Nigeria: Akwa Ibom Witchcraft Riddle
Isioma Madike

1     She lies curled up by the wayside. She looks wretched in rags. Scattered pieces of rocks nearby indicate that she has been there for days. Her crime: She was alleged to have confessed to being a witch. She is said to have killed family members, drank human blood and brought ruin and ill health to her friends. This especially makes her highly hated by her neighbourhood.

<
Udeme, a native of Itu village, like many of her kinfolk, squats in the fringes of her neighbourhood, dejected and neglected. Looking haggard, Udeme cuts the picture of a child from the war-torn Darfur region of Sudan, malnourished with rashes all over her tiny body.

Itu is not the only one in the villages that habour these unfortunate little souls. Tens of them are found in most known quarters of Akwa Ibom State including Eket, the oil-rich community as well as the municipal environs of Uyo, the state capital. They are occasionally found in groups as they scrape life from the unfriendly populace. They are starved, tortured, abandoned and even killed because their parents are afraid and they have become the targets of communities' witch-hunt. Nonetheless, the streets, the highways and the markets welcome the entire guests with open hands.

Their age, ranges from two to 18. Gradually, they have become destitute, hanging their fate on God for survival, or so it seems; a paradox of sort in a state of stupendous wealth.

Witches in contrast to normal human beings are imagined to be the source for most horrible misfortune on their families and communities. They were viewed as the embodiment of everything evil. It is believed that witches could only practice their wicked art only in the dead of night.

In most Nigerian villages, even towns, and recently cities, deaths, natural disasters, and epidemics are blamed on witches. In most beliefs, a witch is said to confess her "crimes" before she dies or goes mad. Homeless, possibly childless old women driven from their matrimonial homes are especially the victims of these alleged "confessions". Old women driven into the streets and losing their mind, in their madness utter nonsense to the effect of being witches, killing their husbands and children, causing accidents, and bringing ruin on their families are immediately set upon and stoned to death by passers-by. Even the educated and the rich believe in the existence of people who "fly-by-night."

The belief in witchcraft; treatment of those accused of being witches and the maltreatment of their families have been part of the African cosmogony for ages. But the brewing calamity occasioned by the recent labeling of children as witches has, indeed, become an easy pastime of exorcists in Akwa Ibom State.

[b]In this neighbourhood, children alleged to be witches and wizards are usually abandoned and thrown into the streets by their parents or guardians. Child-witchcraft, according to natives, appears to be very rampant now than ever before. A day hardly passes without children being allegedly identified as or confessing to having witchcraft. Though witchcraft is not new in Nigeria, child-witchcraft, it appears, is fast becoming the fad. The trend has hit Akwa Ibom State like a plague, and some non-governmental organisations (NGOs), are springing up to reap from the huge budgets of some sponsored interest, sometimes condemning the acts of branding children as witches and wizards.

Akwa Ibom State has the child-witchcraft saga as a peculiar problem, and it has assumed international dimension. The peculiarity of this problem has made the state the highest contributor to the issue of child trafficking, child labour, and child abuse generally.

Labelling children witches has become a fashion for some churches and other spiritual homes, and they are on the increase. There is a litany of gory tales about abused children; tales of children who have been made enemies of society by the unsubstantiated pronouncements of these spiritual homes.

Children, as small as two-year-old are pronounced as witches and the saintly homes are really having a field day labelling them, while he psyche of so many of these kids has been destroyed beyond repairs.

Saturday Enquirer gathered that the commercialisation of prayers, payment for "spiritual counselling and deliverances," poverty, ignorance and fear, are among the factors responsible for the surging number of abused children on the streets.

An NGO, Stepping Stones Nigeria (SSN), based in Akwa Ibom and the United Kingdom (UK), says it is tackling the twin problem of child abandonment and child witches in both Akwa Ibom and Cross River states. The organisation's director, Gary Foxcroft was quoted as saying, "states such as Akwa Ibom and Cross River are well-known for the high number of abandoned children on their streets. Estimates place the numbers of children that have been stigmatised as 'witches' in these states alone at 150."[/b]Foxcroft said the superstitious belief, which "is also known to be prevalent in many other regions of Nigeria is leading to thousands of children being imprisoned in prayer houses, starved, beaten and even killed. Akwa Ibom State has a

particular high number due to this belief.

"Such children then become easy prey for the numerous traffickers that operate in the region. Not only is this issue causing irreparable damage to the lives of these innocent children, it also paints a very negative image of Akwa Ibom State and Nigeria to the international community," Foxcroft said.

Lucky Inyang who is the Nigerian director of SSN also said, "these states have a moral obligation to do everything in their power to enact the Child Rights Acts (CRA) as quickly as possible. "Stepping Stones Nigeria is calling on all stakeholders to unite behind its Prevent Abandonment of Children Today (PACT) campaign and save the lives of these innocent children."

Inyang also called on Akwa Ibom State government to enact the Child Rights Acts and regulate the churches known to carry out violations of child rights. He urged the National Film and Video Censors Board (NFVCB) to take steps to ban all films that promote superstitious beliefs and lead to abuse of children's rights.

But, Helen Ukpabio, founder and senior pastor of Liberty Gospel Church in Calabar, the Cross River State capital says it is all a fraudulent attempt to rip off the region.

The minister of God accused Sam Ikpe-Itauma, who claims to run the NGO at Eket that houses the alleged 150 children, to have started the problem.

"There is a man in Eket who is creating this problem.

He is Sam Ikpe-Itauma."

Ukpabio equally accused Europeans of insincerity and pumping money to the wrong hands in the name of NGO.

Ikpe-Itauma is said to have opened his house to a few homeless waifs he came across, and tries his best to look after them.

"The neighbours were not happy with me and tell me 'you are supporting witches.' This project was an accident. I saw children being abandoned and it was very worrying. I started with three children, then every day it increased, so we had to open this new place. For every five children we see on the streets, we believe one has been killed, although it could be more as neighbours turn a blind eye when a witch child disappears. It is good we have this shelter, but it is under constant attack," Ikpe-Itauma said.

Ikpe-Itauma's wife, Elizabeth is said to act as nurse to the injured children, and has named their refuge home Child Rights and Rehabilitation Network (CRRN). The home, according to reports, has found support from a charity running a school in the area, SSN, which is reported to be interested in assisting to feed the children.

"But the numbers turning up here are a huge challenge," Ikpe-Itauma quipped.

Akwa Ibom State Governor, Godswill Akpabio has expressed anger over the activities of some white garment churches he said threw over 150 children into the streets for "possessing witchcraft."

Akpabio said, "All these white garment churches deceiving and destroying families should stop what they are doing. I intend to address the entire church congregation in the state. I've arranged with the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) to talk to the churches because they're destroying many families.

"In Akwa Ibom State, we have over 150 children who have been thrown into the streets by pastors who claim the children are into witchcraft. They even attempted to burn some children alive in the state. We've rescued children who have been almost burnt to death on the basis that they are into witchcraft," the Governor explained.


An NGO, Stepping Stones Nigeria (SSN)
http://www.steppingstonesnigeria.org/