World Day Against Witch Hunts

August 10 is World day against witch hunts.

During the past five years I have frequently posted on this sad topic. See e.g. the following posts: Witchcraft Persecution and Advocacy without Borders in Africa, earlier this year, as well as the following country-specific postings: DRC, Ivory Coast, Ghana, Kenya, Liberia, Nigeria, Tanzania, Uganda, South Africa, Zimbabwe.

Although not the main focus of this website I find it useful and necessary to draw attention to this phenomenon which is based on superstition, violates human rights and creates many innocent victims – not only elderly women and men but also children, just like ritual murders.

I wish to commend Charlotte Müller and Sertan Sanderson of DW (Deutsche Welle) – see below – for an excellent article on this topic. It’s an impressive account of what happens to people accused of witchcraft and victims sof superstition.
(FVDK)

World Day Against Witch Hunts: People With Dementia Are Not Witches

Witch camps in Ghana

Published: August 4, 2023
By: The Ghana Report

August 10 has been designated World Day against Witch Hunts. The Advocacy for Alleged Witches welcomes this development and urges countries to mark this important day, and try to highlight past and contemporary sufferings and abuses of alleged witches in different parts of the globe.

Witchcraft belief is a silent killer of persons. Witchcraft accusation is a form of death sentence in many places. People suspected of witchcraft, especially women and children, are banished, persecuted, and murdered in over 40 countries across the globe. Unfortunately, this tragic incident has not been given the attention it deserves.

Considered a thing of the past in Western countries, this vicious phenomenon has been minimized. Witch persecution is not treated with urgency. It is not considered a global priority. Meanwhile, witch hunting rages across Africa, Asia, and Oceania.

The misconceptions that characterized witch hunting in early modern Europe have not disappeared. Witchcraft imaginaries and other superstitions still grip the minds of people with force and ferocity. Reinforced by traditional, Christian, Islamic, and Hindu religious dogmas, occult fears and anxieties are widespread.

Many people make sense of death, illness, and other misfortunes using the narratives of witchcraft and malevolent magic. Witch hunters operate with impunity in many countries, including nations with criminal provisions against witchcraft accusations and jungle justice.

Some of the people who are often accused and targeted as witches are elderly persons, especially those with dementia.

To help draw attention to this problem, the Advocacy for Alleged Witches has chosen to focus on dementia for this year’s World Day against Witch Hunts. People with dementia experience memory loss, poor judgment, and confusion.

Their thinking and problem-solving abilities are impaired. Unfortunately, these health issues are misunderstood and misinterpreted. Hence, some people treat those with dementia with fear, not respect. They spiritualize these health conditions, and associate them with witchcraft and demons.

There have been instances where people with dementia left their homes or care centers, and were unable to return or recall their home addresses. People claimed that they were returning from witchcraft meetings; that they crash landed on their way to their occult gatherings while flying over churches or electric poles.

Imagine that! People forge absurd and incomprehensible narratives to justify the abuse of people with dementia. Sometimes, people claim that those suffering dementia turn into cats, birds, or dogs. As a result of these misconceptions, people maltreat persons with dementia without mercy; they attack, beat, and lynch them. Family members abandon them and make them suffer painful and miserable deaths. AfAW urges the public to stop these abuses, and treat people with dementia with care and compassion.

Source: World Day Against Witch Hunts: People With Dementia Are Not Witches

And:

Witch hunts: A global problem in the 21st century

Accusations of witchcraft typically affect the most vulnerable — such as this refugee living in the DRC
Image: Getty Images/AFP/F. Scoppa

Published: August 10, 2023
By: Charlotte Müller | Sertan Sanderson – DW

Witch hunts are far from being a thing of the past — even in the 21st century. In many countries, this is still a sad reality for many women today. That is why August 10 has been declared a World Day against Witch Hunts.

Akua Denteh was beaten to death in Ghana’s East Gonja District last month — after being accused of being a witch. The murder of the 90-year-old has once more highlighted the deep-seated prejudices against women accused of practicing witchcraft in Ghana, many of whom are elderly.

An arrest was made in early August, but the issue continues to draw attention after authorities were accused of dragging their heels in the case. Human rights and gender activists now demand to see change in culture in a country where supernatural beliefs play a big role.

But the case of Akua Denteh is far from an isolated instance in Ghana, or indeed the world at large. In many countries of the world, women are still accused of practicing witchcraft each year. They are persecuted and even killed in organized witch hunts — especially in Africa but also in Southeast Asia and Latin America.

