Two Channel 4 Dispatches films honoured at Rory Peck awards

'A third of Burmese children were malnourished even before the cyclone hit' ... Dispatches: Orphans of Burma's Cyclone. Photograph: Channel 4

Two films shown on Channel 4's Dispatches won recognition at the Rory Peck awards last night.

Orphans of Burma's Cyclone, made by two anonymous journalists who risked 30-year jail terms to film the lives of children left without parents by last year's natural disaster, won the news award.

And Saving Africa's Witch Children, a portrayal of the plight of Nigerian children who are branded witches, won the Sony Professional Impact Award.

The Burmese film was the work of two cameramen from the media organisation Democratic Voice of Burma – known only as "Z" and "T" – who secretly followed eight orphans struggling to rebuild their lives after the devastation wrought by Cyclone Nargis.

Six months after filming the documentary, T was arrested, and last week, after four months in jail, he was told he would be charged with the new offence of filming without government permission. It was shot on location in Burma between May 2008 and March 2009 for the Oxford-based production company Quicksilver Media.

"Despite all the dangers, they still created a film narrative," said the judges for the awards, which celebrate the work of freelance newsgatherers around the world. "It was a journey for each of the individual families – and you went on that journey with them."

Saving Africa's Witch Children was the work of Dutch film-maker Joost van der Valk, who partly funded the project.

His film, which has previously won a Bafta and International Emmy for current affairs, followed the work of Englishman Gary Foxcroft, who has devoted his life to helping so-called "witch" children in Nigeria who are abandoned, tortured, starved and sometimes murdered.

The film led to the arrest of several pastors and prompted the local state government to declare the branding of children as witches illegal.

Van der Valk's 60-minute film was shot between February and May last year for Red Rebel Films, a partnership between the Dutchman and former BBC documentary maker Mags Gavan.

"Its subtle and restrained camerawork doesn't get in the way of telling what is a difficult and harrowing story," the judges said.

The features award was given to Russian cameraman Kazbek Basayev for his film about the conflict in South Ossetia.

Commissioned and broadcast by Reuters Video News, Basayev's film was the first to show the burning of Georgian villages under Russian control.

"He was dealing with a population under stress, a foreign power, tanks, and burning buildings but in the middle of all that he managed to convey the human face of conflict with a series of thoughtful and beautifully composed shots," the judges said.

guardian.co.uk

Child’s Rights Law... Too Much Talk, Little Implementation

Tomorrow November 20, the world will celebrate 20 years of the Convention on the Rights of the Child. For many in Nigeria, it is an opportunity to look at the states that have passed the law protecting children and the level of implementation of the act. However, according to THISDAY investigation, in as much as some states have passed the Act, a lot is still need to be done to liberate the Nigerian child. ROLAND OGBONNAYA writes

Ifeoma (not her real name) is a 10-year old girl. She leaves with her aunty on Asata Street, Enugu. This Thursday morning, Ifeoma should be in school like her other peers. No, instead, she was hawking Okpa, a local delicacy in one of the motor parks in the city. She told THISDAY that she has never been to school before even though she would have loved to go to school. She said she lost her father very early in life and things were not easy for her mother who looks after her other siblings in a village near Nsukka, hence she had to leave with her aunty. She said the arrangement between her mother and the aunty before she came to the town was that she would go to school while assisting the mother’s sister to look after the children.

But this morning, instead of being in school, Ifeoma sweats under the heaviness a tray-full of Okpa delicately balanced on her head as she hawked the food around the major motor parks in the Coal City. She still believes that one day she would go to school and become an actress like her idol Genevieve Nnaji.

The case of little Miss Rose Otubo, an eleven-year-old teenage girl is more pathetic. Rose who is from Effum in Ohaukwu Local government Area of Ebonyi State was sentenced to seven years imprisonment by a Magistrate Court sitting in Effium. Her sentence, for many epitomised how subtle and cruel the country’s legal system is against the rights of the child.

Rose ordeal came to the open when the wife of the Ebonyi State Governor, Mrs. Josephine Elechi visited Abakaliki Prisons. In one of her visits to the prison, the woman was alarmed that an 11-year-old girl was sentenced to seven years imprisonment and put in prison instead of a remand home. She immediately drew the attention of the Ministry of Women Affairs and Social Development.

Narrating her story Rose said, “the incident began in 2007, when I was taken to a distant cousin, one Mr. Nicholas Otubo by the man who claimed to be my father Mr. Nweke Nwochi when I was just 11 years old on the excuse that I was very stubborn”. According to her, “few months later, my foster mother accused me of stealing her N10, 000 and I was immediately dragged to an Effium Magistrate Court in Ohaukwu Local Government Area, which at the end sentenced me to seven years imprisonment.”

Rose stated said at the Magistrate Court, the charges against her were not properly explained before she pleaded guilty, adding that she only took her foster mother’s N200 to buy a loaf of bread as she was being starved even in the face of tedious day-to-day hawking. There are many children like Ifeoma and Rose who are daily abused by biological or foster parents across the country despite an existing law protecting Nigerian children from such inhuman treatment.

There has been a very serious neglect of the rights of the child in every aspect in the country even from the judiciary. Many children have been sentenced to prison without due respect to the fundamental human rights and the convention on the rights of the child like in the case of Rose.

The Convention on the Rights of the Child was adopted and ratified by nations, including Nigeria and accession by General Assembly resolution 44/25 of November 20, 1989. Exactly 20 years ago tomorrow, countries present at the Convention, agreed that in accordance with the principles proclaimed in the Charter of the United Nations, recognition of the inherent dignity and of the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family is the foundation of freedom, justice and peace in the world.

Bearing in mind that the people of the United Nations have, in the Charter, reaffirmed their faith in fundamental human rights and in the dignity and worth of the human person, and have determined to promote social progress and better standards of life in larger freedom. Recognising that the United Nations has, in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and in the International Covenants on Human Rights, proclaimed and agreed that everyone is entitled to all the rights and freedoms set forth therein, without distinction of any kind, such as race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status,
Recalling that, in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the United Nations proclaimed that childhood is entitled to special care and assistance, and convinced that the family, as the fundamental group of society and the natural environment for the growth and well-being of all its members and particularly children, should be afforded the necessary protection and assistance so that it can fully assume its responsibilities within the community. It also recognised that the child, for the full and harmonious development of his or her personality, should grow up in a family environment, in an atmosphere of happiness, love and understanding.

