Saving Africa's Witch Children - Lagos Screening flyer
This is a free event. Please bring your donation along with you, and tell all your friends. Putting a stop to this sick, evil and perverted practice is within reach!
One has to say, the recent actions of the Governor of Akwa Ibom are highly commendable. See here for some of the latest developments.
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7 comments:
There's a light. Not very bright but it's there nonetheless. It is high time we started speaking out against injustice in this country. Whether it is corruption, PHCN, brutality on the streets - WHATEVER!! - let us start to speak out and -if that's what it takes - shame our leaders into action!
This dumentary was made in support of a charity, to raise money from the British public in support of a 'good' cause, fine. But if you have any experience with these things you will understand that they are as a consequence necessarily exaggerated and made to shock the viewing public into reaching for their purses, it is called a 'shockumentary', it take a bad situation and turns it into a truely shocking exposé, not by lying, but by exaggerating the problem, expertly editing the video to make normally unconnected events appear inextricably linked even without explicitly saying so. This was a very well made shockumentary, good work. But to the informed ears and tutored eyes, Helen Ukpabio has been accused of the wrong crime.
The Shockumentary wrongly suggests that Helen Ukpabio is the reason (or at least a significant reason) for the child abuse in villages in Akwa Ibom State, an allegation which is ridiculously untrue, people in villages up and down Nigeria have believed in witchcraft before Helen Ukpabio was born, and will unfortunately continue to do so when she is long dead, she brings nothing new or significant to the stupidity, she is merely a part of it. She, as far as I know, has never physically harmed a child, maybe she has psychologically, but no more than the children's parents themselves, and no more than any other preacher in Nigeria who believes in or preaches hell and demons in the presence of children. The children shown in this documentary have no connection what so ever with Helen Ukpabio, and there is no court of law that will accept a flimsy an evidence as a movie (End of the wicked), produced soley for reason's of monetary profit and approved by the censors, as reason behind child abuse to the extent that the producer of the movie be held responsible for the stupidity, ignorance and wickedness of the perpetrators of child abuse. While we are at it, why don't we arrest Olu maintain for encouraging advanced fee fraud, arrest schwarzenneger for all gun crimes, Al pacino for all violence against women, and all Nigeria pastors for defrauding the public.
There is an excorsist named as Bishop in the documentary, he boasts of killing over 100 children, well guess what, if he was a vulcanizer he would have boasted of patching over 1,000 tyres a day. His job is to promote his trade, and his trade is fear, so in order strike fear into the hearts of those who patronise him, he needs to make these claims. If that man had boasted that he had turned 10 tonnes of stone into gold the producers of the documentary would have taken their time to prove him the liar that he is, but because his claim fits well with their shockumentary then it is necessary to let him have his way, maybe even encourage him to tell more lies, hey why not.
There was a dead body of a grown man lying on the road, something that is not unfamiliar in Nigeria, there could have been a motor accident or a fight or an armed robbery, but hey why not lets put this in the documentary while we are at it, a dead body makes for great shock value. There was no evidence of any parent killing his/her child, but the narrator and the presenter kept pushing the viewers to that conclusion, the presenter even went ahead and to say that he is certain that some parents have been killing their children.
I have a lot more to say but i fear my post is becoming exceedingly lengthy. Excuse me.
It may well be that the motives of the producers of the documentary were mainly to play on the minds of potentioal donors to the charity you refer to. But the fact is that had those awful incidences of child abuse not actually occured, there would be no "truly shocking expose" possible.
That the Akwa Ibom State government has responded in the manner that it has now done, is confirmation that the need exists for innocent children to be protected. Sometimes it takes shocking exposes such as this to bring issues to light. You have yourself admitted that these practices have been going on for a long time and my view is that as Nigerians, we should be ashamed that it took an expose by a Western public television broadcaster to spur our own authorities into action, insignificant though the efforts of the Akwa Ibom State government might still prove to be.
Right, I've sat this one out for too long, finally the itch to respond has overcome the will to ignore the irrationality of the public response to this. The outcry is good, albeit untimely, but the outcry also is irrational, knee-jerk, firebrigade, call it what you want to, typical Nigeria stupidity. At times like this you wonder - where are all the intelligent people in this country?
Before I go any further, shall I state for the record that I am a sceptic, a firm believer in science and reason, and was involved in a long running argument on this blog for insisting that there is no such thing as juju, jazz, witchcraft, magic, devil, spiritual razzmatazz (including holy spirit) and the like, and so many people replied insisting the opposite, calling me naive and so on.
Helen Ukpabio is a deceitful fraudulent scamming scum, yes absulotely, but so is Paul Adefarasin, Mathew Ashimolowo, Adeboye, Oyakhilome, Oritsejafor, the Nigeria Stock Exchange etc. So are all those who prey on the ignorant, so is the person who made that documentary or should I call it 'shockumentary'. You would think that I'd be the first one to call for Helen Ukpabio's head, but not this time, she has done absolutely nothing wrong (besides go about her normal business of defrauding people by telling them what they want to hear, just like all preachers do). But let's begin with the people who made this shockumentary and why.
This dumentary was made in support of a charity, to raise money from the British public in support of a 'good' cause, fine. But if you have any experience with these things you will understand that they are as a consequence necessarily exaggerated and made to shock the viewing public into reaching for their purses, it is called a 'shockumentary', it take a bad situation and turns it into a truely shocking exposé, not by lying, but by exaggerating the problem, expertly editing the video to make normally unconnected events appear inextricably linked even without explicitly saying so. This was a very well made shockumentary, good work. But to the informed ears and tutored eyes, Helen Ukpabio has been accused of the wrong crime.
