“Prophets” Of Our Republic

We have begun yet another year with all manner of prophesies from the so called “men of God” and “Self-imposed prophets”. Interestingly, they don’t see or reveal any good prophesies about our nation, but doom and pronouncement of death sentences on prominent citizens. Maybe these prophets should start telling us when the ordinary Ghanaian and or our grandparents at our villages are going to die as well.

This is what we get when we give too much attention and reverence to some of these “men of God” and think that they hold the key to our very survival. Of course, we know how these “men of God” are worshiped on pulpits and on television screens in this country. Sorcerers, spiritualists and so called “men of God” are all flooding our airwaves, especially television stations to market their “products” to the public, while our leaders watch on.

We have had “pastors” and spiritualists conjure monies on Ghanaian televisions. You might have also heard or seen how some of them give concoctions to some of their unsuspecting clients in churches, in the name of curing all manner of health conditions including HIV/AIDS. I recently heard one of these “prophets” on his radio station in Kumasi, advertising the sale of clothes for women, purported to be a cure for breast cancer and or prevention against breast cancer. This is how far we have come! How can we make progress in our quest to reducing the disease burden of this country and promote healthy lives if we allow some of these things to gain roots? You don’t wait for some of these things to derail your disease prevention initiatives, get problems compounded and then begin to spend huge sums of the nation’s meagre GPD on procuring curative medical supplies and technologies and think you deserve an applause.

Who is responsible for regulating our airwaves and the content of what is churn out to the unsuspecting public? You can’t entirely blame victims of these tricks shown on our television and radio stations, but regulating authorities must be blamed partly for failing to do their job.

Not long ago, when the late Ebony (May her soul rest in peace) had an accident on the Sunyani-Kumasi road, we had tens of “prophets” in Ghana who managed to attribute her death to spiritualty. And they were in one way or the other successful in drawing the entire nation into believing the spiritual cause of death at the expense of the primary cause of death. The entire nation jumped into the discussions of “prophesies” upon “prophesies” while we made little or no mentioned of the police report on cause of accident or death.

Should a section of the media who indulge in so much sensationalism in their reportage be blamed for making these so called “men of God” and “prophets” relevant in Ghana?

I think the proliferation of “Prophets” with “third eye” and their doom prophesies constitute serious threat to our national security. Pronouncing death on fellow citizens in public is obviously problematic and a recipe for fear and panic. I don’t know the stand of the law on this worrying development though. Do victims have the right to sue or not?

Isn’t it about time these same “men of God” and “prophets” who are mortals like us begin to give us prophesies about when they are also going to die?

Author: Samson Gbolu
Email: [email protected]