Traditional African Religion, the true bastion of religious tolerance, diversity, peace
TRUE freedom of worship is only found in the traditions of our forefathers. That is why over the years they have embraced and allowed all manner of beliefs into their midst. Our deities allowed Christianity and Islam to fester and flourish to a point where these foreign beliefs have overtaken them.
The expression of religion in our Ghanaian traditional sense is the true essence of spirituality where every household, clan or community evolved around a unique God concept. That is why an Anlo man will not come to proselytise to an Nzema to throw away his deities and embrace his own. It is akin to someone asking you to disown your father and make another man your patriarch. This is exactly what foreign imposed religions do to our traditional beliefs all in the name of evangelism and Dawah.
After the imported Christian religion succeeded in overwhelming most of our traditions, the next agenda was to entrench themselves to the extent that they now have the audacity to even treat our traditions and deities with contempt. They openly insult our Gods and condemn our deities. After establishing their foothold, Christianity and Islam have conspired to strangle and relegate our deities to the background.
As a tool to colonise the minds of Africans the aggressive and relentless evangelism by Christianity and Islam have almost overwhelmed our traditions and have made us (Africans) lose our identity as a people. People have been so shamed to the extent that they have to drop their Traditional African and Ghanaian name and respond to John, Jane, Abubakar, Aisha and so on. Especially in the pre-colonial era, one will even have to anglicise their surnames in order to gain acceptance in the Church, hence names like Atta became Arthur, Bosome became Bosomeld and Nuxoxo became Newton.
Growing up, there used to be 3 forms of prayer at state functions: Christian, Islamic and Traditional. Now the two foreign religions have succeeded in expelling traditional libation pouring off our National programmes. Currently our children are taught that we have 3 main forms of religions in Ghana (albeit that the Christianised and Islamised teachers refuse to teach it properly) but I fear it’s just a matter of time that our educational authorities will whittle it down to 2: Christianity and Islam!!
The WEYGEHEY bruhaha is just Christianity afraid of Islam doing to them what they have succeeded (and most times in concert with Islam) in doing to our Traditional Religions and way of life! Today we even have Christianised and Islamised Chiefs deciding to swear to the Bible or Quran.
People are quick to point out the fundamentalist and radical nature of Islamic extremism but the domination of the world by Christianity was due to the same kind of fundamentalism posture by Christianity in the distant past. This was a time when women and children suspected of being witches were roasted in what came to be called the Inquisitions across Europe. In fact, radical Christianity then was far worse than radical Islam as we know today. The church in medieval eras were much more ruthless than today’s Boko Haram and their cohorts.
Even though currently Christian fundamentalism has been muffled largely, this WEYGEHEY controversy has jolted them back into life and into the realisation that unless they meet the aggressive advocacy of Islam with same level of aggressiveness they will end up where they have put our Traditional Religions and Deities. No wonder they have taken very strong and entrenched stands against the advocacy by Muslims for greater freedom of religious expressions in mission schools.
It can be boldly stated that neither Islamic nor Christian mission schools today will allow any adherent of Traditional Religion to express their type of religion in their respective schools. In fact, not only will the school administration not allow it, most parents will take exception to it and will swear fire and brimstone should children of Traditionalist be allowed the same freedom of religious expression they seek for themselves. In fact, one cannot safely or boldly declare that he or she is a Traditionalist without being seen as objects of scorn.
The story of Larabanga in the Savannah Region is very instructive. Research shows that the community along with some others in Ghana is exclusively Islamic and the establishment of churches and openly professing Christianity is strictly forbidden. If this has been the posture of our forefathers, these two foreign religions will never had gotten a foothold in Africa and for that matter Ghana.
Let us be quick to add that it is not every community that willingly embraced the religion of foreigners and our colonisers. It is trite that some Traditional communities actually resisted when Islam and Christianity were being forced upon them through various wars of conquest. It has been said that the sojourn of our ancestors, the ancient Ghana Empire to southwards to present day Ghana, was partly due to the profound need to escape Islamic wars of conquest and conversion. They resisted fiercely so they are not forced to abandon their own indigenous religions and customs in favour of Islam.
There is also the case of Abokobi in the Greater Accra Region. The Presbyterian Church through their years of influence and aggressive evangelism has succeeded in assuming allodial ownership of lands at Abokobi. One of the major overriding incidents that goes with this is that chiefs of Abokobi, who hitherto were selected and installed in consonance with tradition and custom, are now performed in according to the doctrines of the Presbyterian Church.
These two foreign imposed religions are afraid of themselves. This current debate and advocacy for religious expressions in mission schools if not handled with tact has the potential of exploding into an all-out struggle for religious supremacy as is being experienced in Nigeria and elsewhere in the Sahel region. The churches and the Muslim Community are all scrambling to seek solace in fundamental human right to religious expression and association. These are the same rights they have over the centuries denied our own traditions and customs. This is poetic justice where co-conspirators of violations of freedom of worship have now turn their guns on themselves.
It is hoped that in the determination of Osman Shaffic v Wesley Girls and others, the Supreme Court will not just narrow the issues to what is happening in WEYGEYHEY but will give a judgment that reflects progress where ALL our major religions including Traditional religious practices to give their true expression in our current democratic and constitutional dispensation.
Even though the Supreme Court panel will be constituted by Christians and Muslims I hold the belief that My Lords will do substantial justice that will ensure that our endangered Traditional Religion, spirituality and culture are safeguarded from the brutish tactics of Christianity and Islam.
The adherents of Traditional religion continue to demonstrate to the world that they are the true peaceful, compassionate and tolerant religion and I invite Christianity and Islam to learn their virtues of coexistence, harmony and mutual respect.
BY MERIGA NUHU KOTOMBE
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