Nigerians are concerned over the rising spate of killing for ritual purposes.
A few months before the 2023 general elections in Nigeria, there appeared to be an upsurge in cases of ritual killing.
That was understandable as most people attributed it to politicians who would go to any length, including human sacrifices to acquire political powers.
Investigation revealed that the evil activities of ritual killers have gone beyond kidnapping people from their homes, on the road or while on transit to the hospitals where there have been recorded demand for a-day-old babies.
Some nurses are believed to be involved in the trade. They connive with politicians and others who engage in the business to steal new born babies soon after they are delivered.
The mothers of these innocent babies are made to believe that their babies are stillbirth and for parents who may not have the wherewithal to go through the rigours of organizing burial for such babies, they would accept the story hook, line and sinker.
“Doctors should be wary of the kind of nurses they employ in their hospitals because this happens mostly in private hospitals.
“They should also, in addition to scrutinizing the nurses they employ, be vigilant at all times because there is no art to find the mind’s construction on the face,” a concerned Nigerian volunteered.
Three days ago, precisely on August 20, a female graduate of the Kwara State College of Health Technology in Offa, Awesu Mojisola Morufat, was killed and allegedly used for money ritual.
Morufat, who was reported missing last week, was later found dead in a bush in Ilorin, the Kwara State capital.
It was gathered that Morufat, who recently signed out on August 6 from the Public Health Department of the school, was murdered for ritual purposes a few days before her convocation.
According to the Police, Prophet Adeniyi Adebayo, also known as Prophet Ogunse, and his son, Promise Ogunse, who were alleged to have committed the evil have been taken into custody.
The police stressed that Promise was the prime suspect in the alleged murder.
According to reports, the deceased was invited to a hotel in Offa last week by Promise, the first son of Pastor Ogunse, where he allegedly murdered her and fled.
“Yes, the lady was invited by the pastor’s son to a hotel in Ilorin. Her dead body was found at a dumpsite. I think it was the hotel staff member, who dumped her there after the assailants fled.
“The police were able to apprehend the suspect and his father, who happens to be a pastor. They are currently being held at the police headquarters in Ilorin,” he said.
On Wednesday, July 10, a self-proclaimed cleric in Omi-Ifon, Odigbo Local Government Area of Ondo State, identified as Aliyu was caught grinding the exhumed remains of a year-old infant.
Aliyu was caught in his residence by the mother of the infant, following a hunch she got when she passed by her child’s grave.
A source familiar with the situation said that the mother had a working relationship with the cleric prior to the unfortunate incident.
According to the source, she had entrusted Aliyu with the care of her sick baby just a few days before the incident.
“The cleric is the woman’s religious guardian. He was even the one who named the children at the naming ceremony about a year ago. So, when the child fell sick, she took the child to him,” the source said.
Unfortunately, the child reportedly died in the custody of the cleric barely 24 hours after being taken there for medical attention.
Aliyu was also present at the baby’s burial with the rest of the woman’s family.
However, a few days after the child’s burial, the mother noticed that the grave had been disturbed; the topography of the soil struck her as odd.
Acting on her suspicion, she attempted to consult Aliyu but was horrified to find him grinding the remains of her baby.
“She went to the cleric’s house when she noticed that something was amiss at the spot where her child was buried.
“She wanted to notify him. But she met him gruesomely grinding the remains with a mortar in his house. He had the head and the limbs of the baby,” the source added.
In June, the Ondo State Police Command equally arrested a 31-year-old man, Yusuf Adenoyin, in the Isua-Akoko area of the state.
Adenoyin was caught with eight human skulls and fresh human flesh.
Again, in May, a 39-year-old fruit seller, Dolapo Babalola, was arrested in Okeigbo for killing five people, including his intimate friend and cousin.
Another cleric, Oluwafemi Idris, was caught in the Akoko area of the state with human organs in March.
On April 27, there were reports that the Lagos State Police Command had arrested a syndicate specialising in ritual killings and desecration of graves.
The 10-member gang, led by a 33-year-old Ademola Akinlosota, son of a pastor, targeted individuals for sacrifice and exhumed bodies from cemeteries to harvest body parts.
The investigation brought to the open the activities of an 85-year-old traditional ruler from Benin Republic, Yusuf Lawal Muse, who reportedly confessed to plotting the murder of his own son for ritual purposes.
However, the plan was foiled when the hired killers tipped off the victim’s mother.
In March, the Kwara State Police Command equally apprehended Atolagbe Yemi Oje, who was accused of raping and murdering a mother of one for alleged ritual purposes.
The deceased woman identified as Mayowa Ajiboye, a palm oil seller and resident of Omu-Aran area of the state, was allegedly raped to death, her corpse burnt and the remains dumped inside a river by the suspect.
The Kwara State Commissioner of Police, Victor Olaiya, described the suspect as a monster and the act as barbaric.
He said the victim initially paid N1,600 to the suspect last November to help her fetch firewood in the forest to cook her palm fruit which he refused to supply.
Olaiya said on February 22, 2024, the victim and her young daughter, Ope, went to fetch firewood in the bush and met Oje who, upon sighting them, immediately joined them in gathering the firewood.
“He asked the deceased’s daughter to carry some of the firewood to where it will be used to prepare the palm fruit and asked the mother (deceased) to follow him inside the bush to gather more so he could perfect his sinister motive.
“After they had both gone far into the bush, the suspect suddenly held both legs of the deceased from behind while she was receiving a phone call and fell her down. But she managed to use the stick in her hand to hit the suspect on his neck in defence.
“He collected the stick and used it to hit her severely on the head and she fell unconscious.
