Children accused of witchcraft
The area mainly interested in these events is in the south/south region of Nigeria.
The social contest is that of the small villages of the rural area, while the cultural background settles in the religious beliefs, mixed with superstition.
Children are charged by the village chief or by the religious guide or by family members, with being responsible for any kind of misfortune happening to their families or to the community, due to their “witch power”.
Religious leaders, who play a fundamental role in the villages, are likely to confirm the accusations. When this happens, nobody tries to refute the accusation because it is believed that the pastors, or men of God, have the “spiritual eye”: which means that people think that the pastors are endowed with the ability to know who is a witch. Once they are labeled as sorcerers, children are brutally tortured in an attempt to be “healed” or for “confession”, if not killed or in any case cast away, or forced to escape away from a sure death.
Cast away children roam around with no food and no water to live on.
We suggest, for further information, the reading of the report of the Directorate General for External Policies of the European Union, July 2013, available here
They happen to be accused and abandoned to their destiny, no matter what their age is. If these children are not lucky enough to be caught by some NGO, their survival depends by their ability to join groups of abandoned kids on the edges of the bigger towns, where they manage a life whose difficulties and consequences of their mental and physical development are easily predictable.
The belief of witchcraft is also happening other places in the world read more that is why our work is more important than ever - we need to stop the superstition.
The local communities’ response to the rescue activity of the NGO’s and the importance of their work on the field.
The fierce opposition of the local communities to the rescue of the children accused of witchcraft is what best explains how rooted superstition is. Rescuers are looked at like people who spread misfortune on the villages’ people by breaking the religious rules according to which those children must be outcast, if not killed, because of their witch nature. Also, rescuers are believed to have the witchcraft power – that is why there can rescue and care for the children – hence they should also be attacked the same way the kids are.
What above described is the reason why we consider as an especially important part of our work in that region of Nigeria, the education of people. Way to the Nations leads various projects toward the spread of a different awareness of superstition.
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The Nigerian law frame concerning children’s rights.
Nigeria signed the Convention on the rights of the Child (CRC), adopted on 20th November 1989, by the United Nations General Assembly, and ratified it in year 1991. In year 2000, Nigeria ratified also the African Union Charted on the Rights and Welfare of the Child (CRCW), which had been adopted by the OAU Assembly of Heads of States and Governments, in July 1990. In year 2003, was approved the Nigerian Child Right Act. In the general frame given by the acts mentioned above, the State of Akwa Ibom, where our orphanage is, approved its own Child’s right law, whose Part 1, sub 1, shall rule:
“In every action concerning a child whether undertaken by an individual, public or private body, institutions or service, court of law, or administrative or legislative authority the best interest of a child shall be the primary consideration”.
Again, section 274 of the Child Right Law of Akwa Ibom State prohibits and penalizes anyone from accusing any child of being a witch, while section 275 prohibits and penalizes anyone from performing any form of exorcism of witchcraft from a child.
We can therefore say that the Nigerian law system as far as children's rights are concerned is complete, as well as we know, from working constantly with them and especially with the Family Courts, that the Institutions are not at all indifferent to what happens to these kids. We are enormously proud to be a ring of the chain of people who work to eradicate the phenomenon of witchcraft and make the world a better place.
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