Many women in Ghana are pushed to live in so-called witch camps because they are rejected by society Image: picture-alliance/Pacific Press/L. Wateridge

Witch hunts: a contemporary issue

Those accused of witchcraft have now found a perhaps unlikely charity ally in their fight for justice: the Catholic missionary society missio, which is part of the global Pontifical Mission Societies under the jurisdiction of the Pope, has declared August 10 as World Day against Witch Hunts, saying that in at least 36 nations around the world, people continue to be persecuted as witches.

While the Catholic Church encouraged witch hunts in Europe from the 15th to the 18th century, it is now trying to shed light into this dark practice. Part of this might be a sense of historical obligation — but the real driving force is the number of victims that witch hunts still cost today. 

Historian Wolfgang Behringer, who works as a professor specializing in the early modern age at Saarland University, firmly believes in putting the numbers in perspective. He told DW that during these three centuries, between 50,000 and 60,000 people are assumed to have been killed for so-called crimes of witchcraft — a tally that is close to being twice the population of some major German cities at the time.

But he says that in the 20th century alone, more people accused of witchcraft were brutally murdered than during the three centuries when witch hunts were practiced in Europe: “Between 1960 and 2000, about 40,000 people alleged of practicing witchcraft were murdered in Tanzania alone. While there are no laws against witchcraft as such in Tanzanian law, village tribunals often decide that certain individuals should be killed,” Behringer told DW.

The historian insists that due to the collective decision-making behind these tribunals, such murders are far from being arbitrary and isolated cases: “I’ve therefore concluded that witch hunts are not a historic problem but a burning issue that still exists in the present.”

A picture of so-called witch doctors in Sierra Leone taken roughly around the year 1900 Image:
Getty Images/Hulton Archive

A pan-African problem?

In Tanzania, the victims of these witch hunts are often people with albinism; some people believe that the body parts of these individuals can be used to extract potions against all sorts of ailments. Similar practices are known to take place in Zambia and elsewhere on the continent.

Meanwhile in Ghana, where nonagenarian Akua Denteh was bludgeoned to death last month, certain communities blamed the birth of children with disabilities on practices of witchcraft.

Screenshot – to watch the video please consult the source

In the Democratic Republic of the Congo, it is usually the younger generations who are associated witchcraft. So-called “children of witchcraft” are usually rejected by their families and left to fend for themselves. However, their so-called crimes often have little to do with sorcery at all:

“We have learned of numerous cases of children suffering rape and then no longer being accepted by their families. Or they are born as illegitimate children out of wedlock, and are forced to live with a parent who no longer accepts them,” says Thérèse Mema Mapenzi, who works as a mission project partner in the eastern DRC city of Bukayu.

‘Children of witchcraft’ in the DRC

Mapenzi’s facility was initially intended to be a women’s shelter to harbor women who suffered rape at the hands of the militia in the eastern parts of the country, where rape is used as a weapon of war as part of the civil conflict there. But over the years, more and more children started seeking her help after they were rejected as “children of witchcraft.”

With assistance from the Catholic missionary society missio, Mapenzi is now also supporting these underage individuals in coping with their many traumas while trying to find orphanages and schools for them.

“When these children come here, they have often been beaten to a pulp, have been branded as witches or have suffered other injuries. It is painful to just even look at them. We are always shocked to see these children devoid of any protection. How can this be?” Mapenzi wonders.

Thérèse Mema Mapenzi is trying to help women and girls accused of being “children of witchcraft”
Image: missio

Seeking dialogue to end witch hunts

But there is a whole social infrastructure fueling this hatred against these young people in the DRC: Many charismatic churches blame diseases such as HIV/AIDS or female infertility on witchcraft, with illegitimate children serving as scapegoats for problems that cannot be easily solved in one of the poorest countries on earth. Other reasons cited include sudden deaths, crop failures, greed, jealousy and more.

Thérèse Mema Mapenzi says that trying to help those on the receiving end of this ire is a difficult task, especially in the absence of legal protection: “In Congolese law, witchcraft is not recognized as a violation of the law because there is no evidence you can produce. Unfortunately, the people have therefore developed their own legal practices to seek retribution and punish those whom call them witches.”

In addition to helping those escaping persecution, Mapenzi also seeks dialogue with communities to stop prejudice against those accused of witchcraft and sorcery. She wants to bring estranged families torn apart by witch hunts back together. Acting as a mediator, she talks to people, and from time to time succeeds in reuniting relatives with women and children who had been ostracized and shamed. Mapenzi says that such efforts — when they succeed — take an average of two to three years from beginning to finish.

But even with a residual risk of the victims being suspected of witchcraft again, she says her endeavors are worth the risk. She says that the fact that August 10 has been recognized as the World Day against Witch Hunts sends a signal that her work is important — and needed.

Hunting the hunters  a dangerous undertaking

For Thérèse Mema Mapenzi, the World Day against Witch Hunts marks another milestone in her uphill battle in the DRC. Jörg Nowak, spokesman for missio, agrees and hopes that there will now be growing awareness about this issue around the globe.

