Education and the Occult in Africa: the Case of "trokosi" and "witch Camps"

Education and the Occult in Africa: The Case of "Trokosi" and "Witch Camps"

Introduction

Nowadays, lack of education is still a grim problem the Africa's children face. Kennedy (2007) stated school was the last thing on Africa's children's mind. The reasons to cause this situation are complicated. Due to military and poverty, schools in African lack of proper facilities and educators. High tuition also keeps the children away from school. However, there is hoary reason and occultism has bad influence the education in Africa. In the case of "Trokosi" and "Witch Camps", there is discrimination on children and deprived their education right. Along with the development of technology, the occultism is not as important as in the past, but the occult movies are still influence on youth.

Education in Africa

School enrolment has expended dramatically over the past forty years in the most of the developing world, but this has not been the case in many African countries. Research Gyimah-Brempong (2011) illustrated only half of their children were going to primary school, adult literacy rates were below forty percent and over fifty percent of women were illiterate in 1990s. The children also struggle for education in Africa. In the Kennedy report (2007), a boy named Pascal Mwanchoka said school was the last thing on his mind. He was ten years old. His mother did not feed his brother and him and she was not taking them to school. After the help from the local children aid association, Pascal backed to class and attended a free program in Nairobi. This program is for the children who are too poor even to afford a meal of maize and beans. This opportunity to go to school on the poorest continent in the word for Pascal is luxury. According to the case of Pascal, it is clear that the most issue keeps the children from school in Africa is poverty.

The majority of the world poorest countries are in Africa today. Of course some African countries like South Africa and Egypt are quite as poor as other like Angola and Ethiopia. And although in recent years the economy in Africa has showed a slight improvement, African income levels have actually been dropped relative to the rest of world. Hunger is the most problem the African should solve. To pay for food, Pascal had to selected scrap mental. He said, "I was so hungry and could not do anything but sit. Unless I collected the scrap mental, we would go to sleep without eating (Kennedy report, 2007)." In the poor African countries, tuition fee is also the major problem they should face. Although in some countries, such as Ghana, Kenya, Malawi and Tanzania, the tuition fees have been abolished, even the smallest expenses for uniforms and books can hamper the enrollment numbers. Governments declared that education is free, but actually it is not free. Uganda also offers free primary education, but fewer than half its children complete secondary school, because they would have to pay fees of up to $100 per term (Kennedy report, 2007). However, Uganda's average annual income is $300. If the children want to study in the secondary school, they should pay one of third their income for the tuition fee. There is no doubt that education in Africa is luxury and only the rich can get it. In addition, as some governments lack the proper schooling finance support, most of schools in Africa are short of proper facilities and educators. There is an overly large size and high average number of students per teacher in a school. Moreover, the teachers are usually those unqualified with few teaching aids and poor textbook provision. In a long run, the quality of education will decrease.

Occult effects on education in Africa

A hoary reason that lead some of children never set foot in a classroom cannot be ignored and occultism has bad influence the education in Africa. In Africa, occultism has a long history and it is hidden, secret, ambiguous and restricted. The people who believe in the occult have occult power and they can use the power to do everything they want. The occult powers include the ability to change from a human being into an animal, the power to call up the spirit of a dead man or woman, ability to diagnose and cure illness, witchcraft powers, etc. the influence of occult is widespread and the occultism also effects on the education in African. The Case of "Trokosi" is on this point.

Trokosi