The Shockumentary wrongly suggests that Helen Ukpabio is the reason (or at least a significant reason) for the child abuse in villages in Akwa Ibom State, an allegation which is ridiculously untrue, people in villages up and down Nigeria have believed in witchcraft before Helen Ukpabio was born, and will unfortunately continue to do so when she is long dead, she brings nothing new or significant to the stupidity, she is merely a part of it. She, as far as I know, has never physically harmed a child, maybe she has psychologically, but no more than the children's parents themselves, and no more than any other preacher in Nigeria who believes in or preaches hell and demons in the presence of children. The children shown in this documentary have no connection what so ever with Helen Ukpabio, and there is no court of law that will accept a flimsy an evidence as a movie (End of the wicked), produced soley for reason's of monetary profit and approved by the censors, as reason behind child abuse to the extent that the producer of the movie be held responsible for the stupidity, ignorance and wickedness of the perpetrators of child abuse. While we are at it, why don't we arrest Olu maintain for encouraging advanced fee fraud, arrest schwarzenneger for all gun crimes, Al pacino for all violence against women, and all Nigeria pastors for defrauding the public.
There is an excorsist named as Bishop in the documentary, he boasts of killing over 100 children, well guess what, if he was a vulcanizer he would have boasted of patching over 1,000 tyres a day. His job is to promote his trade, and his trade is fear, so in order strike fear into the hearts of those who patronise him, he needs to make these claims. If that man had boasted that he had turned 10 tonnes of stone into gold the producers of the documentary would have taken their time to prove him the liar that he is, but because his claim fits well with their shockumentary then it is necessary to let him have his way, maybe even encourage him to tell more lies, hey why not.
There was a dead body of a grown man lying on the road, something that is not unfamiliar in Nigeria, there could have been a motor accident or a fight or an armed robbery, but hey why not lets put this in the documentary while we are at it, a dead body makes for great shock value. There was no evidence of any parent killing his/her child, but the narrator and the presenter kept pushing the viewers to that conclusion, the presenter even went ahead and to say that he is certain that some parents have been killing their children.
I have a lot more to say but i fear my post is becoming exceedingly lengthy. Excuse me.
the best part of the flyer is - "No African time please"!!
Classic!
Controversial Anon - relax! You too yarn. All that defensiveness and angst is not called for.
The whole story stings us Nigerians, I feel your pain.
As for Helen Ukpabio, let her learn to stop using sensationalism to promote her 'ministry' too. It is common knowledge that church attendance is boosted the more 'winchified' the message - playing (and plying) on the insecurities of people made vulnerable by poverty.
So this film whilst a 'shockumentary' is par for the course, I'm afraid.
The 'Baby P' story of child abuse has dominated UK domestic news for weeks. This is a single case of abuse, which has lead to the resignation of 3 top Council officials.
How many people have resigned in Nigeria over the systematic abuse of thousands of children. Witchcraft accusations, early marriage/rape, commercial exploitation.
We've hardly scratched the surface of this issue.
Modibbo
I really couldn't care less what people believe in. For all I care they could believe in mammy water! What concerns me more than anything is the welfare of innocent defenceless children. And as a society, we, all of us, have a collective responsibility and a duty of care towards them. That we have allowed this nefaroius, iniquitous and brutal abuse of children to proceed uninhibited for eons is unpardonable. It is even worse because we ignored it and/or pretended that such wickedness did not exist among our people. Maybe we even subconciously hoped that it would remain hidden unobserved. But now we have been publicly shamed by a Western television broadcaster. The whole world now knows how worthless our children's lives are.
Arguing at this stage that the intentions of the broadcaster were dubious is pointless, because Channel 4 would have nothing of that nature to broadcast had the good people of Akwa Ibom State not provided them with copious amounts of sensational information to be broadcast.
I can confidently declare on here that Paul Adefarasin, Mathew Ashimolowo, Adeboye, Oyakhilome and Oritsejafor do not teach the fear of witchcraft and neither does the Nigeria Stock Exchange! To suggest that these individuals are in any way comparable to Helen Ukpabio is nonsensical.
As I have already said, if people are stupid enough to believe in witchcraft that is their prerogative. What irks me the most is our failure to protect children who have done no harm. Helen Ukpabio in her work advances the message that children can be and are in fact witches. And while playing on an already existing fear of witchcraft, using her position she offers credibility to the prevailing belief that children are indeed witches. So whether or not she intends for children to be abused, her activities certainly contribute to the pervasiveness of this evil activity. They attack children because they know that children are powerless and cannot fight back. How more dastardly can you get?
About the dead body on the road, Channel 4 cannot be blamed when Nigeria presents them with an abandoned corpse on a public highway to be filmed and broadcast to the world!
Mr Contoversial anon, Permit me 2 say i think u r yaning 'TOTAL DUST/RUBBISH'
U r trying to sound smart and 'controversial' but u have just sounded very ridiculous lmao.
i just pray no one drives a nail in2 ur skull accusing u of witchcraft maybe then u would pray the media can exagerate the situation so that some sort of help albeit little can come 2 ur aid
ur arguments comes accross as really prideful like u cannot simply accept that 'oyibo ppl have come to our land to expose hidden evil' lol i mean y else will u try to justify the bishops act??? get real jare....NeWayz u basically need to wake up and smell the coffe and stop make silly arguments all in the name of being controvesial ok
MOVING ON. im am glad the state is taking some visible action. thanx naijablog for putting up d flyer will defintely be there. lets keep surporting this cause finacially, emotionally, prayerfully and any way else you deem fit.
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