As part of his work, Nowak has visited several missio project partners fighting to help bring an end to witch hunts in recent years. But he wasn’t aware about the magnitude of the problem himself until 2017.

The first case he dealt with was the killing of women accused of being witches in Papua New Guinea in the 2010s — which eventually resulted in his publishing a paper on the crisis situation in the country and becoming missio’s dedicated expert on witch hunts.

But much of Nowak’s extensive research in Papua New Guinea remains largely under wraps for the time being, at least in the country itself: the evidence he accrued against some of the perpetrators there could risk the lives of missio partners working for him.

Not much has changed for centuries, apart from the localities involved when it comes to the occult belief in witchcraft, says Nowak while stressing: “There is no such thing as witchcraft. But there are accusations and stigmatization designed to demonize people; indeed designed to discredit them in order for others to gain selfish advantages.”

Maxwell Suuk and Isaac Kaledzi contributed to this article.

Screenshot – to watch the seven images please consult the source

Source: Witch hunts: A global problem in the 21st century

Wassa Nkyirifi, Western Region, Ghana: man kills 7-year-old niece for money rituals

Another gruesome murder for ritual purposes, based on superstition and ruthlessness. An innocent small girl lost her life for a ‘money ritual’. This time it happened in Ghana.

It’s a sad story.

Warning: The articles may upset readers for their graphic contents (FVDK)

Wassa Nkyirifi: Man kills 7-year-old niece for money rituals

Wassa Nkyirifi: Man kills 7-year-old niece for money rituals. The suspect in white shirt at the scene where the body was exhumed on Friday morning

Published: August 4, 2023
By: Dotsey Koblah Aklorbortu – Graphic Online

Residents of Wassa Nkyirifi, a farming community in the Western Region woke up on Friday morning to the horror of a suspected murder of a seven-year-old girl by her uncle for money ritual purpose.

After allegedly killing and burying the body in a nearby bush, the suspect, identified only as Augustine, a 37-year-old farmer reported to the police that his niece had gone missing.

The 7-year-old victim has been identified as Sandy Manu.

The suspect then went further to make public announcements on radio asking for help to locate his niece.

The police in the Wassa Amenfi East Municipal area however, suspected foul play because of Augustine’s responses to the questions and why he was desperately concerned about the missing young girl.

Augustine’s body language, his responses and his eventual exhibition that he was terrified according to a police source, prompted an intense interrogation by the police during which he burst into tears.

According to the police source, he then confessed that he had killed the niece for money ritual so he could evade poverty.

He is said to have told the police that, he complained about poverty to one elderly man in the Wassa Nkyirifi community and the elderly man told him to use one of his many nieces for money rituals.

Upon meditation, he went to see a spiritualist the next day to help him go through the process of money rituals.

The suspect said the spiritualist then told him to bring human head – that is the head of one of his nieces.

From there, he went in for Sandy and killed her.

After killing and beheading her, he buried the headless body and concealed the head for the process.

He then led the police to the nearby bush where the headless body was buried and the body was exhumed.

The head was also retrieved from another location.

The body has since been deposited at the morgue and the suspect is currently in police custody.

A video from the scene where the body was exhumed has been shared on social media by some of the community members.

Source: Wassa Nkyirifi: Man kills 7-year-old niece for money rituals

Also:

Man allegedly kills 7-year-old niece for money rituals

Published: August 5 2023
By: Myjoyonline, Ghana

Residents of Wassa Nkyirifi, a farming community in the Western Region, woke up on Friday morning to the horror of a suspected murder of a seven-year-old girl by her uncle.

After allegedly killing and burying the body in a nearby bush, the suspect, identified only as Augustine, a 37-year-old farmer reported to the police that his niece had gone missing.

The suspect then went further to make public announcements on the radio asking for help to locate his niece.

The police in the Wassa Amenfi East Municipal area, however, suspected foul play because of Augustine’s responses to their questions and how he was desperately concerned about the missing young girl.

Augustine’s body language, his responses and his eventual exhibition that he was terrified according to a police source, prompted an intense interrogation during which he burst into tears.

According to the police source, he then confessed that he had killed the niece for money ritual so he could evade poverty.

The seven-year-old victim has been identified as Sandy Manu.

The suspect is said to have told the police that, he complained about poverty to one elderly man in the Wassa Nkyirifi community. The elderly man advised him to use one of his many nieces for money rituals.

Upon meditation, he allegedly went to see a spiritualist the next day to help him go through the process of money rituals.

The suspect said the spiritualist then told him to bring a human head. From there, he went in for Sandy and murdered her.

