By Christian Purefoy, CNN August 25, 2010 5:09 p.m. EDT Photo: Godswill was abandoned by his mom after being called a witch Watch more about the extent of Nigeria's child witch scandal on CNN International's Connect The World this week at 2000 GMT _____ PART ONE… Akwa Ibom state, Nigeria (CNN) — Just after midnight, the pastor seized a woman's forehead with his large hand and she fell screaming and writhing on the ground. “Fire! Fire! Fire!” shouted the worshippers, raising their hands in the air. Pastor Celestine Effiong's congregants are being delivered from what they firmly believe to be witchcraft. And in the darkness of the city and the villages beyond, similar shouts and screams echo from makeshift church to makeshift church. “I have been delivered from witches and wizards today!” exclaimed one exhausted-looking woman. Pastors in southeast Nigeria claim illness and poverty are caused by witches who bring terrible misfortune to those around them. And those denounced as witches must be cleansed through deliverance or cast out. As daylight breaks, and we travel out to the rural villages it becomes apparent the most vulnerable to this stigmatization of witchcraft are children. A crowd gathered around two brothers and their sister. Tears streamed down their mother's face as she cast out her children from the family, accusing them of causing the premature deaths of two of their siblings with black magic. I was beaten by the prophet in the church. –Samuel, 15, now homeless “I am afraid. They are witches and they can kill me as well,” she sobbed. Taking his time to talk to the mother, Sam Ikpe-Itauma, an imposing man wearing a “Child's Rights & Rehabilitation Network” t-shirt, has come to try to rescue the three children. “If we are not here there's a possibility of them being thrown into the river, buried alive or stabbed to death,” Sam said. He tries to persuade their mother and a crowd of villagers that the three children are not witches – but no one believes him. And so, putting the children in his white pick-up, he drives away to his orphanage and safety. Sam runs Child's Rights & Rehabilitation Network, or CRARN — an orphanage that supports nearly 200 children. All of them were accused of witchcraft and cast out by their families, often after being tortured. The orphanage provides security, healthcare, nutrition and counseling. Godwin's story is typical. As he sat next to the quiet 5-year-old, Sam said that after Godwin's mother died, the church pastor told his family that “Godwin is responsible.” From his own investigation, questioning Godwin and talking with neighbors, Sam said that when a relative asked Godwin if he was a witch, “he said no and was beaten and made the confession that he actually killed the mother.” Sam said Godwin was locked up with his mother's corpse every night for three weeks with little food or water before a neighbor contacted Sam, who was able to rescue him. Witches and wizards, they started getting afraid. I never gave them rest. –Pastor Helen Ukpabio Other children at his orphanage bear the scars of being beaten, attacked with boiling water, and cuts from machetes. But these children are the ones lucky to be alive. “A child witch is said to be a witch when that child possessed with certain spiritual spells capable of making that child transform into cat, snake, vipers, insects, any other animal and that child is capable of wreaking havoc like killing of people, bringing diseases, misfortune into the family,” Sam said. “When a child is accused of being a witch — that child is hated absolutely by everybody surrounding him so such children are sent out of the home… But unfortunately such children do not always live long. A lot of them, they're either killed, abandoned by the parents, tortured in the church or trafficked out of the city.” Sam doesn't believe in witchcraft and is trying to raise awareness in local communities now gripped by hysteria. Belief in witchcraft is rooted in centuries of tradition, but it's only in the last 10 years, that it has become associated with child abuse, he said. “It's a social crisis,” he added. “Poverty propels this child witch phenomenon and poverty is a twin sister to ignorance. “Most vulnerable children come from single parents, divorced parents, dysfunctional families.” But the orphanage has very little space for more children. Overstretched finances mean he can barely pay a skeleton staff of four people, as well as feed the children. Instead, many children are left to roam the streets. “My parents sent me out of the house — said I'm a witch,” said Samuel, a 15-year-old who has lived on the streets for five years after a local pastor blamed him for unexpected deaths in the family. “I was beaten by the prophet in the church,” he said in a quiet voice. Samuel lives in an abandoned building with 10 other children accused of witchcraft. A local group, 'Stepping Stones Nigeria,' which is dedicated to helping street children, visits them. “Religious leaders capitalize on the ignorance of some parents in the villages just to make some money off them,” said Lucky Inyang, project coordinator for 'Stepping Stones Nigeria'. “They can say your child is a witch and if you bring the child to the church we can deliver the child but eventually they don't deliver the children… The parents go back to the pastor and say, 'why is it you have not been able to deliver the child' and the pastor says 'Oh – this one has gone past deliverance – they've eaten too much flesh so you have to throw the child out.'” CONTINUED… added by: EthicalVegan
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