In order to protect the rights of children some states passed the Child’s Rights Law. While some states went ahead to put structures in place for the implementation of the law, many other states in the country have not deem it fit to push for the passage of the act, despite local and international pressures. Last week, THISDAY visited four states in the south east of Nigeria—Enugu, Ebonyi, Abia and Imo to assess their performance in respect of the law. Enugu State House of Assembly passed the bill, but has not been signed into law by Governor Sullivan Chime on the excuse that he does not want to sign any law that will be difficult to implement.

He implored the assembly to look at the document once again. THISDAY was at the office of the Commissioner for Information, Culture and Tourism, Mr. Chuks Ugwoke for explanation the position of the bill, but was told he was away on official assignment. Same brickwall was met at the office of the state Attorney General and Commissioner of Justice.

Apart from Enugu, Imo and Abia States have passed the act through their state House of Assemblies, and are at different levels of implementation. While there is the zeal by the Abia State government to implement the act by setting up the family court and other structures, there is apathy on the side of the law enforcement agencies and other allied government bodies to make the law work. Ebonyi State, which bears the burden of child trafficking, street hawking by children are yet to pass the act.

THISDAY gathered in Abakaliki that the state House of Assembly passed the bill but was not accented to by the former governor and present Minister of Education, Dr. Sam Egwu before he left office. The present governor, Mr. Martin Elechi, on his part said he would not sign a law that was passed by an Assembly other than the one during his administration. As a result, the bill has been returned to the state house of Assembly for fine-tuning and would soon be passed into law, according to sources at the state house of assembly. The unfortunate thing is that while the legislators battle with the fine-tuning of the bill, many children of Ebonyi are trafficked and abused.

In Imo State, the State Assembly passed the bill in 2004 as Law No 6, which was meant to provide for children in the state and the implementation has been zero due to government’s law of direction, understanding of the law and the political will to implement it. At major markets and motor parks in Owerri, the state capital, children are used as hawkers while child labour is rampant. Abia’s case is not too different despite giant strides made.

Speaking at the opening of the 2009/2010 legal year in Umuahia, the Abia State Chief Judge, Hon. Justice S.E. Imo, confirmed that though Abia is one of the states in the country to pass the Child’s Rights Law, the benefit to the child offender derivable from the law cannot be enjoyed without a good remand home facility. “We also have a juvenile court where persons under the child rights law are tried, but unfortunately, children who are tried under this law or even in the regular court, are remanded in prison custody with adults. This should not be so,” Imo said.

The chief judge said it is very necessary and urgent that the government provides a remand home so that these children could be reformed rather than ruined, while in custody with adult criminals. “I am told there is an old remand home in Aba that only requires renovation and refurbishing. The governor may direct that the place be rehabilitated soonest,” he said.

The Minister of Women Affairs and Social Development, Mrs. Salamatu Hussein Suleiman, in a meeting with women, children and other vulnerable groups in Umuahia recently, expressed happiness that Abia is one of the 22 states that have passed the child rights law. She further commended the state for putting in place implementation mechanisms for effective implementation of the law, like the implementation committee put in place as well as a family court, a prerequisite for the implementation of the law.

Her wish was that with the passage of the law and its subsequent implementation, the state would guarantee the rights of children, restore their confidence and self esteem and improve their status.” It will enable children, including those with special needs to enjoy rights to survival, development, protection and participation, as it provides special measures for their care and protection.

“I wish to implore you to continue to support and explore all necessary strategies, structures and mechanisms to further implement the provisions of the law, especially the allocation of adequate and sufficient resources for the implementation of the law. Strategies that would ensure widespread awareness of the law should be vigorously pursued as well as capacity building of the judiciary to effectively enforce the provisions of the law in the interest of the children of this great state,” Mrs. Suleiman said.

The clamour for the speedy passage of the Child Right Act became very paramount in different parts of the country with an onerous task on the different State Houses of Assembly to initiate the bill not just as an act of making law, but also as a matter of saving the Nigerian children. Considering the vulnerability of Nigerian child and in accordance with the principles proclaimed in the charter of the United Nations, recognising the inherent dignity and of the equal rights of all members of human family especially the women and children, the call for the right of child became more appealing, yet inevitable.

The heart warming call for the child right act and the need to extend particular care to the child was first stated in the Geneva Declaration of the Rights of the Child of 1924 and in the Declaration of the rights of the child adopted by the General Assembly on November 20, 1959, which was subsequently recognised in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. UNICEF and other bodies like USAID have been at the vanguard for the law to be passed to give the Child Rights act a legal frame work as well as to reduce the incessant abuses on the Nigerian Child.

In Ebonyi State, for example, before the advent of the missionaries who preached against the killing of twins, it was predominantly seen in Abakaliki and other parts of Ebonyi State that the obsolete tradition almost remained indelible as some of the people, especially those in the rural area still held tenacious to that tradition.

In a bid to nip the cancer on the bud and other violence against children, the Ebonyi State House of Assembly embraced without any hesitation and expeditiously passed the bill into law, thereby establishing the Child Right Act as a law binding on every parents and guardians on the need to protect the vulnerable children. Unfortunately the former governor, Dr. Sam Egwu, did not accent to the law. His predecessor, Martins Elechi refused to sign the law because “I cannot sign any law that an assembly that is not within my tenure passed.” Meanwhile, the law has been sent back to the Assembly for “fine-tuning.” Before the attempt to pass the law, Ebonyi was a fertile place where child abuse reigned, ranging from sexual abuse on the children, child trafficking, street hawking and more especially taking away to other parts of the country as maids where they are often exposed to other different dangers.

Going by the Declaration of Geneva Convention on the Rights of the Child, there was a clear case of defiance from the fundamental human rights in Ebonyi State then often precipitated and by lack of education and civilisation, yet there was a clear number of children regularly whisked away to other parts of the state on child trafficking.

There were agents whose job was to get the children out from their parents with mouth-watering promises that the children were going to drink from the chalice of qualitative education, which apparently, their parents were not able to afford, only to be subjected to street hawking and nursing babies at home. Early this year, the men of the Nigeria Security and Civil Defense (NSDC) intercepted a truck-full of children of different sex, colour and ages. The agents were trying to ship these children outside the state for possible delivery to their different buyers.

That was the situation of the children in Ebonyi state and still remain the problem of the Nigerian Child in some of the states that have not passed the Child Right Act into law to establish that it is now an offence that a child under your care has no access to freedom and education.

Any state like Ebonyi that has not passed the child right act into law stands the chance of having some obligation to protect the child from all forms of maltreatments by parents or others responsible for the care of the child and establish the appropriate social programmes for the prevention of abuse and the treatment of the victims.

