Crash-landings of flying witches in Ghana: Grand mystical feats or diagnosable psychiatric illnesses?

Abstract

Crash-landings are a recurrent theme in Ghanaian witchcraft discourse. In the society’s witchcraft lore, these are inadvertently aborted flights of maleficent witches en route to secret nocturnal witches’ assemblies or to carry out diabolical deeds. While those accused of being witches who have crash-landed invariably face severe mistreatment, no study has systematically explored this purported phenomenon. In this article, I describe the results of an analysis of 10 cases of alleged crash-landings of witches that were reported in the Ghanaian media over a 12-year period. In addition to identifying the common characteristics associated with the alleged crash-landings, I provide a summary description of each case. The results show that the alleged witches were overwhelmingly female, elderly, and poor, and suffered from grave psychopathological conditions. Policy implications of the findings are discussed.

Keywords

flying witches Ghana mental illness witchcraft witches

Introduction

Crash-landings of flying witches are a recurrent and dramatic feature of the Ghanaian witchcraft scene and broader magico-religious landscape. In popular Ghanaian witchcraft narratives, these inadvertently aborted flights occur while maleficent witches are en route to secret nocturnal assemblies or to carry out diabolical deeds. Ghanaian witch lore postulates that, when flying witches encounter Christian religious activities and objects such as powerful devotional worship, deep prayer, or sacred Christian accouterments, their journeys forcibly abort, causing them to crash to the ground. Certain local deities are also believed to have the capacity to identify and extinguish the destructive powers of witches. It is held that a witch that attempts to bewitch a person who has procured the protective services of an antiwitchcraft deity is prone to be captured by the deity and to experience an aerial crash-landing (Field, 1960). Such inadvertent flight terminations, known as by-force landings in local parlance, are characteristically accompanied by transitory mob actions in which public abuse of the putative witch ensues. Vigilante actions are unvaryingly followed by the intervention of law enforcement officials who rescue the alleged witch from a crowd clamoring to mete out instant “justice.” These tragic episodes typically conclude with official disclosures concerning the psychopathological ailment of the purported witch that caused her to wander into an unfamiliar setting at an anomalous hour.

A review of international mass media shows that stories concerning crash-landings of witches are not unique to Ghana (Goodare, 2013; Igwe, 2013). In the last decade, cases of flying witches have been reported in Nigeria (Nnadozie, 2014; Orenuga, 2014; SplashnaijaNG, 2014), South Africa (“Flying Witch Crashes Down,” 2015), Swaziland (Inyang, 2013), Zimbabwe (“Video: Naked Witches Arrested,” 2013), and Mexico (Tj demski, 2009). However, there is considerable variation in the nature and implications of witchcraft accusations across different sociocultural contexts. To fully understand crash-landings of purported witches in Ghana and to explain their recurrence, it is vital to examine witchcraft beliefs, societal perceptions of mental illness, and the status of mental health care in Ghana.

The purpose of this article is to provide an in-depth exploration of alleged witch crash-landings in Ghana and their policy implications. The position of the paper is that reported crash-landings of malevolent witches in Ghana can only be understood through an analysis of both witchcraft ideology and mental health needs, particularly among elderly women. Contrary to the views of many Ghanaians, our analysis revealed that those liable to be accused of being crash-landed witches were socially marginalized women manifesting mental or neurological impairments who were discovered alone in an unfamiliar place either late at night or at dawn. We conclude that many of these alleged witches are persons needing psychiatric care for grave psychological disturbances.

Society, religion, and mental health in Ghana

Ghana is a West African country with an estimated population of 28 million. The society is ethnically heterogeneous and linguistically complex. The society is also religiously pluralistic with Christians constituting 68.3% of the population, Muslims representing 15.9%, and those oriented towards such traditional religions as animism and ancestral veneration comprising about 8.5%. In Ghana, affiliation with or membership in a Christian or Muslim religion does not preclude observation of traditional religious practices, which for some exceed their participation in organized religions (Adinkrah, 2015). Akans are numerically the most dominant ethnic group in the country, comprising 46.5% of the total population. As the majority ethnic group, their language and culture, including witchcraft beliefs, permeate the entire society.

