President Mahama and Gambaga Witch Camp

Gambaga Witch Camp together with all other witch camps in Ghana must be shut down as part of President Mahama’s ‘Reset Agenda.’ Something then President Akufo-Addo refused to do. In fact, together with O.R.A.L, shutting down all witch camps in the country should be good enough for a great legacy if nothing else is achieved under this term of our president.

Congratulations again to H.E John Mahama and H.E Naana Opoku-Agyeman. Some of us had hoped that after O.R.A.L, the next Executive Order would have been to wind down all witch camps and liberate some of our mothers, grandmothers, sisters, aunties and others who find themselves entrapped in ‘witchcraft-prisons,’ scattered across the country.

For every Ghanaian and foreigner including ex-president Akufo-Addo himself knows that he set the country back at least 50 years. President Mahama, even if given 8 years or 10years cannot reverse the rot; Thus, choosing to Reset rather than Reverse was the best mantra for this current term. In short, President Mahama should be viewed more like John the Baptist and not the Messiah.

Gambaga Witch Camp
Gambaga Witch Camp the most popular of these prisons was originally established in the 18^th century in the township of Gambaga in the Northeast Region to protect mostly women accused of witchcraft. The inmates included predominantly mothers and grandmothers who bore the brunt for other people’s misfortune.

To save them from lynchings and other barbaric acts, the camp was established to house the victims of such circumstances. That was then, and this is now and Gambaga Witch Camp and others like it should all be disbanded and possibly designated as tourist sites with its history narrated just like Salem, Massachusetts whose inhabitants were also once massacred for the crime of witchcraft; As a reminder to generations yet unborn of the rather unfortunate and barbaric treatment that was meted out to some of our fellow citizens.

It is a fact that the fervor with which the likes of Kwasi Prempeh, the head of the committee tasked with reviewing and recommending changes to Ghana’s constitution, tackle Transgender and other issues in Ghana is akin to an opera with Luciano Pavarotti, the great Tenor singer.

That fervor is missing when it comes to the prisoners in Gambaga and other witch camps possibly because those ‘witches’ are mostly from very poor backgrounds.

Ironically, in a country and continent where most of the men and women who lead various institutions of power and influence are perceived Warlords and Wizards, and Sorceress, it is rather the poor who are erroneously being maltreated as witches. GYE NYAME!