In accordance with the states’ obligations to the children, the state is obliged to provide special protection for the child deprived of the family environment and to ensure that the appropriate alternative family institutional placement is available in such cases considering the child’s cultural background. The westernisation of Christianity on their own side is not helping matters with their demon crazy Christianity where children are subjected to different kinds of torture often come from allegation that they are witches and wizards. They are subjected to physical and mental torture to cast out the witchcraft or wizardry in them.

Based on the Convention on the Right of the Child adopted by the General Assembly of the United Nation on November 20, 1989, “no child shall be subjected to torture, or cruel treatment or punishment, unlawful arrest or deprivation of liberty. Both capital punishment and life imprisonment without the possibility of release are prohibited for offences by person below 18 years”

According to UNICEF A Field, Mrs. Pelucy Ntabirweki, children all over the world are subjected to different inhuman treatments with 60 per cent coming as a result of religious fanatism and fundamentalism like accusing a child of witchcraft.

Mrs. Ntabirweki also during one of her numerous visits to the wife of Ebonyi State Governor, Chief Mrs. Josephine Elechi said children are the nucleus of “our cosmological existence and therefore deserved to be taken care of through protection and by giving them a bright future. The UNICEF boss also said that any society that takes the children’s future and rights like child’s play always find themselves at the dungeon of chaos and anarchy, adding that children are the fruit from the Lord.

“The child has the right to protection from all forms of exploitation be it sexual prejudicial to any aspects of the child and the state has the obligation to have the rights of the child protected from economic exploitation and from performing any work that is likely to be hazardous to interfere with the child’s education and so on,” she said.

In one of the resolutions made at both the Geneva Declaration and the Convention of the rights of the child, it frowned at the way and manner children are being exposed to dangers and all sorts of subjugation. It took the quick intervention of the Federation of International Women Lawyers (FIDA) and the Ministry of Women Affairs and Social Development following the directive of the Wife of the Governor, Mrs. Elechi to ensure the release of the teenage girl who was languishing at the Abakaliki Prison for over one year.

According to the Probation Officer, Child Development Department of the Women Affairs Ministry, Mr. Innocent Aloke, there was a petition to the Registrar of the State High Court concerning little Miss Rose’s case. “After failing in our effort to include Rose in the Governor’s amnesty list in 2007, FIDA and the state Ministry of Women Affairs appealed against the judgment of the Magistrate Court. At the end of the legal procedure, little Miss Rose was discharged and acquitted few weeks ago.”

After listening to both parties in a long argument, a representative of FIDA, Ebonyi state in the case, Mrs. Nnenna Onuoha agreed with the Women Affairs Ministry that Mrs. Obaji should take custody of Rose, since Mr. Nwochi did not visit the girl through out her stay in Prison and the remand home. These and more were some of the problems the children are being subjected to most of them often come through a broken family where the parents of the child are separated with a problem of who is going to keep the child just as it was in the case of little Rose.

In an interview with THISDAY, the newly sworn in Commissioner for Women Affairs and Social Development in Ebonyi State, Dr. Nora Alo said the state government was committed to protecting the rights of the children and indeed the women in the state, adding that several programmes were being introduced to that effect. She stated that under her administration. It would be unthinkable for anybody to engage in child labour and trafficking as was the case in the past as the state government would always try to abide by the law already passed by the state House of Assembly. How far this assertion could go is better left in the hands of time.

In many states particularly in the north, girls are denied education on the basis of sex. Parents, who do this claim that women have been naturally assigned the responsibility of taking care of homes. Where is it written that women must be treated as second-class citizens? Nigeria ratified the United Nations Child Rights Convention in 1991 and later passed it into law as the Child Rights Act. Since then, 22 states have adopted or adapted the Act but the implementation has continued to be a problem.

Article 27 of the Child Rights Convention says children have right to a standard of living that is good to meet their physical and mental needs while article 28 provides that children have right to education just as primary education should be free. In the HIV/AIDS ravaged states, no policy has been set out to take care of the children, who have lost their parents. What we see is that such children are put in orphanage homes and trained in the primary schools. Of what burden would it be to the government to train orphans up to university level?

In some cases, government officials like Abia State say there is no money but a lot of them keep cars that are not used for weeks or acquire houses nobody leaves in them. These days, in the streets of Umuahia and Aba and other satellite towns, juveniles are seen driving cars in the name of rich parents. Due to over-pampering, such children engage in cult activities because they call themselves "big boys". Kidnappers target children of the well to do so as to be given ransom. Child trafficking is a common feature in Abia, Imo, Enugu and Ebonyi States because some parents believe that they have to trade with them.

One prays and very fast too that the states that have not passed the law find the political will and courage to do that as well as implement it, while states like Ebonyi that has not passed it hast the pace to save children of the state from torture and abuse.

THISDAY ONLINE

Gambia: Country's Witch Hunt Activity Brought to African Commission

The International Humanist and Ethical Union (IHEU) has on Thursday 12th November, brought to the attention of the African Commission on Human and Peoples' Right the gross human rights violations that are committed in The Gambia and some African countries because of the fear of witchcraft across the continent.

In their statement read by Mr. Leo Igwe, at the 46th ordinary Session of the African Commission at Sheraton Hotel, said the belief on witchcraft is strong, common and widespread in Africa. He said that over the years, claims of witchcraft have been used to abuse the universally recognized human rights enshrined in the African Charter on Human and Peoples' Rights. Mr. Leo stated that in many African countries, to call somebody a witch automatically makes the person unqualified for human rights protection. He argued that to accuse somebody of witchcraft is like passing a death sentence on that person. He indicated that those accused of witch craft are tortured, persecuted and killed. He added that those people are subjected to cruel, inhuman and de-grading treatment by gangs, mobs, pastors, witch doctors, parents and family members in the name of exorcising or to elicit confessions.

Mr. Leo asserted that those alleged to be witches and wizards are victims of jungle justice, extra-judicial killing, forced exile and disappearance. He posited that in African those abused in the name of witchcraft are mainly the vulnerable members of the population, the poor, the elderly, women, children and people with disabilities. He added that IHEU has received reports of witchcraft related human rights abuses in many counties across the region.

Mr. Leo pointed out that in The Gambia, the government agents and some witch doctors raided villages and homes, abducted hundreds of mainly elderly persons alleged to be witches and wizards, took them to some secret locations where they were force to drink concoctions. He stated that as a result some died after taking the substance, while others developed several health complications. He added that the state condoned witch hunt is in breach of Gambia's human rights obligations under the African Charter.