As of 2010, nearly 10% of Ghanaians were estimated to be afflicted with some form of mental illness (Roberts, Mogan, & Asare, 2014). Notwithstanding an officially recognized upsurge in diagnoses of mental illness and neurological disorders in the population, health services for the mentally ill remain scarce (Ministry of Health, 2007). According to one estimate, only 2.8% of the country’s mentally ill receive professional care (Roberts et al., 2014). Outpatient psychological counseling services for those suffering from emotional distress and minor psychiatric disorders are extremely limited, while national suicide prevention programs are nonexistent (Adinkrah, 2012).

The shortage of psychiatric services for the mentally ill is partly attributable to insufficient resources. According to one estimate, only 1.4% of the national health budget is allocated to mental health care (Roberts et al., 2014). Ghana has only three psychiatric hospitals, all of which are located in major cities in the southern region of the country, while about 50% of Ghanaians currently live in rural communities. Compounding issues of accessibility of facilities is the shortage of mental health care providers (Ministry of Health, 2007). Roberts et al. (2014) report that as of 2011, “There were 18 psychiatrists, 1,068 Registered Mental Nurses, 19 psychologists, 72 Community Mental health officers and 21 social workers working in mental health which is unbalanced with an unbalanced emphasis on nurses compared to what would be expected” (p. 1). The scarcity of mental health practitioners is partly attributable to poor remuneration and difficult working conditions as well as to stigmatization of the mentally ill, which reportedly extends to practitioners working with psychiatric patients (Read, Adiibokah, & Nyame, 2009).

Mental health care delivery in Ghana is also hampered by a scarcity of psychotropic pharmaceuticals, basic psychiatric medicines, and other critical medical supplies. These shortages often result in lack of or undertreatment for psychiatric illnesses, premature termination of treatment, clinician frustrations, patient dissatisfaction, delays in treatment, and the resort to alternative, often ineffectual treatment modalities (Osei, 2010). In a few reported instances, drug scarcities resulted in lethal and nonlethal assaults by aggressive psychiatric inpatients on other patients and medical staff (Yeboah, 2009).

Public attitudes toward mental health and illness

In Ghana, psychiatric illness and neurological impairments are often attributed to a range of malevolent supernatural forces, including witchcraft and sorcery¹ (Adinkrah, 2015; Field, 1960; Read et al., 2009). Others blame mental disorders on family curses or divine wrath and retribution for violations of cultural prohibitions. Hence, some place greater faith in spiritual cures than medical interventions from health care professionals. Family members of the psychiatrically impaired often dispatch mentally ill relatives to residential Christian prayer camps, herbalists, fetish priests,² spiritualists,³ and myriad other magico-religious functionaries (Read et al., 2009). Given the major stigma that surrounds psychiatric disorders, persons suffering from mild forms of psychiatric illness eschew treatment at both modern and traditional treatment centers. Patients that typically present at these facilities are those exhibiting violent or paranoid behavior. Overtly ill patients who have received treatment at psychiatric hospitals often face social stigmatization, rejection, and difficulties securing employment upon discharge. Families and society at large may refuse to accept their return, forcing their continued stay in these facilities. In January 2010, it was reported that the Accra Psychiatric Hospital—the country’s premier and largest psychiatric hospital—housed 1,200 inpatients, although designed to accommodate 600 (Osei, 2010). Many of the 1,200 inpatients had been previously discharged and were repudiated by their kinsfolk.

In March 2016, the Executive Director of the Mental Health Authority of Ghana described increases in the incidence of mental illness in the country and attributed these to distress arising from difficulties in interpersonal relationships, harsh economic conditions, escalating usage of illicit psychotropic drugs, alcohol abuse, and increases in the incidence of hypertension and dementia (Awaf, 2016). Extant research indicates that depression is the leading mental health problem in Ghana. Thapa, Martinez, and Clausen (2014) analyzed data from a cross-sectional statistical survey collected by the World Health Organization (WHO) in 2007–2009, finding that the prevalence of mild depression among Ghanaian adults aged 50 years and older was 6.7%. Sex-disaggregated data showed that depression rates were higher among women (8.5%) compared with men (5.1%). In addition, they found depression in Ghanaian women to be associated with the following factors: “higher age, living without a partner, never having been to school, living in an urban setting, migration, not currently working, moderate to very bad general self-reported health, lower quality of life and harmful use of alcohol” (Thapa et al., 2014, p. 4). For men, the correlates of depression were “reporting a lower quality of life and current smoking” (Thapa et al., 2014, p. 4).

