Gborble traditional shrine priestess and shrine owners enslaved young virgin girls in a practice commonly called trokosi. The government of Ghana calls it ritual or customary servitude. The practice involves both sexual abuse and manual labor and the movement of the girls was strictly controlled by the shrine. The Gborble shrine priest and owners liberated their trokosi slaves on January 31, 2009 and signed a public agreement that the practice of slavery was ended in that place and that they would take in no more slaves. The shrine is located in a group of mud and thatch houses, where the girls were kept in crowded quarters with nothing but a floor to lie on. In this case a 26 year old woman was freed who had been taken into slavery when she was only three years old, left in the care of the older slaves at the shrine. When the victim’ss father and other members of the family died, they inquired at the shrine as to the cause. The priestess informed them that the grandfather had sex with another trokosi slave, and that to make atonement for that misdeed, a young virgin girl would be required from the family to become a shrine slave. She was held at the shrine for five years before she was even permitted to visit home. Her duties included sweeping the compound, gathering heavy firewood from the forest, and ploughing the fields for the priest’s farm with a short-handled hoe. As a trokosi slave, she was forced to go barefoot and was denied education. She often cried when she was other girls wearing normal clothing and going to school.
Location
Ghana · Ghana · 2001
(location generalized to protect survivors) Response & intervention
No one has ever been prosecuted in Ghana under the 1998 law. However, local law enforcement oficers in Ghana as well as CHRAJ (Commission on Human Rights & Administrative Justice) and various government officials cooperated in the liberation and spoke against the practice of trokosi at the liberation
The practice of ritual or customary servitude was outlawed in Ghana in 1998, but no one has ever been prosecuted under the law. Rather, the practical implementation of the law has fallen largely to NGO's who have facilitated the shrines in ending the practice. Two NGO's, Every Child Ministries Ghana and International Needs Ghana negotiated with the Gborble shrine and educated them as to the issues over a span of over a year, finally winning the approval of the shrine for the liberation of all its trokosi slaves on January 31, 2003. The liberation was a public event in which the shrine freed the slaves and agreed to end the practice of ritual servitude in that place.
The victims were emancipated in a public and culturally appropriate ceremony. This victim was one of 264 from three shrines who were liberated in a joint ceremony that day along with their children. Afterwards they received direct aid, family reunification intervention where possible, vocational training and counseling both immediate and long term. This victim received training in designing and making batik cloth, which enabled her to set up a small business to support herself and her son.
Every Child Ministries (ECM) Ghana and International Needs (IN) Ghana http://www.ecmafrica.org/36289.ihtml
One of the main focus points of these NGO’s is an anti-slavery/anti-trafficking initiative on behalf of African children. The organizations have conducted extensive research into the issue of ritual servitude and follow all the shrines of the area that still hold trokosi slaves with the goal of gradually eradicating the practice and rehabilitating its victims. This liberation was one of the fruits of that initiative.
Documented on the original SlaveryMap (2008–2016). Use “Report a problem” below to add a source or flag an issue.