In Malawi, Leo said a Magistrate's Court has convicted two people for practicing witchcraft. He posited that in October, Emily (62) and James Kunjes (68) were sentenced to five years imprisonment with hard labor for killing two members of their community through magic. He asserted that in Kenya, at least 15 women suspected to be witches were killed last year in a deadly witch hunt that occurred in some parts of the country. He added that relatives of those alleged to be witches and wizards continue to live in fear.

He said in the Democratic Republic of Congo, thousands of children alleged to be witches and wizards have been driven out of their homes and forced to roam the streets.

In Nigeria, Leo said in the Cross River and Akwa Ibom States, children accused of witchcraft are abandoned, beaten, slashed with knives, bathed with acid or lynched by parents, family and community members. He said some of these so call children witches are claimed and starved, some have been tortured to death by unscrupulous pastors during deliverance ceremonies.

He added that human right activists working to defend the rights of those accused of witchcraft has been at risk. He said rights defenders have suffered attacks, threats, intimidation and harassment. He asserted that in July, agents of a self-proclaimed witch exercise and founder of the liberty Gospel Church, Helen Ukpabia, raided a center for the rehabilitation of child victims in Eket in Akwa Ibom State. He also stated that they attacked the organizers of a child rights conference in Calabar in Cross River State.

In Ghana, Leo said women accused of witchcraft are attacked, persecuted and killed. He stated that some of them fleeing persecution have taken refugees at a camp in Gambaga in the Northern Region. He pointed out that those alleged to be witches and wizards suffered similar fates in Angola, Tanzania, Uganda, Cameroon, Zimbabwe, Sierra Leon, Liberia and so on. He indicated that the witch hunts in many African countries are not isolated attacks but an organized campaign, a silent and systematic elimination of any body alleged to be a witch or a wizard.

Mr. Leo urged and calls on the African Commission to issue a resolution condemning witch hunts and witchcraft related rights abuses in Africa.

He stated that IHEU request the Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Women in African, on Refugees, Asylum Seekers and internally displaced persons in Africa, on Human Rights Defenders in African to raise issues concerning witchcraft related abuses with State parties during their promotional mission.

IHEU calls on the government of The Gambia Nigeria, Malawi, Kenya, Zimbabwe, South African, Uganda, Tanzania, Cameroon, Sierra Leone and Liberia to fulfill their commitments under the African Charter on Human and Peoples' Rights by improving the quality of education, law enforcement and the justice system. IHEU urges all State parties to take all necessary legal and administrative measures to combat all human rights abuses that are committed in the name of witch hunts.

allAfrica.com

Churches denounce African children as "witches"

This Aug. 18, 2009 photo shows children accused of witchcraft carrying water at the Children's Rights and Rehabilitation Network in Eket, Nigeria. The idea of witchcraft is hardly new, but it has taken on new life recently partly because of a rapid growth in evangelical Christianity. Campaigners against the practice say around 15,000 children have been accused in two of Nigeria's 36 states over the past decade and around 1,000 have been murdered. (AP Photo/Sunday Alamba)

The nine-year-old boy lay on a bloodstained hospital sheet crawling with ants, staring blindly at the wall.

His family pastor had accused him of being a witch, and his father then tried to force acid down his throat as an exorcism. It spilled as he struggled, burning away his face and eyes. The emaciated boy barely had strength left to whisper the name of the church that had denounced him - Mount Zion Lighthouse.

A month later, he died.

Nwanaokwo Edet was one of an increasing number of children in Africa accused of witchcraft by pastors and then tortured or killed, often by family members. Pastors were involved in half of 200 cases of "witch children" reviewed by the AP, and 13 churches were named in the case files.

Some of the churches involved are renegade local branches of international franchises. Their parishioners take literally the Biblical exhortation, "Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live."

"It is an outrage what they are allowing to take place in the name of Christianity," said Gary Foxcroft, head of nonprofit Stepping Stones Nigeria.

For their part, the families are often extremely poor, and sometimes even relieved to have one less mouth to feed. Poverty, conflict and poor education lay the foundation for accusations, which are then triggered by the death of a relative, the loss of a job or the denunciation of a pastor on the make, said Martin Dawes, a spokesman for the United Nations Children's Fund.

"When communities come under pressure, they look for scapegoats," he said. "It plays into traditional beliefs that someone is responsible for a negative change ... and children are defenseless."

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The idea of witchcraft is hardly new, but it has taken on new life recently partly because of a rapid growth in evangelical Christianity. Campaigners against the practice say around 15,000 children have been accused in two of Nigeria's 36 states over the past decade and around 1,000 have been murdered. In the past month alone, three Nigerian children accused of witchcraft were killed and another three were set on fire.

Nigeria is one of the heartlands of abuse, but hardly the only one: the United Nations Children's Fund says tens of thousands of children have been targeted throughout Africa.

Church signs sprout around every twist of the road snaking through the jungle between Uyo, the capital of the southern Akwa Ibom state where Nwanaokwo lay, and Eket, home to many more rejected "witch children." Churches outnumber schools, clinics and banks put together. Many promise to solve parishioner's material worries as well as spiritual ones - eight out of ten Nigerians struggle by on less than $2 a day.

"Poverty must catch fire," insists the Born 2 Rule Crusade on one of Uyo's main streets.

"Where little shots become big shots in a short time," promises the Winner's Chapel down the road.

"Pray your way to riches," advises Embassy of Christ a few blocks away.

It's hard for churches to carve out a congregation with so much competition. So some pastors establish their credentials by accusing children of witchcraft.

Nwanaokwo said he knew the pastor who accused him only as Pastor King. Mount Zion Lighthouse in Nigeria at first confirmed that a Pastor King worked for them, then denied that they knew any such person.

Bishop A.D. Ayakndue, the head of the church in Nigeria, said pastors were encouraged to pray about witchcraft, but not to abuse children.

"We pray over that problem (of witchcraft) very powerfully," he said. "But we can never hurt a child."

The Nigerian church is a branch of a Californian church by the same name. But the California church says it lost touch with its Nigerian offshoots several years ago.

"I had no idea," said church elder Carrie King by phone from Tracy, Calif. "I knew people believed in witchcraft over there but we believe in the power of prayer, not physically harming people."

The Mount Zion Lighthouse - also named by three other families as the accuser of their children - is part of the powerful Pentecostal Fellowship of Nigeria. The Fellowship's president, Ayo Oritsejafor, said the Fellowship was the fastest-growing religious group in Nigeria, with more than 30 million members.

"We have grown so much in the past few years we cannot keep an eye on everybody," he explained.

