MPs condemn activities of magicians, sorcerers

Members of Parliament (MP) on Thursday condemned activities of magicians and sorcerers gaining currency in the country.

The MPs cautioned that such people operate with impunity, and have taken over the airwaves to dupe unsuspecting Ghanaians of their hard-earned monies.

The House, therefore, called on the security agencies to as a matter of urgency, clamp down on activities of such charlatans since there were enough laws to deal with them.

Mr Alexander Roosevelt Hottordze, MP for Central Tongu, submitted a statement on the issue of money doublers and its impact on national development to Parliament.

He said these impostors were able to woo unsuspecting people with claims that they could apply various means to double or multiply monies.

Mr Hottordze indicated that such unscrupulous people, who were mainly confident tricksters, capitalised on the ignorance of the citizenry and their quest to get rich quick, to dupe them.

He also said some greedy Ghanaians, who would stop at nothing to become filthy rich without doing genuine business, have fallen prey to magicians and sorcerers.

Mr Hottordze said despite the fact that the activities of magicians and sorcerers were illegal, they operated openly with impunity.

He said they seem emboldened by the fact that there were no serious efforts by the security agencies to clamp down on their activities, while well-meaning law abiding citizens looked on unconcerned.

Mr Hottordze stressed “what is more worrying is the suspicion that some request for human blood, as well as body parts. It will, therefore, not be wrong to conclude that some of the abductions and kidnappings are occurring because of the request for human parts and blood for performance of rituals, which will enable the money doubling activity to take place”.

Mr Hottordze said these money doubling activities have dire consequences for the nation’s economic growth, particularly the strength of the cedi, which seems to be facing some instability in value.

He stressed that it was important for security agencies do all within their power to undertake a thorough investigation to ascertain whether there was any linkage between the activities of magicians and sorcerers and the recent kidnappings in Ghana.

Commenting on the statement, Abdul Aziz Muniru, MP for Akan Constituency, said the country’s criminal statute deals with the situation.

He, however, said the offence, which attracted only 25 penalty units, was inadequate to serve as deterrent measures, adding that it was high time the House amended the Act to deal with cyber crime and other offences.

Mr Dominic Nitiwul, Minister of Defence and MP for Bimbilla, said the operations of charlatans have also been extended to the social media.

He said these unscrupulous persons create fake Facebook pages of important persons in society, and used such mediums to dupe unsuspecting people, through unsolicited adverts.

Mr Nitiwul said on a number of occasions, people have posted recruitment of Ghanaians into the security agencies through such mediums, ultimately to dupe people.

He cautioned that no security agency would use such platforms for recruitment of personnel.

He, therefore, asked Ghanaians to disregard such adverts since it was ostensibly meant to dupe people, adding that, it was high time Ghana Revenue Authority, kick-start a process of investigating people with unexplained wealth to show the source of their monies.

BY LAWRENCE MARKWEI