After killing and beheading her, he reportedly buried the headless body and concealed the head in the process.

The suspect then led the police to the nearby bush where the headless body was buried and the body was exhumed.

The head was also retrieved from another location. The body has since been deposited at the morgue and the suspect is currently in police custody.

Meanwhile, a video from the scene where the body was exhumed has been shared on social media by some of the community members.

Source: Man allegedly kills 7-year-old niece for money rituals

Also:

Man arrested for allegedly killing niece for money rituals
Published: August 10, 2023
By: Ghana Web

Western Region – Ghana (Source: Wikipedia)

Ghana: attempted ritual murder in Accra 

If one could speak of good news when hearing about an attempted ritual murder then the good news comes from Ghana.

Reportedly, a 29-year old man abducted a 5-year old girl with the intention to have her sacrificed in a money ritual, but thanks to an honest herbalist whom he presented the child the death of the innocent victim was prevented.

The incident happened in Accra, last month, and this week the accused stood trial. An Accra Circuit Court sentenced the accused – who denied – to 60 months in jail. A victory for justice. Hail to the herbalist and to judicial system in Ghana! Read the full story below (webmaster FVDK).

Head porter jailed 60 months for attempting to use 5-year old girl for money ritual

Published: May 30, 2023
By: My Joy Online (myjoyonline.com)

An Accra Circuit Court has sentenced a 29-year-old head porter to 60 months imprisonment for presenting a five-year-old girl for money ritual at Pokuase in Accra.

Isaac Gabianu kidnapped the victim at a public toilet in Accra and presented the minor to a herbalist at Pokuase for money ritual. The herbalist, however, sent the victim and the convict to the Police. Charged with child stealing, Gabianu pleaded not guilty.

At the end of the trial, the court presided over by Mrs Christina Cann found him guilty.

The court held that the prosecution at the end of the trial succeeded in proving the offence against Gabianu. It, therefore, handed down a deterrent sentence. In his plea for mitigation, Gabianu, who was self-represented, said: ” I cannot confess what I have not done.”

The prosecution led by Superintendent of Police, Agnes Boafo, narrated that the complainant, Patricia Asamoah, was a trader residing at Mallam, Accra. It said the convict was a head porter residing at CMB, Accra.

On April 3, 2023, at about 7:30 pm, the complainant went to the Charge Office of the Railway Police Station, Accra, to report her missing daughter. The prosecution said the complainant indicated that she had gone to the Kantamanto Market, Accra, with the five-year-old daughter and had asked her to wait for her (complainant) in front of a public toilet while she attended to nature’s call at about 1730 hours.

It said after attending to nature’s call, the complainant could not find her daughter and on April 4, 2023, at about 12:30 am, the Police at Pokuase received information that Gabianu had been arrested over an attempted money ritual and brought to them by a herbalist.

The prosecution said the Police at Pokuase then handed over Gabianu to the Accra Railway Police for further investigations. It said the herbalist indicated that Gabianu had brought the victim to him to be killed for a ” sacrifice for money ritual”.

The prosecution said in Gabianu’s caution statement, he admitted the offence.

Source: Head porter jailed 60 months for attempting to use 5-year old girl for money ritual

Witchcraft Persecution and Advocacy without Borders in Africa

Leo Igwe does not need any introduction. Multiple times I have posted articles on this indefatigable human rights champion. See e.g. my October 25, 2021 posting.

The belief in witchcraft and the weak rule of law in many African countries contribute to mob justice (or ‘jungle justice’ as this popular act is also called) and lynchings of perceived witches. In Kenya e.g., as in many other African countries, mob justice is criminal. Nevertheless, up to five incidents are reported (!) weekly in this East African country. The reader may guess what happens in other African countries… (FVDK).

Witchcraft Persecution and Advocacy without Borders in Africa

Published: March 3, 2023
By: This Day – Nigeria

The Advocacy for Alleged Witches urges Africans to campaign against abuses linked to witchcraft beliefs everywhere. This call follows the rescue of Nigerian nationals, who were accused of witchcraft in Kenya. As reported, the police rescued these Nigerians in Thika Town in Kiambu County. It was stated that an angry mob beat and almost lynched them while they were performing some rituals. These Nigerians claimed that they were conducting some prayers. It was not stated the kind of prayers that they were conducting. The police intervened, resisted the mob, and took these nationals, who sustained some injuries, to a nearby hospital.

The Advocacy for Alleged Witches commends the Kenya police for intervening and rescuing these foreign nationals. As in many parts of Africa, witchcraft accusation is a killer phenomenon, and a death sentence. These foreign nationals were fortunate. Police rescued them. In many instances, the police arrive late, after the damage has been done.

