This two year old boy had been abandoned by his family on the streets of Uyo in Akwa Ibom for 8 months. This was because his parents had been told that he possessed witchcraft. Yes, seriously, that was the reason. He was feeding of scraps which passers-by threw at him. People walked past him daily but no one did anything to help. Until the faithful day when a tattoo-covered Danish aid worker, Anja Ringgren Loven found him and took him off the streets.When she found him, she says, he was riddled with worms and had to have daily blood transfusions to revive him. "Thousands of children are accused of being witches" she wrote in Danish on Facebook, as she appealed for funds to pay for food, medical bills and schooling. She has named the boy Hope.
Loven is the founder of African Children's Aid Education and Development foundation.
About a week ago, I wouldn't have believed that an act as barbaric as this still exists in 21st century Nigeria. But now I know and it's sickening. How could we humans be so blinded by religion that we throw away or even sometimes kill our own children just because some savage religious "god of man" says the child possesses some sort of witchcraft. How can we justify such Idiocy. Even lower animals would never kill their own children over someone else's claims, talk-less we higher animals.
Upon hearing this story, I began to ask myself questions. Questions like, why people walked past this child daily and no one decided to do anything about it? Is the government aware of cases like this? If they are, what measures are they taking to curb it?
Acts like this make me question the purpose of humanity.
"We are a very crippled giant suffering from self inflicted wounds, that if we do not treat and heal, will in fact bring us to our knees and ultimately to our doom" - Bill Moyer (2009)
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