Traditional authorities of Adansi Akrofuom in the Ashanti Region have banned the Oyoko family in the community from performing the final funeral rites of their late relative, Maame Serwaa, who died recently during childbirth.
The angry traditional leaders, led by the regent, Nana Annin Agyekum II, arrived at the decision on Tuesday after they found scandalising, the family’s decision to return the body of 27-year-old Maame Serwaa to the mortuary.
The family had laid the body of the young woman in state the previous night on March 6, 2015 and was about to send it for interment when the Abusua Panin, Kwabena Okyere, ordered its return to the morgue because the lady’s husband failed to attend the burial rite.
The chiefs rescinded their initial decision to deny the woman’s body a final resting place at the community’s cemetery and rather fined the family a staggering GH¢2,900 to allow the interment and also to pacify the gods of the land.
According to the Akrofuom regent, the family had defiled the community and brought a curse on Akrofuom, which then occasioned their decision to impose a fine, part of which would be used to buy sheep and drinks to make sacrifices to the gods of the land.
According to the chief, they need to appease the angry gods due to the action of the family head who was bent on harassing and persecuting the lady’s husband for unknown reasons.
Nana Agyekum revealed that Abusua Panin Kwabena Okyere also forced the man to marry the deceased, and that they as chiefs found the family as imposing unnecessary hardships on their in-law.
“We found their action unwarranted and a desecration of the sanctity of our land and gods. We needed to take a drastic action to preclude any danger per their action and we thought they should not be allowed to perform the final funeral rite in our community,” he pointed out.
Though the decision of the chiefs did not go down well with the family, Abusua Panin Okyere said they would comply with the verdict.
He described it as harsh, intimating that while they accepted the verdict, the Ayorko family got it all wrong and that their decision was not dissimilar to his action.