“He then raped her, cut some hair from her vagina, cleaned the semen and blood from her private parts with white handkerchief for money ritual purpose, slaughtered her with her cutlass and set her remains on fire before dragging the burnt body to a river to conceal it,” he said.
The CP submitted that the suspects hid the deceased’s phone in the bush and threw away the sim card and battery, adding that Oje confessed to killing the woman after raping her to avoid being exposed.
However, the incident is not restricted to any state or geopolitical zone; it cuts across all parts of the country.
Looking at the ugly trend from a religious angle, an Islamic cleric and Deputy Iman of Ibuku Oluwa Ratibi Mosque in Mile 2 area of Lagos, Ustaz Jamiu Aro, told Newspot that Islam frowns at killing in whatever form.
“God Almighty Allah does not condone ritual killing or any killing for that matter. The Islamic injunction is that whosoever kills a fellow human being should also be killed,” he said.
He believes that ritual killing thrives in the polity because the system permits it.
“I blame our constitution for the trend. When a person is suspected to have killed a fellow human being for ritual purposes, the law demands that proper investigation be conducted to establish the authenticity of the allegation and in the process, justice is always miscarried because justice delayed is justice denied.
“The constitution states that except where the courts have been convinced beyond every reasonable doubt, a suspected killer should not be found guilty.
“This makes it possible for ritual killers to go scot-free most of the time because there may not be enough convincing facts before the judge to convict such a suspect, even when in truth, he is guilty.
“This is because the western legal system which we copied will argue that truth alone is not enough to secure conviction of a criminal, and as such truth must be backed up by facts.
“That is the irony of our legal system and that is why ritual killing will continue,” he said.
Also dissecting who ritual killers are, he said: “Ritual killers are people who do not believe that prayers could solve their problems.
“Both Christians and Muslims believe that prayer is the master key to their problems but ritual killers are people who don’t believe in the efficacy of prayers.
“They want to be rich at all cost or to have powers and they believe that prayers cannot do that. But, they have forgotten that with prayer and hard work, one could achieve greatness in terms of wealth.
“The native doctors would convince them that with one part of the human body or the other, they could wield enormous power or become rich instantly.
“There are cases of people who were caught in the past with human parts and they confessed that they wanted to get rich quickly and that was why they engaged in the act as directed by their herbalist,” he said.
He described ritual killing as like a whirlwind that has infiltrated into Christianity and Islam, and is blowing nobody any good.
“The practice has even spread to churches and mosques. Some pastors and imams are taking part in these ritual killings.
“They patronise herbalists who convince them that once they perform one ritual or the other using human body parts, their churches or mosques would grow.
“This, they are made to believe, will ultimately translate to a larger congregation and eventually more money in their pockets,” he said.
Most of the ritual killers had confessed to being more wretched than they were before they committed the atrocity.
“This was corroborated by Ustaz Aro, when he said: “All in all, ritual killing is all about craze for stupendous wealth and enormous power, which most of the time, do not come to reality even after the atrocity must have been committed,” he said.
Also lending his voice to the trend, the Director of Centre for Justice, Mercy and Reconciliation; a Christian, Non-Governmental Organisation based in Ibadan, Pastor Hezekiah Olujobi agrees that ritual killing seems to be on the increase because people are looking for power and wealth at all cost through demonic means.
“When elections are coming, people believe that they need the life of another person to be able to achieve their political aim.
“They always go through kidnapping and ritual killing. The politicians who need money for his campaign would readily engage in ritual killing to raise enough money for that purpose,” he told Newspot.
He also insisted that the trend was thriving because those who are involved in it seem to forget that the blood of Jesus Christ shed on the Cross of Calvary is enough ransom for whatever they need in life.
He posits that he was not surprised at the development because the bible foretold that when the world would be coming to an end, things like that would definitely be happening.
“So, I want to advise those involved in these heinous crimes against humanity to seek the face of God rather than the things of this world,” he warned.
Also speaking about the ugly development, a security expert and President of the Association of Licensed Private Security Practitioners of Nigeria (ALPSPN), Dr Davidson Akhimien advised that both the government and individuals have serious roles to play in making sure that Nigeria becomes a security-conscious country.
He suggested that security should be part of educational learning of the Nigerian child and youth from primary one up to part four in the university, “so that we will all be security conscious. Travellers should always use recognised cab services as well as reputable hotels where there are security monitoring gadgets like the CCTV camera.”
In his contribution, a Consultant Psychologist at the Lagos State University Teaching Hospital, (LASUTH), Ikeja, Dr Leonard Okonkwo attributed the increase in the menace to the fact Nigerians tend to celebrate people who have financial power, without attaching any importance to the means of acquiring such wealth.
“They don’t care how you came about your wealth; they celebrate wealth without considering how the wealth was gotten,” he told our correspondent.
However, he agreed that oftentimes, people are lured into the act, adding that the psychological effect of their action is living in denial.
“They live in denial as a way of justifying their action because most times, they are not told from the beginning that they would kill somebody.
“So, by the time they get to a point where they have to kill somebody so as to become rich, they live in denial thereafter.
“You begin to hear excuses like, ‘well, it is not my fault; I didn’t know it was going to be like this and now they have told me that if I don’t do it, I am going to die, I just have to do it.’ That is denial,” he said.
He stressed that apart from living in denial, they would still come up with some other psychological problems because they are human.
Such other psychological problems, according to him, include self-guilt as well as becoming callous and conscienceless.
“They suffer self-guilt because even if people don’t know how they acquired their wealth, they very well know how they got it.
“The knowledge of how they made their money leads them to becoming more callous and conscienceless.
“What other people will ordinarily be sensitive to, they are no longer sensitive to such issues. They become more callous,” he submitted.
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