But Foxcroft, the head of Stepping Stones, said if the organization was able to collect membership fees, it could also police its members better. He had already written to the organization twice to alert it to the abuse, he said. He suggested the fellowship ask members to sign forms denouncing abuse or hold meetings to educate pastors about the new child rights law in the state of Akwa Ibom, which makes it illegal to denounce children as witches. Similar laws and education were needed in other states, he said.

Sam Itauma of the Children's Rights and Rehabilitation Network said it is the most vulnerable children - the orphaned, sick, disabled or poor - who are most often denounced. In Nwanaokwo's case, his poor father and dead mother made him an easy target.

"Even churches who didn't use to 'find' child witches are being forced into it by the competition," said Itauma. "They are seen as spiritually powerful because they can detect witchcraft and the parents may even pay them money for an exorcism."

That's what Margaret Eyekang did when her 8-year-old daughter Abigail was accused by a "prophet" from the Apostolic Church, because the girl liked to sleep outside on hot nights - interpreted as meaning she might be flying off to join a coven. A series of exorcisms cost Eyekang eight months' wages, or US$270. The payments bankrupted her.

Neighbors also attacked her daughter.

"They beat her with sticks and asked me why I was bringing them a witch child," she said. A relative offered Eyekang floor space but Abigail was not welcome and had to sleep in the streets.

Members of two other families said pastors from the Apostolic Church had accused their children of witchcraft, but asked not to be named for fear of retaliation.

The Nigeria Apostolic Church refused repeated requests made by phone, e-mail and in person for comment.

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At first glance, there's nothing unusual about the laughing, grubby kids playing hopscotch or reading from a tattered Dick and Jane book by the graffiti-scrawled cinderblock house. But this is where children like Abigail end up after being labeled witches by churches and abandoned or tortured by their families.

There's a scar above Jane's shy smile: her mother tried to saw off the top of her skull after a pastor denounced her and repeated exorcisms costing a total of $60 didn't cure her of witchcraft. Mary, 15, is just beginning to think about boys and how they will look at the scar tissue on her face caused when her mother doused her in caustic soda. Twelve-year-old Rachel dreamed of being a banker but instead was chained up by her pastor, starved and beaten with sticks repeatedly; her uncle paid him $60 for the exorcism.

Israel's cousin tried to bury him alive, Nwaekwa's father drove a nail through her head, and sweet-tempered Jerry - all knees, elbows and toothy grin - was beaten by his pastor, starved, made to eat cement and then set on fire by his father as his pastor's wife cheered it on.

The children at the home run by Itauma's organization have been mutilated as casually as the praying mantises they play with. Home officials asked for the children's last names not to be used to protect them from retaliation.

The home was founded in 2003 with seven children; it now has 120 to 200 at any given time as children are reconciled with their families and new victims arrive.

Helen Ukpabio is one of the few evangelists publicly linked to the denunciation of child witches. She heads the enormous Liberty Gospel church in Calabar, where Nwanaokwo used to live. Ukpabio makes and distributes popular books and DVDs on witchcraft; in one film, a group of child witches pull out a man's eyeballs. In another book, she advises that 60 percent of the inability to bear children is caused by witchcraft.

In an interview with the AP, Ukpabio is accompanied by her lawyer, church officials and personal film crew.

"Witchcraft is real," Ukpabio insisted, before denouncing the physical abuse of children. Ukpabio says she performs non-abusive exorcisms for free and was not aware of or responsible for any misinterpretation of her materials.

"I don't know about that," she declared.

However, she then acknowledged that she had seen a pastor from the Apostolic Church break a girl's jaw during an exorcism. Ukpabio said she prayed over her that night and cast out the demon. She did not respond to questions on whether she took the girl to hospital or complained about the injury to church authorities.

After activists publicly identified Liberty Gospel as denouncing "child witches," armed police arrived at Itauma's home accompanied by a church lawyer. Three children were injured in the fracas. Itauma asked that other churches identified by children not be named to protect their victims.

"We cannot afford to make enemies of all the churches around here," he said. "But we know the vast majority of them are involved in the abuse even if their headquarters aren't aware."

Just mentioning the name of a church is enough to frighten a group of bubbly children at the home.

"Please stop the pastors who hurt us," said Jerry quietly, touching the scars on his face. "I believe in God and God knows I am not a witch."

seattlepi

Nigeria: Renaissance of Paganism

Lagos — I can't remember now where I read the true story: it must have been in one of the papers, but certainly not a home video story. Anyway never mind the source. Just read the true story. Once upon a time there lived in Lagos a husband and wife who were childless despite many years of being married. One day in the couple's church, it turned out that the owner of the church saw a vision to the effect that the mother of the lady was a witch "responsible" for the economic misfortune of her son-in-law and the bareness of her daughter.

Believing everything that came out of the mouth of the man of God to be true, the couple ostracized the old woman in the village. To cut the long story short, after missing her daughter for a long time, the old woman decided to travel all the way from the village to Lagos see her first daughter and son-in-law. Her luxurious bus touched down Jibowu, Yaba, Lagos at about 4 p.m. It was a bright evening. Lagos was still fully awake. Vehicular traffic was not so thick either. The young girl accompanying the woman rang up the couple and said: "Mama has arrived to Lagos . We are carrying a big bag and some tubers of yam. Come and pick us up at Ekene Park , Jibowu".

But to the utter shock of everyone, the lady not only snubbed the call but sent someone to inform her stranded mother at the park that she was a witch "responsible" her misfortune and that of her husband and consequently she was unfit to come into their house.

It was at this juncture that I disconnected from the story. So I cannot now tell you whether the couple later changed their minds and went to the park to pick up sorrowful old mama or whether the poor woman entered the next Ekene bus and headed back for the village.

Anyway, what this true story illustrates is that despite the high religious fervour in the land, there is something we are not getting right. Call it religion for atheists, or fanatical atheism, or paganized Christianity, or religious syncretism or Christianity mixed with superstition, the fact remains that we are witnessing the dawn of a new paganism today, a new paganism that is an amalgam of Christianity, African traditional religion and old paganism. Without getting mired into the gobbledygook of sociology of religious talks, whereas the old paganism thrived on superstitious beliefs, divination, incantation, dreams, vision-seeing, the new paganism of today strives on the same platforms but on a new panoply of modern technology, beautiful church songs, bright colours, movements, fine artistry, modern dancing, drama and even poetry. Whereas the pagans of old, at least in Africa , were somewhat uncultured, our new religious people are the aristocrats of intelligence. Handsome boys and beautiful girls having a nice time.