Recently, Kenya recorded incidents of witch persecution and killing. Last week, two elderly women, accused of witchcraft, were lynched in Murang’a County. There is still no information regarding the arrest and prosecution of suspected perpetrators of this heinous crime. In other African countries, such as Ghana, Malawi, Zambia, and Zimbabwe, accusations of witchcraft and witch persecution take place. Alleged witches have been attacked, killed, or banished. However, in most cases, locals are the target. 

People often accuse members of their neighbors, members of their family or community. This incident draws attention to the fact that foreigners are also at risk of being accused. Africans should look beyond their borders in advocating against witchcraft-linked violations. People often demonize strange and unfamiliar prayer and ritual forms. They regard them as evil, as invocations of occult harm. African Christians and Muslims have been indoctrinated to demonize, occultize and witchcraftize religious others, especially traditional religions or any ritual forms that deviate from religion, as they know it.

As this incident has illustrated, those who conduct prayers and rituals that depart from local norms are at risk of being accused of witchcraft and evil magic. Witchcraft accusation is a threat to the lives of Africans everywhere. Africans should not look the other way as alleged witches are attacked and killed in other countries. They should know that everyone is at risk of being accused or killed for witchcraft, whether you are a local or a foreigner. Africans should strive to advocate against witchcraft accusations and witch persecution without borders.


Leo Igwe directs the Advocacy for Alleged Witches

Source: Witchcraft Persecution and Advocacy without Borders in Africa

Related: 9 foreigners escape death in Thika after prayers mistaken for witchcraft
Published: February 28, 2023
By: Nation – Kenya

Ghana: The National Head Pastor of the 7th Day Pentecostal Assemblies calls for effective enforcement of laws on ritual murders

In Ghana, on average at least 16 ritual murders occur each year. Every fortnight, a family mourns the death of a loved one who lost his or her life because of the wickedness, unscrupulousness and the belief in witchcraft of the perpetrator(s) who search power, prestige, wealth or good health by committing a ritual murder.

The National Head Pastor of the 7th Day Pentecostal Church, Elder Enoch Ofori Jr., addressed a large crowd at the end of December (2022), condemning ritualistic practices and calling on the government to apply the rule of law. The meeting was organized by the 7th Day Pentecostal Assemblies and was held in the Ashanti Region (Central Region). In particular, the reverend minister cited the notorious Mankessim ritual murder case which occurred in the Central Region last year. I’ve reported on this ritual murder case on various occasions (see my postings dated September 27, September 30, and October 1, October 2 and October 3).

Elder Enoch Oforu is to be commended for raising his voice against the ugly practice of ritualistic killings in the country. His condemnation is even more important as he spoke at a meeting which was attended by the entire 25 branch churches across the country.
(webmaster FVDK).

Rev Minister calls for effective enforcement of laws on ritual murders

Published: January 3, 2023
By: King Amoah – Modern Ghana

Source: Rev Minister calls for effective enforcement of laws on ritual murders

Countless Centuries of Human Sacrifice

As stated elsewhere on this site, human sacrifices are of all ages and all places. In principle, this site focuses on ritualistic activities including killings and murders on the African continent but without pretending that these cruel and superstitious acts are only happening or being committed by Africans in African countries.

The article presented below amply illustrates the foregoing. It goes without saying that a topic such as ‘human sacrifices in historical perspective’ covers a vast area and cannot be treated in one short and simple article. Nevertheless, I have thought it useful and informative to include the following article on this site.

Warning: some readers may find the following text shocking because of its graphic contents.
(webmaster FVDK).

Countless Centuries of Human Sacrifice

Live Science recently published a list of 25 cultures that employed human sacrifice “from prehistory to the 21st century.”

Published: December 25, 2022
By: James A. Haught – ‘The Good Men Project’

In the history of religion, uncountable centuries of human sacrifice present a gory stunner.

It’s astounding that parents around the world sent their children and unwed daughters to be stabbed, burned, skinned, strangled, beheaded, drowned, crushed, clubbed or otherwise killed to please absurd gods and goddesses now known to be imaginary. Men – especially prisoners of war – also were sacrificed.

Live Science recently published a list of 25 cultures that employed human sacrifice “from prehistory to the 21stcentury.” It included China, the city of Ur (in today’s Iraq), Mound 72 near St. Louis, the Incas of Peru, the Mayas of Mexico, the Philistines of the Mideast, Aztecs of Mexico, ancient Egypt, Stonehenge, medieval Japan, Hawaii, early Romans, ancient Greeks, the Moche tribe of Peru, the Dahomey of Africa, Celts of Europe, Nazca of Peru, Vikings, Carthage, Mongols, hunter-gatherers of early Europe, the Indus Valley, ancient Korea, India, Tanzania.

