RITUAL KILLINGS IN NIGERIA

The spate of ritual killings is shocking. Most of the victims were killed in a bid for their killers to make money. One wonders what our society has become and how we can curb this trend about to destroy our society.

Some will argue that the trend has been in existence for long and nothing can be done about it, but should we be barbaric in all areas to make money?

The conversation of the African culture is rife as some say the constant need to spill blood as a form of ablution is the reason for these killings. At our traditional festivals we are so quick to spill the blood of any living thing.

There is also a conversation on when will Africa pivot from blood -letting in its traditional worship but other argue that African traditional worship frowns at killings. It strongly supports the ethos of togetherness and love.

The question on the front burner is: does anyone get rich from ritual killings? I interviewed over 10 people by asking if they have seen how ritual killings translate to wealth. What they all said was it was based on hearsay. In most cases they stated that it was attributed to what people say about sudden wealth.

I stand to be corrected but there is no empirical correlation between ritual killings and wealth and those videos of a particular spirit bringing money in the night to people remains figment of imagination.

So I ask: Why did the media create an imaginative correlation of spirits bringing money to people after ritual killings? Could this have been used to bolster the claim that ritual killings lead to money? Could the media have increased the problem? Or was it because they wanted to sell sensation to people and make money? Should the censor’s board censor movies on ritual killings?

In 1992 the first mainstream movie on Nigerian home video as it was called made the rounds. It was the story of Andy and the movie was “Living in Bondage.” The movie tells the story of the occult world and the story of ritual killings. I recently did a survey and I discovered that most people surveyed said “Living in Bondage” was their first major introduction to ritual killings, although they couldn’t link the empirical proof that ritual killings bring wealth but they believe it does; and they also said they heard stories that some ritualist were wealthy.

So I ask: could the media have played a role in the increase of ritual killings and should we have television shows or movies that debunk the veracity of ritual killings stories? Whatever the approach might be we must start from somewhere

Rufai Oseni, rufaioseni@gmail.com