The Government has announced an action plan to tackle the ‘wall of silence’ around the abuse of children accused of witchcraft. According to the plan, the Government aims to raise awareness of the problem, to train police, teachers and social workers to spot the signs of abuse, and to help victims give evidence, thus enabling the authorities to identify and prosecute those responsible. The plan also recommends that victims should have better access to therapy and emotional support, and aims to raise awareness of how faith-based abuse is connected to other crimes such as child trafficking and sexual exploitation. The plan was drawn up with charities, religious leaders, and the Metropolitan police, and calls on local communities and churches to work more closely together to stop abuse. The British Humanist Association (BHA) welcomes the plan.
Children’s Minister Tim Loughton said that there has been a ‘wall of silence’ around the ‘scale and extent’ of witchcraft-based abuse. Despite low official figures of ritualised abuse, police say that the crime is under-reported. The announcement of the action plan follows the conviction earlier this year of Eric Bikubi and Magalie Bamu, who tortured and murdered their 15-year-old relative Kristy Bamu after accusing him of practising witchcraft. Kristy, who lived in Paris, travelled to London in 2010 to visit the couple for Christmas. During Kristy’s stay, they became fixated with the idea that he was practising witchcraft, and used increasingly violent means to ‘exorcise demons’ from him. The ordeal which he was subjected to was described in the trial earlier this year as ‘a staggering act of depravity and cruelty’, and ended with him being drowned in a bath.
The case follows other examples of witchcraft-based abuse, such as that of ‘child B’, an eight-year-old Angolan girl who was beaten and had chilli rubbed into her eyes after being accused of witchcraft in 2003, and the case of eight-year-old Victoria Climbie, who was murdered by her guardians in 2000. In the past 10 years there have been 81 recorded police investigations in London into faith-based child abuse. Research by the Department for Education and Skills in 2006 also looked at 38 cases involving 47 children from Africa, south Asia and Europe, who were abused after being accused of possession or witchcraft. The Department for Education is expected to publish more research on faith-based child abuse by the end of the year.
Pavan Dhaliwal, BHA Head of Public Affairs, commented ‘For too long the authorities have not been effective enough in tackling witchcraft-based child abuse. As this kind of abuse is based on religious and superstitious beliefs, the reluctance to confront the problem has perhaps been motivated by a fear of offending religious sensibilities. However, we welcome the fact that the government has now launched the new action plan. We hope that it marks a new resolve to protect the children who may be at risk, and to prosecute the offenders who commit this kind of abuse.’
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For further comment or information contact Pavan Dhaliwal, Head of Public Affairs at pavan@humanists.uk or on 0773 843 5059.
The Government’s action plan ‘Safeguarding children from abuse linked to faith or belief’, at the Department for Education website: http://www.education.gov.uk/a00212811/safeguarding-children-from-abuse-linked-to-faith-or-belief
Media coverage of the action plan:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2012/aug/14/abuse-children-accused-witchcraft?newsfeed=true
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-19248144
The British Humanist Association is the national charity working on behalf of ethically concerned, non-religious people in the UK. It is the largest organisation in the UK campaigning for an end to religious privilege and to discrimination based on religion or belief, and for a secular state.