Encyclopedia Britannica says:

“Sacrifice is not a phenomenon that can be reduced to rational terms; it is fundamentally a religious act that has been of profound significance to individuals and social groups throughout history, a symbolic act that establishes a relationship between man and the sacred order. For many peoples of the world, throughout time, sacrifice has been the very heart of their religious life.”

Here’s a section from my book, Holy Horrors, reprinted with permission from Prometheus Books and Rowman & Littlefield:

Over the centuries, sacrifice had many varieties. In ancient Phoenicia, boys were burned to satisfy Adonis and other gods – and the fall of Carthage was blamed on the faithlessness of nobles who substituted children of slaves for their own on the altars. In ancient Gaul, the Druids allegedly put victims into large wicker figures of men and set them afire. In Tibet, Bon shamans performed ritual killing. In Africa, the Ashanti offered about 100 victims each September to assure a good yam harvest. In Borneo, builders of pile-houses drove the first pile through the body of a maiden to satisfy the earth goddess.

The golden age of sacrifice came with the highly organized theocracies of Central America. After the Mayans amalgamated with fierce neighbor tribes in the 11th century, ritual killings proliferated to appease the plumed serpent Kukulcan (later called Quetzacoatl by the Aztecs) and sundry other gods. Maidens were drowned in sacred wells, and other victims were beheaded, shot with arrows, or had their hearts cut out.

In Peru, pre-Inca tribes killed children in “houses of the moon.” Beginning in the 1200s, the Incas built a complex theocracy dominated by priests who read daily magical signs and offered sacrifices to many gods. At major ceremonies, up to 200 children were burned as offerings. Mothers brought their darlings dressed in finery and flowers to be put to death. Special “chosen women” – comely virgins without blemish – sometimes were removed from their temple duties and strangled. Local rulers sent choice daughters to the capital at Cuzco as chosen women. Later they were sent back to be buried alive.

The ultimate murder religion was that of the Aztecs, which demanded about 20,000 victims per year. The chief deity was the sun, which might disappear, priests warned, without daily sustenance of hearts and blood. Multitudes of victims, mostly prisoners of war, were held on stone altars by clergy who ripped out their hearts with obsidian knives. Flesh from their arms was eaten ritually, and their skulls were preserved on racks holding as many as 10,000 heads. Raids called “wars of the flowers” were conducted to seize plentiful sacrifice candidates.

Priests also killed many Aztecs. Weeping children were sacrificed so that their tears might induce the rain god to water the crops. To please the maize goddess, dancing virgins were seized, decapitated, and skinned – and their skins were worn by priests in continued dancing.

In 1487, when the great Aztec temple in Tenochtitlan was dedicated, eight teams of priests worked four days sacrificing 20,000 prisoners, the entire manpower of three captured tribes….

In the Far East, five different types of human sacrifice were halted by British rulers in the 1800s. One was the yearly meriah by the Khonds of Bengal, who cut a victim into small pieces and buried the fragments in many fields to assure a good harvest. Another was a weekly rite by certain followers of the bloodthirsty Hindu goddess Kali who sacrificed a male child every Friday evening at a shrine in Tanjore, India.

A third was the Hindu code of suttee, which required a widow to leap onto her dead husband’s funeral pyre, willingly or unwillingly. The British banned it in 1829, but it persisted. (When Brahmans of Sind protested that suttee was their holy custom, Governor Charles Napier replied: “My nation also has a custom When men burn women alive, we hang them. Let us all act according to national customs.”)

In Burma, the Buddhist king moved the capital to Mandalay in 1854 and sanctified the new city walls by burying scores of “spotless” men alive in vats under the gates and bastions. In 1861, two of the vats were discovered to be empty – whereupon royal astrologers declared that 500 men, women, boys and girls must be killed and buried at once, or the capital must be abandoned. About 100 actually were buried before British authorities stopped the ceremonies.

The worst holy slaughter halted by the British was the infamous Thuggee strangling in India. For generations, certain secretive followers of Kali, the goddess of destruction, had been ritually dispatching an estimated 20,000 victims a year. The toll since the 1500s was estimated as high as two million. Thug theology held that Brahma the Creator produced lives faster than Shiva the Destroyer could end them, so Shiva’s wife Kali commanded believers to hunt humans and garrote them with sashes.

Thugs usually preyed upon travelers in unpopulated places. Victims were seized, strangled, ceremonially gashed, and buried, then the Thugs ate a ritual meal over the burial spot. (They also plundered the victim’s possessions – another motive for their religious fervor.) British officers finally broke Thuggee by ferreting out 3,689 cultists and hanging or imprisoning them, or branding them with “Thug” as a public warning. At a trial in 1840, one Thug was accused of strangling 931 people.

