Duamenefa Foundation and the Trokosi

Duamenefa Foundation means “Let us co-exist in peace together”, and is a registered NGO in Ghana and a 501c3 in America. We educate our listeners to understand the culture and traditions in which we live here in the Volta Region of Ghana and beyond and teach best practices. Duamenefa Foundation is working to help assure people do not use the freedoms of worship in their traditions and religions to hurt other people, families or communities. We speak for those voiceless ones who need help.

If we find an infraction of this peace, we intervene in these spiritual matters in such areas as:

(a) Invocation of the wrath of the “gods”

(b) Using human beings as servitude to the “gods”

(c) Falsification of prophecies, counterfeit visions, and revelations by false prophets

As a result of our investigations and interventions, we took a closer look into the plight of a forgotten people group, unknown in most of the world; the Trokosi. These are women who are used as human sacrifices by their families. They are given to the shrine leaders to live in forced servitude to the idols and fetish priests as part of a penalty for a sin committed by a family member. (An uncle might have raped someone, so the family begins to suffer the wrath of the gods because the family of the raped one will pay to invoke the wrath of the gods against the rapist’s family. People start dying, going mad or blind or something else and the afflicted family will then seek counsel at their shrine to find out what is going on. Finding out that the wrath of the gods has been invoked; they must appease or pacify the gods. The family has to pay in money, goats, chickens, alcohol, and a human sacrifice to serve for a number of years depending on the crime. The human sacrifice is a young virgin girl from puberty age or younger, given to the shrine. They give up everything they own and only enter with a wrap provided by their family. They are often raped and abused by the priests, work the fields and make money for shrine. They bear children and have to fend for themselves and their children. If they run away, the family has to replace them with someone else. It is a perpetual sacrifice. The girl represents a type of savior to the family.

Duamenefa Foundation, up until this point, has been negotiating to keep the human sacrifice off the list of requirements and has saved a lot of young girls from a horrible life of slavery. Now it is time to go to the heart of the matter. We hear their cries to be free, to live normal lives with their children and to have basic human rights which, by law, should be afforded to every human being.

We began by inquiring of the chiefs in one area and received a list of 205 Trokosi and as we went back to assess the needs, we found some interesting facts: There are 26 current Trokosi yet to be released, some Trokosi have completed their servitude, but are still awaiting a final payment owed to be released. Then there are 95 former Trokosi abandoned and left destitute to fend for themselves with no training, no education, no money and nowhere to go, so many have no choice but to return to the shrines. These are single parents needing help to survive with their children.

But most heartbreaking is that we discovered 232 orphans left behind due to death of the parents from the invocation of the wrath of the gods against their families; 86 are under 15 years of age and need education for a good future. The rest need training to survive.

All these are crying out for our help. They see a flicker of hope for the first time from the inquiries of Duamenefa Foundation and its Executive President, Evangelist Emmanuel Ketaman Evortepe, also the CEO of FAFAA FM 100.3 radio, which has been utilized to broadcast the interventions live. Can we turn any away?

Duamenefa Foundation will help by God’s grace. This is our mandate from Jehovah and we will succeed.

www.duamenefafoundation.org / news editor in chief