“Imagine yourself visiting a
community called Basa Komo in the FCT and all of a sudden, you come
face-to-face with a crowd. You move closer and are confronted with a
helpless infant, struggling to set himself loose from the grip of
community leaders, who want to bury him alive”.Continue for more...
Sun News in a report published today, recounted the story of Olusola Stevens, the North Central Director of the Christian Missionary Foundation (CMF) and his wife who witnessed the practice of killing infants or burying some alive with their dead mothers even in the domain of the Federal Capital Territory.
According to the report, in Bassa Komo,
Abuja, it is abomination to be born a twin; or if a mother dies within
three months of a baby’s birth; or if a child grows upper teeth first or
is born with defect. These are all faults of the baby or babies
involved. To the people of the community, these are signs that such
babies were fabricated in the factory of the devil and are themselves
evil. Such offences by the evil baby or babies are punishable by burial
alive.
“If you are not very observant, you
will not know this practice is going on and it took us some time to
actually confirm. Some of the enlightened indigenes of the area deny the
practice, maybe out of shame, but it is still happening till date,” Stevens confirmed.
He has been in the FCT since the late
80s, reaching out to the people in Bassa Komo, the Gbagyi Yama and the
Ganagana. His Foundation has been able to rescue some of the children,
some of whom have been reunited with their families, even though they
are still living with the Stevens.
How they are killed
Twins: When they are delivered, they will be poisoned
(the child dies gradually) or strangulated after being forcefully taken
from the mother by masquerades that women are not allowed to see. Once
they are killed, an altar will be raised on the walls of their huts to
worship their spirits and make sacrifices to ward them off from
returning.
Mum’s death after birth:
If a woman delivers and dies during childbirth, the child will be tied
to the body of the dead mother and buried alive with her. If the nursing
mother should die of any cause without weaning the baby, the baby will
be accused of having strange powers that killed the mother, the penalty
for this is also death. In some villages, the children may be abandoned
on the grave of the dead mother while some are left unattended to in the
village, leading to starvation and eventual death.
Wrong teeth child: A
child that grows upper teeth first is also bound to die. The couple
discovered that babies that grow the upper teeth first are also killed
because they are bad omen. This is neatly done, an outsider may never
know when and how unless you understand their language and pay close
attention to young babies in the area.
Stevens
noted that up to 40 villages are still involved in such practices in
the Abuja. He also added that the practice is not common among the Abuja
indigenes alone, “We also learnt from some other agencies that we work closely with that twins are not allowed to live in Uturu, Abia State,” he told Sun News.
Stevens and his wife have now set up a home called the Divine Heritage Home
where the rescued children live. So far, the foundation has rescued
about 33 kids spread across several villages. Some of the kids were
rescued at tender ages, a day old, two weeks old, a month old and so on.
At the time they started rescuing the
children, one of them had asked the villagers if they would take the
child back if after four years the child remains healthy. They bluntly
refused, saying the evil spirit would still be in their bodies.
However, they have continued to preach
to members of the community, shelter all the children and send them to
school among many other philantropic activities. To read more about
their works in Abuja, read the full Sun News report HERE.
Culled from Bellanaija.
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