23 Sep 2009 |
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Say you’re one of them is a collection of short stories written by Uwem Akpan, It won this year’s commonwealth prize for first books and has also been selected by Oprah winfrey for her book club. When I first saw the title, I thought it had got to be about child witches, particularly as Akpan is from Akwa Ibom state. It is not, it is about child abuse in different forms and in different parts of the continent. But I haven’t stopped thinking about the title, and in my head insisting that the book should have been about child witches, it is a perfect title, a perfect description of these horrendous act committed on children. Say you’re a child witch, this is what the pastors ask the children to say, they are forced to admit that they are witches or face dire consequences. And so children that they are, trusting that adults can only mean well, admit that they are witches so that they may be freed, but instead they are thrown into the lake of fire. Child witches were first given a voice by steppingstones Nigeria, through a documentary, saving Africa’s witch children’. Further research showed that some men masquerading as pastors were taking advantage of the ignorance and poverty of some parents mostly in Eket and Oron in Akwa Ibom State. These pastors often require a certain amount of money to deliver these children. The amount can range from NGN20,000 to NGN250,000. In a predominantly civil service state, this money is hard to come by forcing parents to abandon their children in fear of the havoc an undelivered child may cause in the home. The abandoned ones may actually be the luckier ones as the ones who can afford to be delivered are taken through an atrocious routine of beatings, starvation etc. The parents pay money for their children to be tortured. Pathetic! On the part of the pastors it is sheer greed mixed with a criminal mind. It is business, pure and simple. A means to make money. Deliver your children and you will be free. All your problems will end. On the part of the parents, it is ignorance, foolishness, poverty. There is a high level of illiteracy and poverty in Akwa Ibom state, the people are desperate for something, anything and so these men have provided them with the solution. We have always believed in witches in Akwa Ibom state, probably more than any other part of Nigeria, if you have an accident, it’s witchcraft, even if the driver was drunk, and if you die during childbirth, it’s witchcraft too, never mind that there was no medical aid available. And so it’s easy for the ‘pastors’ to take advantage of an already polluted mind. Unfortunately, the situation hasn’t generated as much coverage with the mass media as one would have thought. It was initially reported but as with all things Nigerian, it has died an unnatural death. Sadly though, only the coverage seems to have died as each day, there are reports of more and more abandoned children. Gary Foxcroft, a BRITON is determined to fight the cause to a standstill. It breaks his heart he says, to hear about these children. Steppingstones and CRARN have established a home in Eket, where these children are catered for. Where are the Nigerians? Where is Senator Eme Ufot Ekaette when we actually need her? Where is Dora Akunyili? Where is the government? One would have thought that following the Steppingstones documentary on this barbaric act, there would have been a public outcry from across the nation but instead there is an uncanny silence. Coming at a time when Nigeria is rebranding, this situation is very embarrassing for Nigerians both home and in the Diaspora. To name children witches and proceed to torture them is very unbecoming of a good people and a great nation. Let’s join hands together and stop this madness now.
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