The future of a 7-month pregnant woman lies in uncertainty as she has been abandoned in a thick forest by her family on suspicions of being a witch.
26-year-old Martha Ama Appiah resides in a dilapidated structure engulfed with worms, rodents, reptiles and at the mercy of wild animals because her family believes she is under a curse.
According to Martha, her parents were living together until the sudden demise of her mother who was cursed by someone for allegedly insulting her.
“I was living with my mother and father. Shortly after the birth of my younger sibling, she was killed by thunder after a woman evoked a curse on her. My father married afterwards, and my stepmother said she couldn’t live here so they should relocate. My stepmother told people I was a useless person who wasn’t supposed to live among human beings. My dad agreed to what she said and that’s why I’m still living here,” She said
She said her step mother afterwards managed to influence her father to abandon her (Martha) after which they both moved to settle elsewhere.
Ama Martha who says life hasn’t dealt pleasantly with her says she sometimes sleeps with men in exchange for money because she needed to feed.
This has resulted in the birth of three children who importunely die shortly after birth as she doesn’t have the means to properly take care of them.
She also narrated how she singlehandedly gave birth to all three babies in the forest.
“I don’t have money. The men come to me here to offer me money in exchange for sex and that’s how I got pregnant. I gave birth to three children singlehandedly. They died after delivery because nobody took care of them. I resorted to using blade to cut the placenta and I’m sure all that accounted to their death. One of my children also fell from my back into a river while I was trying to cross,” She added.
Martha went on further to state that the stigmatization against her worsened after the death of her babies with people accusing her of ‘eating up’ her children due to circumstances surrounding the death their death.
Ama who is expecting her fourth baby says she was impregnated by one ‘Abodam’ who promised to marry her but has failed to fulfil his promise after she conceived.