Common folklore about witchcraft and witches in Ghana

Witchcraft beliefs are ubiquitous in Ghana, found in virtually every domain of Ghanaian society (Adinkrah, 2015; Bannerman-Richter, 1982). Anecdotal evidence suggests that most Ghanaians believe in witchcraft and the ability of witches to use spiritual powers to positively or negatively affect people’s lives. Indeed, the acceptance of witchcraft as a phenomenon cuts across socioeconomic lines, from university scholars to the unlettered, from the affluent to the indigent, from the medical professional to the peasant farmer. Witches and wizards are believed to have the capacity to perform extraordinary feats through spiritual means, including influencing a person’s thoughts, actions, feelings, and destiny (Adinkrah, 2015). Many Ghanaians invoke witchcraft to explain baffling, untimely, or catastrophic events such as illnesses, accidents, deaths, and natural disasters (Adinkrah, 2015; Field, 1960). The ability of witches to transmogrify (usually into animals and insects) and fly through the sky without detection is also an integral part of witchcraft lore (Adinkrah, 2015; Debrunner, 1961; Field, 1960). Witches may also travel by a special aircraft, most commonly the stem of a plantain tree, to cover long distances in a short time.

In the Akan ethnic group, a distinction is made between beneficent and maleficent witches. Beneficent witches are said to employ their witchcraft power to advance the interests of their beneficiaries, conferring financial, academic, or reproductive success. Conversely, maleficent witches can utilize their witchcraft to cause financial ruination or premature death, spread disease epidemics in their communities, or afflict their victims with stigmatized illnesses such as leprosy and tuberculosis (Adinkrah, 2015; Field, 1960). They take pleasure in inflicting myriad forms of economic, physical, and psychological torment on their victims (Adinkrah, 2015; Bannerman-Richter, 1982; Debrunner, 1961; Field, 1960). Witches are further believed to meet regularly with their covens, at which time they may spiritually cannibalize the flesh and blood of their victims. According to witchcraft ideology, a bewitched individual is unlikely to recover from the pernicious effects of malevolent witchcraft until the purported witch has been physically eliminated or exorcised of their witchcraft power.

Stereotypes of witches in Ghana depict an inquisitive, garrulous, and cantankerous woman. Elderly, widowed, and childless women as well as women who have lost several of their biological children through death are prone to be targets of witchcraft accusations. Physiological attributes of witches are believed to include shriveled stomachs, sagging breasts, wrinkled faces, toothless mouths, red or yellowish eyes, emaciated bodies, and stooping postures. Women who violate numerous gender expectations (in interaction with men or in their physical features) are also often suspected of witchcraft as are school girls who demonstrate academic brilliance. Affluent individuals or persons of high social standing are rarely accused of witchcraft (Adinkrah, 2015). While men are believed to use witchcraft mainly for beneficent purposes, it is believed that female witches are overwhelmingly maleficent (Adinkrah, 2015).

In Ghana, confessions of being involved in witchcraft have always posed a considerable threat to the confessor. In precolonial Asante society, and during the earliest years of colonization, suspected Akan witches were beaten and forced to undergo a trial by ordeal to determine guilt or innocence (Gray, 2001; McCaskie, 1981). Following an “affirmative” verification of witchcraft, some witches were forced to endure brutal cleansing rituals, banished from their communities, sold into slavery, or executed by strangulation (Gray, 2001). Variations on these beliefs and sanctions exist today, including violent retribution against those who are accused of or confess to being a witch. Because of this violent response, confessions tend to be confined to circumstances of coercion or mental impairment of the alleged witch.

Extant research on witchcraft and mental illness in Ghana

It has long been recognized by psychiatric experts in Ghana that voluntary confessions to the possession of witchcraft power and the perpetration of witchcraft misdeeds are symptomatic of psychiatric disorder (Field, 1960; Osei, 2011). In her ethnographic study in rural Ghana, psychiatrist Margaret Field interviewed scores of women, men, and adolescents who visited fetish shrines with symptoms of physical and psychiatric ailments. She found that despite the deeply opprobrious nature of the “witch” epithet, several patients voluntarily proclaimed themselves witches and confessed to having utilized witchcraft to commit abominable acts. She observed that many of the middle-aged and elderly women who made self-accusations of witchcraft suffered from “involutional depression with self-blame,” “reactive depression,” and “schizo-affective psychosis.” For example, she described:

In rural Ghana, involutional depression with agitation is one of the commonest and most clearly defined of mental illnesses. The majority of patients are conscientious women of good personality who have worked hard and launched a fleet of well-brought-up children. Many of them have paid for their children’s schooling with money earned by diligent trading, market-gardening or cocoa-farming. Asked to describe the onset of their symptoms they use the phrases familiar in the admission wards of our own [British] mental hospitals. “I became useless. I couldn’t do any work but neither could I sit still and rest. At night, I couldn’t sleep because my mind was restless and I often got up and walked about.” Then they add, “Soon I knew that I was no good and had become a witch. I have done so much evil that I ought to be killed.” (Field, 1960, p. 149)

In a more recent study, Ghanaian psychiatrist Osei (2011) used multiple diagnostic tools, including the ICD-10, to examine 17 middle-aged Ghanaian women who had voluntarily confessed to being witches. The self-professed witches had self-reported or been brought to traditional fetish shrines and healing centers by family relations after exhibiting varying symptoms of illness. All had their claims to being witches confirmed by the consulting traditional healers. Following extensive medical exams, Osei (2011) found all 17 women to be suffering from depressive illness. He observed:

These women believed they were witches because they woke up one day with generalized swelling of the body or nightmares or they had seen themselves flying in their dreams, particularly on a horseback or seen themselves in the dream being chased by the traditional priest. Yet others felt they were witches because they had malaise or worrisome physical conditions like persistent headaches, urinary incontinence or burning sensations over the body. The logic seems to be that “If I were not a witch why do I have these complaints and why was I being chased in the dream?” As part of the witchcraft belief, the women admitted to some guilt, mostly of being the cause of some deaths or misfortune in the family. In phenomenology, this is delusion of guilt. All the women looked sad and had the features of clinical depression. (Osei, 2011, p. 113)

Research methods and data sources

The data for this study were extracted from various Ghanaian print and electronic media sources. Efforts were made to identify all witch crash-landings reported by the media during the study period through a systematic search of all major electronic and print news databases. As a first step, a manual review was conducted of all print issues of major newspapers published in Ghana during 2005–2016. Newspapers surveyed include The Daily Graphic, The Ghanaian Times, The Mirror, and The Weekly Spectator. This was supplemented with an extensive electronic search of all the main Ghana-based Internet news sites. The following Ghana-based websites were scrutinized for relevant information: Ghanamma.com, GhanaWeb.com, Ghanatoday.com, and ModernGhana.com. Pertinent keywords and phrases (e.g., “flying witch,” “witch shot down,” “witch arrested”) were used to identify reports involving flying witch cases. In all, 10 cases were identified from 107 case reports. Information relating to each case was photocopied and read. Data on witches’ sociodemographic attributes (sex, age, marital status, occupation, mental health status) as well as the spatial and temporal aspects of the incidents were then extracted and compiled. In Ghana, witchcraft-related stories are considered particularly newsworthy. Consequently, various media outlets expend considerable energy, resources, and time to report such stories, with monitoring from inception to conclusion and granting ample space to their coverage.

Results

A search of print and online newspapers and Internet reports identified 10 reported cases of witch crash-landings from 2005 to 2016. Several patterns were observed from the analysis of the cases. All reports of alleged crash-landings of putative witches garnered a great deal of attention in the media, while generating horror and fascination in the public. With regard to sociodemographic characteristics, all accused witches were middle-aged or elderly, ranging in age from 35 to 110 years old, and women were disproportionately represented. Of the 10 putative witches, only one was male. Many of the accused witches possessed physical characteristics that fit the Ghanaian stereotype of a witch. In Case 7, the woman was described as having a masculine appearance, but with both male and female genitalia. In Case 6, the male witch was said to have had female breasts. Putative witches invariably were of lower socioeconomic status.

As the following summaries illustrate, half of the cases involved explicit references to the alleged witch as psychiatrically impaired at the time of the incident. In the other cases, psychiatric impairment could be inferred from the case descriptions. Many were described as having an unkempt appearance, sporting disheveled hair, being disoriented or incoherent, or providing conflicting answers to questions—all signs and symptoms associated with a disordered mental state in Ghana.