No suffering. No deprivation. No want. Some of the people you find in many places today shouting and heating their heads against the wall are offering the same services which the dibias, babalawos, futurists, clairvoyants, native doctors of those days used to offer, but in modernized ways. They can, among other things, foretell future events. They have the power to command, invoke and the power to do and undo. They can banish the devil, change ancestral curses into blessings, restore sight to the blind, destroy the enemies and restore trapped material wealth. If a woman is in search of the fruit of the womb, there is a child to be implanted in her womb. If a lady is desperately looking for a husband, there is a heaven-made husband waiting for her. Those suffering from financial difficulties should claim the prosperity reserved for them from all eternity.

In the midst of all these is the new reveling in superstition. Whereas Scottish missionary and White Queen of Calabar, Mary Slessor stopped the killing and torture of twins and children branded as witches and wizards in Calabar betweeen1873 to 1915, the children of Akwa Ibom are still crying for help today, crying because some religious bigots in town who have condemned them as witches and wizards are looking for them to kill them or torture them. So superstition is religion and religion is superstition. The evil spirits and devils are hovering all over the world looking for whom to devour. If your business is going down it is a sign that you are having a secret pack with the devil.

If you haven't given your dead great-grand father a third or fourth burial as required by paganized village tradition, be sure that he will be getting up at night from his grave and tormenting you. In my village nothing happens by chance. Everything is either caused by one juju or one medicine man or the other. If the rain is falling, a rain maker is behind it. Conversely, if the rain is not falling, a rain stopper is behind it. If your leg is paining you, know that you have stepped on a juju planted on your way by your enemy. If a successful young man dies, someone who was jealous of his wealth must have poised his food and killed him. So we live perpetually in fear, fear of imaginary an evil spirits, fear of an imaginary devil and fear of life itself.

But nevertheless, you cannot beat the religious fervour in this country. Nigerians are deeply religious people. That probably explains why we are the happiest people in the world. The average Nigerian holds anything sacred in great awe. In the days of Bishop Joseph Shanaham, Revered Hope Waddell and others, it was the Christianization of Africa. Today Africans are being invited to re-Christianize Europe and other parts of the world. Among these Africans are many Nigerians. With the new secularization and Godless materialism depicting Europe as one hellish place, Africa stands taller than many continents in affirming faith in one Triune God.

I spent the last vacation with one Spaniard and others in one seemingly good-for-nothing village in Ezeagu-North Local Council, Enugu State . Without trying to flatter me, this man was so impressed with what he saw about Nigeria . One Sunday we attended Mass at a village Catholic Church. After Mass, he called me to his side and confided in me that Nigeria was the hope of the world. Why? Because of the young men and women he saw inside the Church attending Mass. Probably in Spain and other countries only a few old people go to church. And since there is scarcity of people to form the choir, liturgical hymns and recorded ahead of time and played by the official minister at the opportune time.

But in Nigeria churches are daily jam-packed with exuberant young men and women including children, singing and dancing. God is still present in the public square. Every time you set out to travel in Nigeria there is always someone volunteering to pray for journey mercy. There are many prayer warriors in Nigeria whose professional job is to pray for others. The other day I was traveling to Onitsha by bus and one highway evangelist stood up to preach. After preaching he asked for contribution for his highway evangelism. Many offices in Lagos cannot start the day without prayers. This is the good thing about Nigeria . Everybody remembers God at all times. But it is dangerous to carry the cross on one shoulder and at the same time carry juju or superstitution on the other shoulder. Granted, the faith is deep here but it is yet to penetrate the culture. That is where the issue of acculturation, unity of life and all that may come in. If a guy goes to church on Sundays, he should struggle to do his work well; love his neighbour; pay his tax as and when due; he should stop stealing public funds and stop rigging elections to grab power by all means.

Those who argue that religionis a very personal thing which should be exercised privately and subjectively forget that unreasonable practice of the so-called private religion could cause a great harm to the Common good. For example, the Akwa-Ibom child torturers cannot argue that they are exercising their private religious right or their right to freedom of worship. This is because, without prejudice to religious freedom guaranteed in our Constitution, the State owes the citizens a duty to control the unreasonable way in which religion is practised.

allAfrica.com

Nwanakwo’s death, the search for justice and the re-branding project

Absolutely shocking! Distasteful, traumatizing and unbelievable! Can this be another April fool? No, it is not. The news is indeed true: Nwanakwo is DEAD! This is state that beclouded the Child’s Right and Rehabilitation Network (CRARN) Centre when the news of the death of 9 year old Nwanakwo Udo Edet from Ikono LGA who was receiving treatment at University of Uyo Teaching Hospital (UUTH) having been bathed with acid by his father.

Pitiful! Poor, innocent Nwanakwo was taken to the UUTH in July this year from General Hospital Ikono when his medical situation deteriorated. His sin is the acceptance to an invitation to attend a prayer meeting with a church in Urban, near Calabar, Cross River State Nigeria. “When I arrived the church, people were clapping and dancing. I prayed God to bless me and our family including my father; soon the pastor came, turning around, holding my head ‘Do you know that you are a witch?’ he asked me. I told him no, I am not a witch…” ‘He told me that I must confess or he will beat me, even as he slapped me immediately. He handed over a bottle of olive oil to me to be drinking at home. I was annoyed, and went and told my father so that he will arrest the pastor with police.

To his chagrin, his father merely told him that if he were a witch he would be cast out of the house. That was an understatement. After four days his father told him that they would travel home to see their relatives. The little lad was so elated by this offer. Did Nwanakwo and his father come back truly?

He told CRARN team who visited him at the UUTH in August that his father called a cyclist and whispered to him. They mounted on the bike and moved to a particular road that was bushy up to a distance where there were no houses and stopped there. His father took him inside the bush and pretended that he wanted to ease himself, while the cyclist waited. “He brought out a gallon from a sack bag and forced me on the ground, pressing my legs with his knees, he forced my mouth opened and poured acid into it. I cried and pleaded with him that I am his son; he shouted and called me a wizard and devil. He poured the acid on my face, head and body and ran away. Somebody came and took me to the police.” He said with a clear as is using a wireless microphone

Looking at Nwanakwo’s photograph, the acid burns are very glaring. The boy, who lost his mother four years ago, said he wants justice to prevail. “Even in my grave I want my father and Pastor King of Mouth Zion Light House, Urban to be arrested and brought to book.” The Chief Medical Director (CMD) of UUTH, Prof. Emmanuel Ekanem was contacted to know what measure has been taken to ensure that justice is done. “The Head of the Corporate Affairs Unit (UUTH) has contacted the Divisional Police Officer of Ikono LGA who said that his men have been drafted to investigate the matter …” the CMD had responded briefly.