Other sacrifices lingered. In the 1800s an Ashanti king in Africa, wishing to make his new palace impregnable, sacrificed 200 girls and mixed their blood in the mortar of the walls. In 1838 a Pawnee American Indian girl was cut to pieces to fertilize newly sown crops. During the late 1800s, bodies of sacrificed children occasionally were found at Kali shrines in India.

***

Among those thousands of priests, I wonder if any realized that their gods were purely imaginary. Whether they did or not, their careers consisted of senseless, pointless, horrifying murder.

Source: Countless Centuries of Human Sacrifice

Nigerian kills Nigerian girlfriend in Ghana for money ritual

Nigeria is Africa’s most populated country. With a population estimated at over 200 million people it is not surprising that Nigeria ranks high in the list of countries where people are murdered for ritualistic reasons or in a ritual way, including the performance of rituals believed to bring or enhance political power, economic or financial wealth, good health to the perpetrator(s) and/or conspirator(s). It is my estimation that Nigeria is Number One on the African continent when it comes to ritualistic murders, locally referred to as ‘money rituals’.

Not all ritual murders are discovered whereas not all murders which seem to be ritual murders are true ritual murders. Perpetrators may hide traces or create circumstances intended to mislead investigators. Hence we have to be always careful when reading about reported cases of ritual murders.

That being said, a case is being reported of a Nigerian residing in Ghana who killed his girlfriend for ‘money ritual’. Read the following report.

Warning: Some people may find the following story and/or the video disturbing because of the explicit contents (webmaster FVDK).

Nigerian kills Nigerian girlfriend in Ghana for money ritual

..Any Nigerian that commits a crime in any country, the law of the land should take its course, says NiDCOM

Published: November 30, 2022
By: Per Second News

In his desperate get-rich-quick bid, a Nigerian, whose identity is still unknown,  has killed his girlfriend, a Nigerian, in Accra, Ghana.

According to reports, the “lover boy” beheaded the girl at Spintex, Accra, the  Ghanian capital, to use her body parts for money ritual.

Just before dismembering her body, Police on a tip-off, swooped on the house and arrested the man, a report reaching Persecondnews said.

A video of his arrest which also showed the moment the corpse of the girl was recovered by the police, was shared on Facebook by a user identified as Smile Baba.

He had commented: “Very sad development this afternoon. I have just arrived from a crime scene here in Accra, Ghana, where a Nigerian young man beheaded his Nigerian girlfriend in Spintex, Accra, Ghana.

“My question is, who actually lies to these young boys and girls that money rituals truly exist?

“Ladies, you have to be careful of who you trust; it doesn’t matter how calm the man looks. Just be careful.”

Contacted for his comment, the spokesman for the Nigerians in Diaspora Commission (NiDCOM), Mr Abdur-Rahmam Balogun, said: “Our stand is that any Nigerian that commits a crime, let the law of the land take its course.

“The Nigerian government has no role to play in such instance. If you go to another man’s land and commit a crime, the law of the land will always take its course.

“So, we always advise Nigerians to be good ambassadors wherever they find themselves. I have not watched the video and we have not been petitioned.”

Source: Nigerian kills Nigerian girlfriend in Ghana for money ritual

Also:

Nigerian man allegedly beheads his girlfriend in Ghana  – YouTube

Death of Death Penalty in Ghana

Recommended reading for those interested in the pros and cons of the death penalty.
(webmaster FVDK)

Death of the death penalty in Ghana

Published: November 3, 2022
By: Prosper Andre Batinge – Graphic Online, Ghana

For some time now, Ghanaian penal advocates tracking liberal global criminal justice crusaders have been trying to kill the death penalty with only near successes.

The real chance at abolishing the death penalty in Ghana emerged in the case of Dexter Johnson v the Republic [2011] 1 SCGLR 601. But a majority decision of Ghana’s Supreme Court, against the spirited protestations of the minority, especially Justice Samuel Kofi Date-Bah (as he then was), declined and passed the buck to Parliament.

In throwing the ball from the Supreme Court to the chambers of Parliament, then Justice Kwasi Anin Yeboah (now the Chief Justice of Ghana) wrote: “I am aware that the death penalty has been abolished in other jurisdictions, especially in the Commonwealth countries.

“I would, like my brother Dotse JSC, advocate statutory intervention like other jurisdictions where they have degrees of murder instead of judicial intervention by way of interpretation.” [Dexter Johnson at 703.]

Bills

Parliament now has a clear chance to abolish the death penalty. The Madina Constituency lawmaker, Mr Francis-Xavier Sosu, is a front advocate of the Death Penalty Bills: The Criminal and Other Offences (Amendment) Act 1960 (Act 29) and the Armed Forces (Amendment) Act 1962 (Act 105).

