Cameroon: Six women jailed for witchcraft

The women had been accused of killing their relatives and other inhabitants of Makanga neighbourhood in Muyuka, Southwest Region.

Sitting at the Muyuka Magistrate Court, Magistrate Divine Metiege Njikang pronounced the verdict, Thursday after the matter had dragged on for five years.

According to the judgement, the first convict, Mariana Alemji Forzi, 69, was sentenced to two years with a 3-year suspended sentence and asked to pay FCFA 1 million as civil damage to the complainant, her nephew, Maurice Amin Mbetenhduoh, as well as FCFA 38,750 to the State for cost of proceedings.

The other five; Lucia Menchat Anyinkeng, 63, Mary Amin Ngu, 59, Mary Asonglefack Aminkeng, 54, Christina Awung Fombe, 80 and Matina Kissob, 70, were each sentenced to six years imprisonment.

Each of them is liable to pay FCFA 1 million as civil damage, a fine of FCFA 100,000 and FCFA 38,750 to the State for cost of proceedings. Failure to pay the said fine, and pursuant to Section 565 of the CPC, the said amount shall be recovered by distress. The court also notified them on their right to appeal within 10 days.

According to the Magistrate, Alemji’s sentence was suspended because it was established that she was initiated into the cult without her knowledge and she had held steadfast on her confessional statement for five years, and even went further to name the people whom they killed through witchcraft from her family and even from the families of the other accused.

Genesis

This reporter learnt that Alemji was initiated into the cult with the use of cooked food (plantains and pork), which was offered to her by Awung, head of the cult, through Alemji’s co-wife, Amin, when she (Alemji) lost her elder sister - the complainant’s mother - and the cult women decided to pay her a condolence visit under the guise of a Lebialem association called LECUDO.

Alemji is said to have suspected the food was coming from her adversary, but Awung lured her into eating it and when she ate, she claimed that she started appearing in a mystical meeting where she met her co-wife and her initiator, as well as the other women.

In October 2005, Alemji reportedly confessed to her nephew, Mbetenhduoh, her children and her pastor that she was a witch and that she wanted to sell her farm and get rid of her belongings.

Subsequently, it was gathered that Alemji confessed to Mbetenhduoh that their cult was responsible for the death of one of their relatives, Susie Nkeng, who died in a car crash that involved Mbetenhduoh’s daughter, Melvis Amin Atemfac, a student of the University of Buea, UB, who survived the crash.

According to the confession, Atemfac who had taken ill was next on line to die. After her confession, Alemji’s children proposed to poison her but the pastor dissuaded them. Alemji then named her accomplices; the other five women, and they resolved to go to the village and take an oath that they were not responsible for Atemfac’s illness.

The accused women are said to have taken the oath but nothing happened to them.

Meanwhile, Mbetenhduoh had been shuttling with Atemfac between Mary Health of Africa Hospital in Lebialem and the Yaounde General Hospital, where she finally died on September 16, 2006.

It was against this background that Mbetenhduoh vowed that the women must pay for damages, claiming FCFA 10,000,000 in his charges against them.

Legal implication

Some legal minds posited that in a case of witchcraft, the legislator, in Section 251 of the Cameroon Penal Code, had previewed that witchcraft can be punished from two to 10 years imprisonment and payment of a fine of FCFA 5,000 to FCFA 100,000, which implies that who-so-ever practices witchcraft can be punished.

The case involving Alemji and five others was peculiar because Alemji confessed that she was a member of the cult; and that she was introduced into it by the 5th accused, Awung, and with the accomplice of her co-wife, Amin.

The matter first appeared in court in November 2005, before Magistrate Ambroise Abongwi Forchap. It started and ended in a ‘mediasres’ (case ending in the middle of proceedings) because there was a hitch, given that the Attorney General had not given a fiat for commencement of the trial of a witchcraft issue.

The Cameroon Penal Code provides that before a witchcraft matter is tried in court, there must be a fiat from the Attorney General to the State Counsel, permitting the State Counsel to prosecute the witchcraft issue. So, the Attorney General finally gave the fiat which ensured its legality, after which, the matter was handed over to Magistrate Metiege.