This brutish act was committed in January this year, precisely eight months ago, and Nwanakwo died about four days ago. As at the time of writing this piece, there was no news as to the arrest of Nwanakwo’s father or Pastor King. Will justice ever be done?

Nwanakwo represents the hundreds or thousands of children in Akwa Ibom , Cross River, Bayelsa, Abia Rivers States, etc, who have suffered similar faith; either by being set on fire, thrown into the river to serve as delicious meal for the fish, buried alive, poisoned to death, slaughtered, hacked to death, pierced hot pokers into the anus, stoned to death, incarcerated and manacled in churches or prayer houses, sold to child traffickers or ritual syndicates, enslaved in brothels, strangled to death, starved, neglected, hung or suspended to die by piece-meal and or bathed with acid.

The rebranding of Nigeria is a project I so endeared and so I can die for it. But the rebranding has to start from the first rung of the ladder. The first rung is the children. The visit by the Governor of Akwa Ibom State, Chief Godswill Akpabio to children at CRARN Centre where over 200 stigmatized or witch-branded are rehabilitated children is an inroad to this concept of rebranding. Therefore, all the undoing committed against these children must be addressed and redressed. The Childs Right Law should not be allowed to be sleeping in archives and libraries unattended to. Its spirit should be evoked and allowed to hound the phony pastors, fake evangelists, apostles and prophets. The Child Witch Inventors should not be allowed to continue in the hoodwinking business using the name of God and garnering criminal awe and reverence while children continue to suffer, the image of Christianity and Nigeria remain in the mud; they must face justice. There should be no sacred cow. This to me is rebranding! Rebranding should be an egg we cannot trifle with, if sincerity is anything to go by. Parents who give themselves up to be brainwashed by the renegade men of God thereby unleashing all sort of terror on children should be made to face the full weight of the law. To say that the rate of child-witch branding with its attendant consequences on children is alarming is making an understatement.

This is not enough; there must be a Special Implementation Committee saddled with the responsibility of monitoring the activities of churches, liaising with the police in ensuring the prosecution child’s right violators in the truest spirit of the law. But I am confident that where the conventional law take some doses of sedatives and remain drowsy, fidgeting or opt not to wake up at all, the natural justice will brave the storm and fish out the untouchable and the sacred cows. ‘Be not deceived, God is not mocked…’

You will agree with me that I have digressed a lot. So I hereby plead for amnesty. Yes Nwanakwo, in the spirit of rebranding should be immortalized! This will awaken the consciousness in our psyche that children, the world over, deserve special attention; not assault and battery, not machetes cut, not hot iron-branding, not hot water-bathing, not even violent exorcism, but love, good food, education and good health. And that no one should be religiously irreligious as this sometimes leads to ‘insanity’-so giving the urge to harm others, especially vulnerable children.

Nwana, my sole-friend, your death reminds me of the 9 year old Mary Effiong of Oruko, Oron axis who was slaughtered in a broad daylight in 2007 by his beloved daddy because an apostle of God revealed to him that his frequent arrest by the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency-NAFDAC for trading in Indian hemp and hashes, was the handiwork of his daughter who was a witch. He was arrested; but pressure from the elite and the community made him to walk the street like Fidel Castro of Cuba while in office. Justice was not done! So for Nwanakwo, will justice ever be done?

Sam Ikpe-Itauma is the President,
Child’s Right and Rehabilitation Network (CRARN) Akwa Ibom State.

Kenya: Human Body Parts Don't Create Wealth

Nairobi — This week's kidnapping and eventual murder of a six-year-old Sudanese boy, Emmanuel Agwar Adar, in Nairobi was gory as it can be. But they rubbed it on cutting off his tongue.

Emmanuel's murder comes barely a month after the city's taxi drivers took to the streets to protest the murder of their six colleagues in mysterious circumstances.

The taxi men claimed all the victims had their private parts chopped off before being dumped in the outskirts of the city.

Although there was no official confirmation, the drivers' say these murders could be related to a mix of occult and extortion.

Witchcraft hasn't disappeared from African culture just as it refuses to go in the West. For centuries, human body parts have been used as ingredients for magical concoctions and charms. To obtain body parts, performers of these dark arts kill people in order to harvest specific organs for use in the occult.

Things haven't been easy for them with the advent of the nation-state in Africa where murder is a capital offence, meaning witchdoctors can only acquire these body parts from underground organ hunters.

Demand for human skin

Cases similar to that of the Kenyan drivers, where people disappear mysteriously, only for their bodies to be discovered several days later minus various body parts are so many in the continent today that they are treated as routine crimes in some countries.

According to the South African Police Service Research Centre reports, there is a belief that body parts taken from live victims are rendered more potent by their screams, which means victims must be subjected to pain before death.

Ritual killings have been reported in Mozambique where the country's Human Rights League has blamed them on the proliferation of witchdoctors from western Africa. Authorities have also confirmed that although most of the organs trafficked in that country are for transplants, extraction of organs for witchcraft purposes also happens.

Human skin appears to be one of the most sought-after things by ritual killers in Africa.

During the early 2000s, there were widespread cases of people being killed and skinned in Mbeya region of Tanzania and Mwiki outskirts of Nairobi. Investigations by the media and police revealed there was a high demand for human skin in Malawi, Zambia, Mozambique, South Africa where it fetched $2,400 (Sh180,000) to $9,600 (Sh180,000) depending on the age of the victim. In an effort to raise awareness about the trade in human skin Tanzania's chief government chemist's office kicked up a storm at an international business fair in Dar es Salaam by displaying skin and other human body parts.

Nigeria has the highest number of occult killings in the continent. Not surprisingly, the vice has found thematic expression in the country's vibrant film industry. According to Nigerian authorities, the killings are perpetrated by people commonly known as headhunters, who act at the behest of juju men.

Murdered in London

Cases of children being abducted and ritually slaughtered are so many in southwest Nigeria that they sparked a spate of murderous protests and mob lynching early last year that left more than 20 suspected kidnappers dead.

The murder in London of a Nigerian kid, which British police named "Boy Adam" for lack of positive identification, in September 2001, brought to international attention to Nigeria's ritual killings.

Forensic examinations on Adam's torso, found floating in River Thames, revealed that he was a native of Yoruba Plateau in Nigeria and the state of the cadaver indicated a style of ritual killing practised in West and Southern Africa.

