Witchcraft Beliefs and Societal Impact

• Sefa-Dadeh believes that if entrepreneurs are too afraid of witchcraft attacks to expand their businesses, the entire country suffers.
• Witchcraft is a belief system that affects development.
• Former national team coach Milovan Rajevac has spoken out about some Black Stars players using black magic.
• Coach Goran Stevanovic reported to the Ghana Football Association that players used black magic against each other during the Nations Cup.
• Stevanovic said that they needed to help change some players' mentality about using black power to harm themselves, and install discipline and respect.
• Witchcraft involves possessing and using personal spiritual or psychic powers for good or evil, which may be inherent or acquired.
• God, deities, ancestors, and wild spirits can cause misfortune, as can man's malice, often channeled through an associate or relative.
• Misfortune can appear as failure in social or economic ventures, illness, accidents, injury, or death.
• It is believed that some people have spirits that can do such things as fly, change into animals, and perform nocturnal misadventures.
• Witchcraft is psychic and spiritual, with methods not visible to the ordinary eye.
• Witchcraft characteristics vary across societies and can be involuntary, such as in the Azande case, where a witch may not know they are responsible for the harm caused.
• Sorcery, also known as 'juju,' is based on learned techniques and the the manipulation of objects, and is considered equally harmful.
• Proof of witchcraft and sorcery is hard to find, so it relies more on suspicion or what a witch doctor claims.
• Witchcraft beliefs have a long history, and some see them as unscientific searches for causality.
• Witchcraft attempts to answer why misfortunes happen where science can only answer the question of how.
• People require answers to their misfortunes, which explain the persistence of witchcraft beliefs, even among scientifically educated people.
• The key issue from an academic perspective is not whether witchcraft exists, but the effect of witchcraft beliefs on society.
• This makes witchcraft a developmental issue with potential positive and negative socio-economic implications.
• Witchcraft has gender implications that affects community life, individual participation, and choices.
• The negative effects of witchcraft outweigh any good that it may do.

Witch-Hunting

• Because evidence for witchcraft is difficult to find, it is inevitably associated with suspicion.
• People who are highly successful are frequently accused of witchcraft due to suspicion of spiritual intervention.
• Marginalized members of society like women, the childless, widows, and orphans are also frequent targets of witchcraft accusations.
• Anti-social personalities like the cantankerous, talkative, reticent, and envious, as well as those who engage in incest or homosexual intercourse are accused.
• People with extraordinary physiques like the deformed, very ugly, very beautiful, or red-eyed are also targeted.

Case Studies

• In Tamale, police arrested two people for allegedly battering to death a 62-year-old widow accused of bewitching a 23-year-old man in Gilic, Northern Region in July of 2010.
• The deceased supposedly held the soul of the 23-year-old and was severely beaten as a result, leading to her death.
• Takoradi police arrested a couple for causing the death of their nine-year-old son in April of 2008.
• The couple kept their son indoors based on the orders of a spiritualist who claimed the boy was possessed by witchcraft.
• The spiritualist ordered that the boy be kept in a room until he died.
• The boy complained of excessive heat and ate abnormally, which resulted in his body swelling.
• In Kwadaso, Kumasi, a 45-year-old woman named Konadu set fire to the room she shared with her mother, 14-year-old son, and 4-year-old boy killing all four in January 2007
• Konadu accused her mother of inflicting illnesses.
• Konadu, who had asthma, diabetes, hypertension, and a stomach ulcer, accused her mother of her condition.
• Despite being talked out of it, she locked the bedroom door, set the room on fire, and hid the keys, so no one could escape.

Witches' Villages

• There are about four to five witch camps in the Gambaga, Kukuo, Ngani, Kpasinkpe, and Kpatinga communities.
• These camps house approximately 535 women who are suspected of being witches according to CHRAJ officials.

The Accusers

• Witch doctors & medicine men are often the accusers.
• Some pastors and religious figures attribute illnesses to witches during healing sessions
• People who are unsuccessful and seeking a scapegoat are often accusers
• Those who harbor jealousy or people who are competitors, like co-wives and work mates can be accusers.
• Close kin and associates are also known to be accusers.
• The accusers are also often those who suffer calamities.

The Harm Caused by Witchcraft Beliefs

• Witches can be mistreated, ostracized, & even killed.
• A person's character is defamed without justification.
• Pragmatic answers to problems are not sought, especially when health or business are concerned.
• Distrust of family members and associates spreads.
• People are reluctant to exhibit achievements or talent for fear of arousing suspicion or being attacked.
• Dangerous ordeals and procedures may be used in the search for the Witch.
• Witchcraft marginalizes the marginalized even further.

Schooling Rights

• If one's mother is labelled a witch, it can affect education and life prospects.
• The mother of Zoyen Teiya, a resident of Zanerigu in the Talensi-Nabdam district, was accused of witchcraft in Primary Four.
• Stigmatization and discrimination by her mates compelled her to move from school to school, but the continued discrimination led her to drop out of school at the basic level.
• At 22, Zoyen Teiya was impregnated by a man who left her after finding she was a witch.

Positives

• The association of the weak with witchcraft may result in the powerful not abusing the rights of the weak for fear of being bewitched.
• There may be increased attendance to the needs of the vulnerable which can help to avoid bewitchment.
• Witchcraft might promote an egalitarian society by discouraging flaunting of wealth, as well as may promote psychic healing.
• Some cases attributed to witchcraft may be psychic in nature and can be treated by witch doctors.