."

Mr. Kyenge says he never put a curse on Calderoli.

"We are Christians like him, we have forgiven him and our prayer was only meant to encourage him to make statements befitting his role," he told the Telegraph.

If Calderoli was sincere in his apology to his daughter, there is nothing to worry about; however, if he's not sincere, "the ancestors may become nervous," Kyenge said.

Calderoli might seem like an hysteric, but curses are actually much more common that people think.

The word "curse" is a generic term commonly defined as "harming others through demonic intervention" according to Rome's exorcist, Fr. Gabriele Amorth.

Generally speaking, curses come in four different forms:

1. Black magic, witchcraft, satanic rites that culminate in black masses - this involves placing a curse on someone through some kind of magic formula (spell) or ritual, by invoking demons

2.  Curses - curses invoke evil and are particularly powerful if there is a blood relationship between the one who casts them and the accursed.

3. The evil eye - this is a spell cast by someone who looks at you with the intent to do you harm with the intervention of demons. It's the equivalent of deliberately calling demons upon a particular person.

4.  The spell - also known as malefice or hex is the most common means to achieve evil. The name malefice in Latin means "to do evil". It usually involves making some kind of object or potion and then offering it to Satan to be imprinted with his evil power.

As for Miss Kyenge, who is an Italian citizen and a European minister of parliament (MP), she scoffs at the idea of a curse.

"I ask myself what religion Mr. Calderoli practices," she said. "I am Catholic and therefore do not believe in many other practices and rites and I don't agree with his statements, which I consider irreligious."