Although this case came about barely ten days after the September 11 terrorist attack on the US, it prompted such a huge media coverage that retired South African President Nelson Mandela and Nigerian soccer star Nwanko Kanu joined the rest of the world in appeals for clues leading to the arrest of Adam killers.

But even after the arrest of 22 West Africans in Britain and an aggressive campaign by Metropolitan police in Nigeria to track down the boy's mother, the case was never resolved.

A confidential report by the police afterwards established that children were being trafficked into the UK from Africa and used for human sacrifice. The report also claimed that "for spells to be powerful it required a sacrifice of a male child unblemished by circumcision".

Increased unemployment, poverty, food shortages, famines and greed for money are some of the reasons blamed for the recent surge of deaths attributed to human sacrifice in Uganda. The frequency of the killings is especially high in the country's poor north and eastern regions.

Although in 2008 alone more than 300 cases of ritual related murders cases were reported to the police, only 18 of them made it to the courts. The situation was made worse by the fact that several of the high-profile suspects arrested in these cases were parents and relatives of the children victims.

"My experience working with victims suggests that the perpetrators are greedy people who want to get rich quick. In rural areas, people can sacrifice their own child. In urban areas, educated and rich people will look for somebody else's," says Elena Lomeli, a volunteer with the British charity VSO.

The situation has been so bad that in January 2009, the Ugandan government appointed a special police taskforce on human sacrifice and announced that 2,000 officers were to receive special training in tackling child trafficking with the support of US government.

These incidences have prompted Bakayambira, a renowned Kampala theatre group, to come up with a production called Baffesa Iwa feza. In the midst of its humour, the production carries a strong condemnation of ritual killings. However, all these murders take a backseat compared to the killings of albinos in Tanzania.

Believed to have magical powers to attract wealth in a short time, albino body parts are a hot commodity for sorcery and witchcraft in that country.

Derogatorily referred to as zeru, ghost in Kiswahili, people with the pigmentation defect in Tanzania are not, in certain cases, safe even among members of their own families.

A 35-year-old man in Lake Tanganyika was accused of trying to sell his 24-year-old wife to Congolese businessmen for $2,000 (Sh150,000) while in Mwanga District a mother was alleged to have sold her albino baby girl to a group of men who slaughtered her and drunk her blood.

Danger lurks everywhere

"They are cutting us up like chickens. Our biggest fear now is the fear of living. If you leave work at night as an albino you are unsure of reaching home safely. When you sleep you are unsure of waking up in one piece. In the streets you hear people plotting how they can get you," lamented Zihada Msembo, Tanzanian Albino Society secretary general.

The case of Elizabeth Hussein, a 13-year-old girl from Shinyanga, is a testimony to the plight of albinos in Tanzania.

After leaving home alone to watch a film about Jesus in the village centre, the girl had signed her own death warrant. On her way back, she was waylaid and hacked to bits by a machete-wielding mob.

Official reports in Tanzania indicate that 35 albinos were murdered in 2008, mostly women and children, but leaders in the Tanzanian albinism community believe the number of deaths could be higher. The situation is so bad in some areas that children with this genetic defect have to be escorted to and fro school by community or government bodyguards.

Even in death they are not safe. Heavy rocks have to be placed on graves to deter grave robbers.

The growth of mining and fishing activities in the Lake Victoria regions of Mwanza, Shinyanga and Mara regions has led to a sudden rise in demand of albino body parts. Besides the three regions being known for witchcraft, some miners and fishermen believe that albino body parts cause instant success.

Fishermen for instance, have this macabre belief that if they weave strands of red albino hair into their nets, fish will be attracted by the glimmer. Although poverty and ignorance are the major causes of these barbaric acts, Nigerian films are being accused of touting the efficacy of witchcraft.

Reports also indicate that albino body parts harvested in Tanzania are being exported to neighbouring countries where they fetch higher prices. In one instance last year, a Tanzanian trader was intercepted travelling to the Democratic Republic of Congo with an albino baby head in his luggage. On further questioning the man confessed that a businessman was going to pay for the head by its weight. In North America and Europe one in 20,000 people have some form of albinism but in Tanzania it's five times as common with one in 4,000 being albinos.

Although various sources put the number of albinos in the country at around 300,000, the WHO says the number hardly exceeds 170,000.

The wave of killing sprees has led to many albinos seeking refuge in the remote Ukerewe Island on the shores of Lake Victoria where murders are rare. Albinism is a hereditary lack of melanin pigment which protects the skin, eyes, and hair from the sun's ultraviolet rays. But there is a myth in the lake region that a mineral in a native fish causes the high levels of albinism.

Al-Shaymaa Kwegyir, Tanzania's first albino MP, launched a spirited campaign in 2008 to sensitize the public on these heinous acts.

In October 2008, albinos staged a demonstration in the city of Dar es Salaam to raise awareness and many people supported it. But that same evening one of the demonstrators was followed home by unknown assailants who chopped off her hands and left her for dead. It's that bad.

During his monthly television addresses to the nation Preside nt Jakaya Kikwete has dwelt on the issue at length in several occasions, urging Tanzanians "to discard superstitious beliefs and shortcuts to wealth" and instructing the police to crackdown on traditional healers involved in the albino killings. May 4 is National Albino Day in Tanzania and draws representatives with albinism from Ghana, Kenya, Malawi, Senegal, South Africa and United Kingdom.

During last year's Albino Day forum in Dar, the Albino Association of Kenya chairman, Alex Munyere, urged Tanzanian authorities to stop the killings before they spread to Kenya.

However, albinos in Burundi, affected by the killing wave in Tanzania, got a moral boost when eight men charged with killing albinos in the town of Ruyigi were sentenced to life imprisonment.

"I think it will reduce the amount of attacks on albinos in our country," Mr Kazungu Kassim, spokesman for Burundi albinos, told journalists.

The stature of ritual murders and witchcraft in the past was reinforced by the rise of leaders like Jean-Bidel Bokassa and Idi Amin who, from their public utterances and evidence discovered in their homes after their ouster, had an affinity for human body parts.

Although the reason for ritual killing is squarely blamed on witchcraft, ignorance, poverty, greed for money and power, the quest to overcome diseases like HIV/Aids also contributes to the escalation of this barbarism.

In Swaziland for instance, a country weighed down by intricate traditions and superstitions, police and the press have reported an upswing in ritual murders during electioneering periods.

"It's a form of sympathetic magic where the life force of the victim is sacrificed to give power to the recipient" says Dr Thandie Malepe, director of the National Psychiatric Centre in Manzini, the country's commercial capital.

allAfrica.com