Presentation

This is an essay about witches. A documentary film about child witches in Africa has inspired me to tell about this. This is a sad topic, but we cannot hide from it because this is the real truth. I am so grateful that I can live her in Denmark and I want to help the people who are accused of being a witch or a wizard some day, when I get a lot of money.

The documentary film is going on in Akwa Ibom that is a poor and dangerous state in Nigeria. Akwa Ibom is the highest oil and gas producing state in the country and the oil industry is killing the fish in the sea and making the people in Akwa Ibom sick. The people are mostly of the Christian faith.

Because of lack of education and a miserable government, the people blame the children and the devil for the devastation and the children suffer much.

The documentary film ''The Child witches of Africa''.

The film is about some of the Christian churches in Akwa Ibom in Nigeria where the adults think that their children are possessed by the devil. The families blame the children for the sickness, devastation and death and the closest family will abandon, torture or murder their children in the name of God if the children do not confess that they are a witch or a wizard. Also, the powerful priests in the churches will torture the children until they confess to something they are not.

The documentary tells about a 5-year-old girl called Mary, who is accused of being the devil himself. When she went to visit her family, her family did not want to see her.

An English man called, Gary Foxcroft, helps Mary and she moved into the centre CRARN where Sam Itauma would take care of her. Sam and his people are working hard to help the children who are accused of being a witch or a wizard. The children arrive with serious wounds when they come to the CRARN centre, because only a few clinics and hospitals want to help possessed children.

The documentary film shows a man called, Sunday Ulup-Aya, he calls himself a “bishop”. He has made a fortune on exorcism and on killing over 100 children who was innocent. The price is 170 pounds and he will keep the child until the poor parents pay. He seems proud of what he does for a living. The film shows the bishop trying to make an accused little boy go spiritually blind so he cannot see the witch world again. He made the boy a drink, containing pure alcohol, African Mercury and the bishop's own blood.

All this happens because the African people want to blame someone, anyone, for the death, sickness and devastation in their country or city. The easiest thing to do would be blaming the helpless children, but this is not the children’s fault. International experts confirm that the reason is the big oil industry that is causing the earth – and air pollution and making the people sick. But anyway, the people still think that it is the child witches and not the oil-industry that is causing all this.

My thoughts about the child witches in Africa

I think that these things that are going on are absolutely terrible. I want to help them by giving them money, but I always wonder why things in Africa never are improving. Money that is donated through charity does not seem to help the poor, helpless and stupid religious African people, it is sad that it is not certain that the money goes to what they are supposed to. I think that the African government are rich because they keep the money for themselves.

I think it is pure evil that people can treat kids like that, but the African culture is so violent and poor that things like that is normal. I blame the government.

I am frustrated that the government is careless with its people. I am frustrated that the police does not do anything.

 

I think the children are defenseless because the families are often extremely poor, and sometimes maybe relieved to have one mouth less to feed.

The churches are seen as spiritually powerful because they can detect witchcraft and the parents pay them a lot of money for exorcism. I think the other churches might see it as a competition and they will ‘find’ child witches as well so they can earn some money and respect.

If I were growing up in Akwa Ibom

If I were 10 years old and had lived in Denmark all my life, and should move to Akwa Ibom, I do not think I would survive. I would be used to having unnecessary things, clothes, food and a home with walls, doors, beds, clean water and electricity. If all that was taken from me and I had to move to Akwa Ibom with my parents and 5 siblings, we would suffer more than the African people. I would feel helpless and sad. I would be so lost in memories of my old life, instead on getting used to my new life in Africa. Maybe I would kill myself.

If my parents would join the crazy churches and my siblings would die because of the pollution, I would be doomed.

But this is something nobody knows, you can only find out, if you go there and live there. 

If I was born in Akwa Ibom and had always lived there, I think my chance of survival would be different. I would have no money, dirty water and maybe I would be a member of one of the crazy churches. But then it would be normal and I would never know that a child’s life could be much better, because I had never experienced it. My life would be miserable, because my needs and my wishes as a child would never come true. I would die young and only live to survive and not live to live. I would feel abandoned if my parents died or I was left alone to live in the streets. I would feel like a nobody among everybody.

My friend who lives in Imo, Nigeria.

I have a childhood-friend who was kicked out of Denmark 6 months ago. His name is Aham Ogueri and he lives in Nigeria, he has lived there in about 7 years. I asked him if he knew something about child witches. He said that he had heard that people blame their children for the sickness and death and that the parents maybe are tired of their children and would give them to the church. He did not know anything about childwitches. He knows that it is not the children’s fault and he says it happens all the time.

Brainwashing.

Brainwashing has much to do with the people of Akwa Ibom. Most of the people are of the Christian faith and believe that their actions are right. The parents are asked for so much money that they will sell their property or torture their kids themselves. This is not what churches should be doing. The Bible says nothing about blaming the children for death and devastation, but the people in Akwa Ibom think they are doing the right thing.

I think the extreme poverty is a big influence to the people's choices. A poor person from Akwa Ibom is always worried and just wants to survive. They would probably enjoy going to church and sing and worship God, but I also believe that people go to church because everyone else does, too.