These Bills seek to amend sections 46, 49, 49a, 180, 194 and 317a of Act 29 and sections 14, 15, 16, 17, 19, 20, 40, 78, and 79 of Act 105. The Bills were gazzetted on Tuesday, June 28, 2022.

These Bills seek to abolish the death penalty for ordinary offences, still leaving in the purgatory of the death penalty those convicted of serious crimes like High Treason and Treason.

Cruel

Ghana has not executed anybody convicted and sentenced to the death penalty since 1993. In strict terms and in practice thus Ghana appears not a death penalty state.

But the nation’s trial courts continue to impose the death penalty on persons upon conviction. Some 165 convicted persons were on the death row at the end of 2021; the number is now more than 170.

The death penalty offends the right to life etched in crucial human rights conventions, covenants, and declarations.

The death penalty also offends African customary law. Ubuntu was influential in abolishing the death penalty in South Africa. The South African Constitutional Court in S v Makwanyane held that the death penalty violated the right to human dignity, underscoring that the right to dignity was an integral part of ubuntu.

The death penalty is too cruel and has proven parallel to the values of evolved human sensibilities. The death penalty appears a relic of backward societies of a backward era.

The psychological torture to people on death row is immense. They wait for the never-arriving day of their execution. Some have taken their own lives during this uncertain period of waiting.

As well, the psychological effect of the death penalty on executing officers is no less tormenting. The introduction of so-called mercy killing such as injecting convicts to die peacefully and painlessly has not lessen the cruelty of the practice on both the victim and the killer.

Innocent people – not infrequently – are accused, convicted, and executed for crimes, of which they are not culpable. Fairly recently, Mr Emmanuel Tetteh was released from prison after he was wrongfully sentenced to death for murder. He did 33 years behind bars. At his release, he was 75 years.

The case against abolishing the death sentence, therefore, often makes both theoretical and common sense. But on few occasions, the argument against the death penalty is difficult to advance with clear conscience in a society of persistence instances of ritual murders.

Some of our compatriots believe that they can sacrifice their fellow human beings for money, and they, according to allegations too numerous to ignore, kill others with the hope of attaining wealth.

Some of the victims of ritual murders are young citizens in their prime with full potential of their lives in front of them, promising lives cut painfully short by evil people. It is with pain that I still believe and argue that even a ritual murderer ought not to suffer the death penalty.

Parliament

Writing for the majority in the case of Dexter Johnson supra, Justice Jones Dotse (as he then was) opined that “the time has possibly come for the Parliament of Ghana to seriously consider whether to have a policy shift in the mandatory death penalty regime imposed on those convicted of murder.” {[2011] 1 SCGLR 601 at 702.}

More than a full decade after the Supreme Court’s indication, and after years of campaigns to end the death penalty, Parliament appears willing to kill the death penalty in the case of ordinary crimes.

As Parliament commences a new session of its lawmaking duties last Tuesday, October 25, 2022, it should ensure that the death penalty ends with the end of the Third Meeting of the Second Session of the Eighth Parliament of the Fourth Republic.

The writer is a lawyer/doctoral fellow at Fordham Law School, N.Y., USA: 
E-mail: pbatinge@fordham.edu

Source: Death of Death Penalty in Ghana

Ghana: Invoke death penalty as punishment for ritual killers — PNC

In many African countries the capital punishment has been abolished, yet in a number of countries people start pressurizing their governments to re-introduce the death penalty notably for convicted ritual murderers.

Consequently, in Malawi and other Southern African countries (Botswana, South Africa, Zimbabwe) as well as in East Africa (Uganda), in West Africa (Nigeria) and in Central Africa (Equatorial Guinea) the death penalty is no longer a taboo or has been already legalized.

In the aftermath of an increasing number of shocking ritual murders it is now Ghana’s turn. Recently, the People’s National Convention (PNC) called on the government to reintroduce the death penalty for convicted ritual murderers. (webmaster FVDK).

Invoke death penalty as punishment for ritual killers — PNC

Published: October 2, 2022
By: Modern Ghana

Source: Invoke death penalty as punishment for ritual killers — PNC

Ghana – Mankessim ritual murder: Awakrom chief calls for arrest of ‘missing’ fetish priest, Ebusuapanyin

For a better understanding of the article cited below it is highly recommended to read yesterday’s posting with useful background information on the cultural-historic background pertaining to this ritual murder case as well as background information on the three arrested suspects (webmaster FVDK).

Mankessim murder: Awakrom chief calls for arrest of ‘missing’ fetish priest, Ebusuapanyin

Two of the arrested suspects

Published: October 2, 2022
By: Ghana Web

Source: Mankessim murder: Awakrom chief calls for arrest of ‘missing’ fetish priest, Ebusuapanyin