Albinos in Politics

[Martin Hash]

Albinos Killed Front Page.JPG

The Wednesday, May 20, 2009 issue of the “Daily Guide,” one of Accra, Ghana’s leading newspapers had the headline story “Albinos Killed For 2008 Elections.” The story is on page 3, right above the picture of a semi-clothed man hanging from his own necktie (“Graduate Commits Suicide.”)

In the story:

“A one-time Imam in the Ghana Armed Forces, Sheikh Salawati Imam Rashid, has made a scary disclosure about how some politicians in the country buried a number of albinos and children alive, in their quest for political power.

The spirits of these persons, whom he said did not die natural deaths, will continue to haunt this country in the form of road accidents and other calamities unless a spiritual atonement is sought.

Until President John Evans Atta Mills considers having the country exorcised, all his efforts at putting things right will come to naught. Albinos in Accra under aegis of Society of Albinos-Ghana (SOA-G) recently organized a press conference during which they expressed apprehension about their precarious situation in the country, having become ritualistic materials for money and power seekers.

The accidents which swept across the country immediately after the 2008 elections were a sign and warning to Ghanaians. That Imam Rashid has made such a revelation about the extent to which politicians can go adds credence to the apprehension of the pigment-deficient humans, otherwise called ‘ofli gyato’.

In Tanzania, albinos are endangered as they are sought for spiritual interventions by jujumen in the East African country – a trend which appears to be gradually rearing its head on our shores by Imam Rashid’s revelation.

Ghanaian politicians who sought the spiritual interventions consulted voodoos, mountain and river gods, as well as marine spirits, both in Ghana and outside it, during which they made pledges to the shrines and deities.

As for the bloodbath on our roads, he made a chilling revelation that they would continue, asking that ‘the churches, mosques and other religious sects in the country should come together and ensure that the devil does not rule Ghana.”

Almost everything you need to know about African politics and religion is present in this news story, and sobering it is. The calamities like those in Dharfur and Ruanda may have been averted if The West had only known - or at least automobile accidents on the freeways in those countries could have been averted – if there were freeways – and if people in those countries had automobiles.

I shudder to think what American politicians will do with this knowledge! American politics is already cutthroat - and aren’t all white people albinos? It could be a bloodbath of historical, not to mention biblical, proportions. Vote early in the next election, otherwise you may not have a chance to vote at all.