Human sacrifice in Ghana

Is your business suffering?  Are your efforts to finally strike it rich being frustrated?  No problem!  Just ritually sacrifice a five year old boy and your troubles will be over.

Half Assini (W/R), Nov. 7, GNA – Police in Half Assini in the Western Region have arrested two galamsey (illegal mining, JAY) operators at Amantem near Tarkwa for offering a five-year old boy to be killed for ritual purposes to boost their business…
The Jomoro District Police Commander, Deputy Superintendent of Police (DSP) John Ferguson Dzineku, briefing the Ghana News Agency on Sunday, said the two galamsey operators claimed that during their activities, each time they were about to hit the gold, it vanishes immediately and they therefore decided to perform a ritual to enable the gold to be stable…
Unfortunately, the one to perform the rituals, whose name is being withheld for security reasons, told Kojo and Amoah that he did not use human beings for his rituals and therefore rejected the boy. DSP Dzineku said the two men decided not send Nana Yaw back home so they resolved to sell him at 3,000.00 Ghana cedis to anyone who was interested.
He said the chief of the town, who was informed of the activities of the two men, decided to buy the boy and after bargaining, issued them with a fake Ghana Commercial Bank cheque for 2,000 Ghana cedis to be cashed at the Takoradi branch and took possession of the boy. DSP Dzineku said while Kojo and Amoah were preparing to leave the town, the chief informed the police who came to arrest them. He said they have been placed in police custody pending further investigations and prosecution while the boy is in the care of a policewoman at the station.

Ghana is one of the most advanced states in sub-Saharan Africa and, to its credit, this story had a happy ending.  Still, I take the copious positive descriptions of Ghana with a grain of salt.  The leftists must have at least one “successful” black African country to point to – and Ghana has been selected for this role.  It is difficult to tell how prevalent human sacrifice is in Ghana.  One commentator, on Ghanaweb, wrote this:

Throughout Southern Ghana, all chiefs still believe and practise human sacrifice when it comes to burial of dead chiefs. This is the reason some people still think ritual murder can make them prosperous. We all still have that 6th century thinking and mindset.
We have never changed from the way we think and do things. This is why Africa is still lagging behind in all aspects of human endevour.

Although the above commentator is clearly (hopefully) exaggerating, there might be a kernel of truth to his words.  According to Wikipedia, human sacrifice in that part of West Africa was, until recently, widely practiced and, in neighboring Cote d’Ivoire, it has been acknowledged as a serious problem very recently:

Child abduction, which is already a serious problem in Cote d’Ivoire, may worsen in the run up to presidential elections later this year as political hopefuls using traditional myths of human sacrifice to improve their electoral chances will fuel an already significant market for stolen children, according to the Ivorian police.

Few can honestly say, “my ancestors never practiced human sacrifice”, because there is hardly a place on Earth where it has not been done.  But in the old days, people did what they felt they had to do because ignorance and superstition ruled.  Obviously, there are places in Africa where ignorance and superstition still rule.  Like so many other traits, the ongoing practice of human sacrifice will reveal which societies are capable of absorbing civilization and which are doomed to remain in darkness.