Ghanaians And Superstition.

The following stories which you are about to read were first broadcasted on Ghana Waves radio.

The first story involves a German based Ghanaian emigrant who was apparently doing well in life until misfortune became him. According his friends, this particular guy came to Germany an illegal emigrant and like most Ghanaians was making an effort to get some kind of order created in his life, which he did manage to realize quite successfully.

And it was not long before employment did bring him financial stability, thus making it possible for him to travel back home and pursue a business endeavour. Whilst in Ghana he did manage to build three storey buildings,set up a restaurant and even bought a huge land, which he intended to farm, but since he couldn't be in Ghana on a daily basis to oversee the daily management of his empire, he instructed his mother to do it on his behalf and this the mother did wholeheartedly. Most of his close friends were very proud of his accomplishments and loved how he spoke so esteem of his mother. The mother would keep his son updated on what was going on the Ghana market and what her son needed to do to get some piece of the action, which he did and became more successful business wise.

But as some time went by and on things were bound to change and how, this guy got fired from his job not because of anything he had wrongfully done, but because the company which he was working for was moving out of the country to Thailand. Anyway he got a hefty amount of money from the company, when he was made redundant and invested it in his business back home in Ghana. Now exactly six months after being made redundant and this guy was still at home unemployed, six months became a year and a year became two years and this guy just hit rock bottom.

He didn't tell his mother about his condition in Germany and so the phone calls from Ghana kept coming, inquiring about why he was not sending them this and that, things simply took turn for the worse and so on the advise of a friend he went to see a pastor from one of those spiritual churches. Now after an intense conversation and prayer with the pastor, he was informed by the pastor that his very own mother was behind his misfortune.

Now according to one of his close friends, this guy went and bought a return plane ticket to Ghana were he confronted his mother with this allegation and when the mother denied, he simply out of anger slapped his mother on her face, pulled her wig from off her head and started thrashing her so severely that had the police not arrived on time, the mother would've died and all because somebody said that his dear was a witch and he believed it. This guy is now under incarceration in Ghana.

This second story is about a brother who brought his sister over from Ghana and married her for reasons we all know. Now both of them were living in the same city, but after they divorced the sister moved out of the city to start new life of her own, where she met a Ghanaian guy immediately after. Her brother also wanted to get married and settle down, but he couldn't find anyone despite his good looks and money.

And so in his quest for an answer he met one of those juju men from India, who told him that his inability to find a suitable woman for himself was because his sister had married him in spirit. According the sister her brother paid her an unexpected visit one saturday evening and confronted her with this allegation, which she called ridiculous and blatantly denied, but her brother kept on talking and screaming at her until violence erupted from both sides with him injuring his sister severely.

The neighbours who overheard them fighting called the police, her brother has been charged with assault and is now in prison.

Now after hearing all these stories, I wondered if we as a people could ever rise above our superstition and face reality for what's worth.