Those who hold the belief that witchcraft is a myth and not a reality will have a rethink after reading this piece. A promising and highly anointed Jos-based gospel songstress came from a family where sorcery is a way of life in their Jarawa community, a location not too far away from Jos, the Plateau state capital (Nigeria). So highly gifted was the songstress that any time she mounted the dais to minister songs in her church, the entire congregation would be electrified, some would even collapse in tears as they whined for God’s forgiveness and mercy.
The songstress, who was a born again child of God, carried her anointing too far when she decided to visit her sick cousin in the village who had been bedridden with an undisclosed illness. Bogged down by the recording process of her first album, she had no time to travel to the village to look up the sick young man. Mission accomplished, she took off, armed with some provisions for the un-well relation.
Upon arriving at the compound, she met the mother of her cousin seated on guard by the entrance of the room where the poor boy was holed up. After exchanging some greetings and rendering apologies for her inability to show up much earlier, she told the mother she wanted to pray for the boy. Then she made for the door. But curiously, the mother refused her entry, telling her to mind her own business. That cold attitude rattled the songstress because the mother knew how very close they were. At first, she thought the mother assumed that posture because she was visiting him belatedly. When she brushed the mother aside to enter the room, the woman told her to be prepared to accept whatever fate that befell her since she insisted on entering the room.
Ignoring the warning and believing that her mission was divine (to pray for the healing of her cousin), she yanked the door open and stepped into the poorly illuminated room. Then something strange happened. She fell flat on her face. The devil is a liar, she must have shouted. Gathering herself together, she crooned some healing songs and prayed for the sick that lay motionless on his deathbed. Moments after, she began to experience some funny feelings. Then a mysterious illness set in. And her cousin’s condition began to improve, while she was getting sicker and sicker, her cousin was getting better and better. Three or so months after the encounter, the songstress kicked the bucket. And her cousin, who had not seen the daylight for months, suddenly jumped out of his deathbed as if nothing had happened to him before.
There was pandemonium in her (Pentecostal) church when the news of her demise broke out. Her church members mourned her the way they had never done in the annals of the church. The pastors and the members of the choir were inconsolable. So also was the young banker who could not resist proposing marriage to her after he was ensnared by the soul-moving tracks in her debut album on the very day it was launched.
On the day of her burial, the church was full to the brim. After the funeral service, the entire congregation trooped to her village. The convoy had to park some long distance away because the location was not motorable. The sympathisers cried and wailed along as the corpse was taken to its final resting place.
Overwhelmed by the anger of the relations of the songstress and the quantum of condolences that poured in, the mother of her cousin broke down a few weeks after the burial. She confessed that the young man had been marked down for sacrifice because it was her turn to provide meat for her fellow witches in their coven, regretting that the songstress was too stubborn not to heed her warning against setting their prey free with her songs and supplication on the day of her visit. She said that with the intervention of the songstress, her members decided to release the original meat and preyed on the intruder instead. After that open confession, the witch mother paid the price for her disclosure and gave up the ghost.
Meanwhile, the young man that was already on the altar of sacrifice is alive, hale, hearty and kicking.
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