News

The bizarre and the shocking sell newspapers. And London's Evening Standard managed to combine both in a headline last month which screamed: "Children sacrificed in London churches say police - boys brought to Britain for ritual killings." The accompanying news story, based on a leaked Metropolitan Police report, claimed that children were being trafficked into the UK for human sacrifice in some African churches.

This sensationalist story came just days after the Hackney "witchcraft" child abuse court case in which two Angolan women were found guilty of child cruelty by subjecting a girl of eight to ritualistic abuse, including rubbing chillies in her eyes and stabbing her, believing she was a witch. The girl's aunt, who cannot be named, and relatives Sita Kisanga and Sebastian Pinto, who was found guilty on a different charge of aiding and abetting child cruelty, are in custody awaiting sentencing.


A belief in witchcraft and spiritual possession goes back centuries, says Richard Hoskins, a senior research fellow on the sociology of religion at King's College London. For some Africans, these beliefs are deeply engrained and are strengthened when they move to the UK and are surrounded by atheism and agnosticism.

But there is one fundamental difference in the belief system held by many Africans in the UK as opposed to those in Africa. Hoskins says: "In the new African churches there is a belief of actual possession by witchcraft that needs exorcism physically [rather than exorcism through prayer]."

In the past four years, Africans Unite Against Child Abuse (Afruca) has come across 26 cases in the UK of children involved in extreme exorcisms that resulted in physical abuse. Director Debbie Ariyo says several factors in Africa's history lie behind this strong belief in the spirit world.

Much of the continent has faced - and continues to face - extreme poverty; it is gripped by the HIV pandemic; and decades of conflict and war have destroyed the lives of millions of people. With this in mind, it is perhaps unsurprising that some seek to blame spiritual influences for their difficulties, such as witchcraft, says Ariyo.

One such belief is kindoki, cited in the Hackney case. It comes from the Democratic Republic of the Congo and refers to the bad spirit of a dead person inhabiting - and therefore controlling - a living person. This possession of an individual leads them to behave in a way that creates misfortune for those around them. Another term heard during the trial was ndoki, a type of possession thought to allow its victim to fly and transmute into other creatures. Other African countries have similar expressions: in Nigeria the term used to describe a child who is thought to be a witch is aje.

When Africans believe a relative is possessed they often turn to their church for help. In the UK there are more than 3,000 Christian churches whose congregations have a black majority. These are split into three types: the first covers mainstream Christian religions, such as Baptists or Catholics; the second is a new wave of Pentecostal evangelical churches; the third comprises indigenous African churches that combine ancient African traditions with their own brand of Christianity.

According to Ariyo, it is the latter that is most likely to practise the more extreme forms of exorcism that have so dramatically hit the headlines. However, she emphasises that most African churches do not behave in a way that would be perceived as abusive or harmful towards their congregation.


This point is reiterated by Katei Kirby, general manager of the African and Caribbean Evangelical Alliance, which represents 1,300 churches, charities, Christian companies and Christian ministries in the UK. Christian leaders from the African communities have expressed their dismay to her about the media's coverage of their churches. She says: "They have said they don't even recognise themselves in these news stories."

Much has been made in news reports about the role of pastors in churches in identifying whether a child is possessed. In Victoria Climbie's case, it was the pastor at her local church who attributed her bedwetting to her being possessed. Pastors have a great deal of status in their churches, which they have often started themselves, and many of the congregation adhere to their teachings, Ariyo says. "Pastors have a lot of control because they are seen as messengers from God."

Many African cultures are well versed in ideas of spiritualism and possession but their relative absence in the west may explain why there is such a gap between how some African communities and social care professionals relate to each other. While myriad languages may not necessarily keep people apart, different mindsets do.

All this leaves professionals pondering how to engage with religious African communities to identify children at risk from this belief system.

The NSPCC's national project manager for services to ethnic minority children, Norbert Marjolin, says practitioners should be confident enough to work with people from a variety of cultural backgrounds without having to fear being described as racist.

He says: "It is not an issue of race, religion or culture, but it is about behaviour. The safety of a child is paramount and a professional has to be willing to say 'I am challenging your behaviour, not your religion or cultural difference'."

Hoskins argues that those involved in safeguarding children need to ensure they can reach all communities: "If professionals don't try to see the world as some Africans do they will never fix anything. Once they have walked out of the room and the door is closed behind them then that will be it - they won't have got anywhere."