They do not know any better and would just ‘follow the flow’. So when they all kill and torture their children and accuse them of being witches, it is easy to do the same. I do not think they can believe that they are brainwashed, because when everyone does this, then it must be the right thing to do?

Short text of Wikipedia’s definition of ‘Mind control’:

Mind control (also known as brainwashing, coercive persuasion, mind abuse, thought control, or thought reform) refers to a process in which a group or individual "systematically uses unethically manipulative methods to persuade others to conform to the wishes of the manipulator(s), often to the detriment of the person being manipulated". The term has been applied to any tactic, psychological or otherwise, which can be seen as subverting an individual’s sense of control over his or her own thinking, behavior, emotions or decision-making.

- I think Wikipedia is right about something. I do not think that brainwash always has something to do with the wishes of the manipulator(s). I think that a person is an easy victim if they are desperate and wants to believe anything to feel better or stronger. Some people follow a group or the society and imitate what others do. They end up being brainwashed without knowing it.

I think that people who knows how to brainwash people has a dangerous ability to control people into doing things that the person normally would never do.

I do not think the people in Akwa Ibom will understand that they are wrong about their beliefs. If I asked them, if they where brainwashed, they would probably say no. Maybe they could understand if all the manipulators (the priests), was prisoned and if a big organization helped all the people to understand what is right and wrong. I do not know the answer, because the people in Akwa Ibom are extremely brainwashed since they can kill and torture their own children, only because a priest says so.

When I was 11-14 years old, my family and I where members of a Danish church, called Faderhuset. We were homeless and they offered us a place to live. We loved the church at first, but after a couple of years the leader/priest of the church, Ruth Evensen, began to manipulate with my parents and the rest of the church.  

Once a desperate woman came to Ruth and told her that her 4-year old daughter was raped by her husband, the daughter’s father. Ruth said that the girl was possessed by a lying demon, which made her say that her vagina was hurting and that her father had touched her there. The mother was angry and still believed in her daughter. Ruth took the girl and said that if she wanted her back, she had to understand that the little girl was possessed and that she must stay married with her husband or leave the church. The rest of the church was angry with this mother because she listened to a demon. The mother left and became desperate after a few weeks and wanted to see her daughter. She went back to Ruth and said that she would stay married to her husband and that Ruth was right.

The father raped the little girl again when she was 6 years old. The mother took off with her alone and I have not seen them since.

Other members of the church bought a new Audi for 250.000 DKR and gave it to Ruth because she said that God had told her that it was a gift to her. Ruth controlled when people could have sex with each other, even if they were married. Everybody wash brainwashed in that church.

I was also brainwashed once when I was 13 years old. I was on a military boot camp in Faderhuset, with the leaders and 15 young people. The leaders treated us in ways that are illegal in Denmark. They made us do things and they did things to us that I, at that time, did not know was wrong. Everybody including myself thought that what we did was right. We were all brainwashed. After the camp I never told anybody about it, not even my parents. I just thought it was normal. Now I know that I was brainwashed and my parents know that they where brainwashed as well.

 

I would tell more about my experience with brainwash but there is so much to tell, that this essay could go on forever.

When they abuse the children.

There are many stories about the childwitches in Africa, I think it is sad to read the details about what the children have been through. The major part of the children have wounds or are mentally damaged and they would need a lot of help and love to recover and get normal again.

I think a child is an easy victim of brainwashing, because they do not know any better. When the entire community and people at home and at church are blaming a child for causing death, the child will believe it and feel guilty.
These stories tell about the reality around the world.
Here are some stories I found from different articles on the Internet:

 Nwanaokwo Edet, 9 years old

A little boy lay on a bloodstained hospital-sheet where ants where crawling, the boy was just staring blindly at the wall. The 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 and burned away his face and eyes. The little and skinny boy barely had strength left to whisper the name of the church that had denounced him — Mount Zion Lighthouse.

A month later, he died.

Abigail Eyekang, 8 years old

A “prophet” from the Apostolic Church accused Abigail, because she liked to sleep outside on hot nights – she might fly away and join a witch meeting or something.

Series of exorcisms cost the mother, Margaret Eyekang, 8 months wages, or US$ 270. The payments ruined the mother.
The prophet and the neighbors attacked Abigail. They beaded her with sticks and Abigail was left alone and had to sleep in the streets.

Jane

There is 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 did not cure her of witchcraft.

Michael

Michael was found by a farmer clearing a ditch, starving and unable to stand on legs that had been flogged raw.

Rachel, 12 years old

Rachel dreamed of being a banker but was instead chained up by her pastor, starved and beaten with sticks repeatedly. Her dear uncle paid the priest $60 for the exorcism.

Mary, 15 years old

Mary 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.

Israel, Nwaekwa and Jerry

Israel's cousin tried to bury him alive.

Nwaekwa's father drove a nail through her head.

All knees, elbows and teeth, was beaten on Jerry by his pastor, they starved him and made him eat cement. His own father then set Jerry on fire, as the pastor's wife cheered it on.