In all profiled cases, the arrival of law enforcement officers prevented an escalation of the situation. Also, in all cases, public reaction was swift, as expressed in editorial comments in newspapers and other public forums. Believers of witchcraft perceived the incidents as veritable substantiation of the concrete reality of witchcraft and malevolent witches. Concurrently, witchcraft skeptics or deniers perceived the stories to be manufactured tales about people who in actuality had diagnosable psychiatric impairments. Some commentators found it highly implausible that a healthy and psychologically well-balanced individual would publicly self-identify as a malevolent witch and cavalierly confess to committing such misdeeds.

Case summaries

This section provides descriptive summaries of the 10 cases analyzed in this study.

Case 1

In August 2005, an elderly woman in her mid-nineties was nearly lynched by a gang of neighborhood youth in Kumasi on suspicion that she was a flying witch. The youth had come across the feeble and distressed woman sitting atop a huge boulder in front of a residential building at 1:00 a.m. The youth inferred that the woman was returning home from a nocturnal witch sabbath and that her flight had been derailed by their witch-sighting. After subjecting her to 4 hours of physical and psychological torment, the youth frog-marched the woman to the local police station where police personnel detained her for another 3 hours while attempting to disperse a fractious crowd that assembled in front of the police station demanding to mete out “instant justice” to the woman. Amidst the commotion, relatives of the woman arrived at the police station to appeal for calm and to secure her release to their care. They told police that the woman was a member of the royal family of a neighboring town and was prone to leaving home at odd hours as she did on that early morning. Following the publicity surrounding the story, Help-Age Ghana, a nongovernmental organization, called for the criminalization of witchcraft accusations in the country as a measure to combat violence toward elderly persons based on witchcraft suspicions (“Labeling People Witches,” 2005; Nunoo, 2005).

Case 2

In this case, the principal and students of a computer and secretarial school detained an elderly woman, stripped her naked, and beat her to a comatose state. The assailants suspected that the woman was a witch returning home from a nocturnal witches’ meeting whose flight had been disrupted. According to media reports, a man had brought his 110-year-old mother from a village to reside with him in a nearby town where he lived and worked. The man had lived with his mother without incident for 3 consecutive months. The elderly woman had been advised by her doctor to take regular walks to maintain her physical fitness and overall health. The day of the incident, she set off for her routine walk at 6:00 a.m. When she did not return soon after, the man and his son went in search of her. About 200 meters away, the son found her surrounded by a hostile mob that had stripped her naked and beaten her pitilessly. Among the mob were the principal and students of the school. The crowd claimed that they had apprehended a witch and were in the process of saying prayers for her. When the woman’s grandson attempted to rescue her, the crowd set upon him and beat him as well. The woman’s son and other members of her family arrived in time to save her and the grandson (“Party Official,” 2006).

Case 3

In this case, a male resident of an Accra suburb said he woke up to find a 35-year-old woman in his bedroom in the early morning hours. She purported to be a witch. In interviews with police, the man stated that around 3:45 that morning, he was awakened by a booming sound in his bedroom and a strange woman in his bed. His loud screams of “Witch!” woke up his neighbors, attracting a large crowd to the neighborhood. According to a statement given to the police, the woman claimed that she was a witch who was en route to Italy to disrupt the marriage of her brother residing there. Her flight crash-landed when she encountered a giant crucifix that had been affixed to a nearby church. She told police that her father was a wizard who gave her witchcraft with instructions that she use it to cause malevolence to unsuspecting persons. She claimed that she used her witchcraft to destroy the career of her sister who had been a successful lawyer. In subsequent interviews, the police noted that the woman sounded incoherent and there were several inconsistencies in her story, such as claiming to be an emissary of the Christian Holy Ghost sent on a mission to destroy the devil while also repeatedly confessing to being a witch. Furthermore, she made conflicting statements about her occupation, claiming she was a soldier, policewoman, and soccer player, among a series of other professions. The police appealed to the public to assist in locating the whereabouts of the woman’s relatives (Awuku, 2008).

Case 4

In this case, an elderly woman was the target of the most vicious form of vigilante punishment directed at purported witches in Ghana—homicide. A 72-year-old woman traveled over 100 miles from her village to Tema, Ghana’s harbor city, to visit her son. Unbeknownst to the woman, her son had relocated to another suburb of Tema. She arrived at the former abode, unable to find him. Lost and disoriented, she wandered about the neighborhood, beseeching community members for food and water and for money to pay for her transport fare back to her village. She wandered into the living room of a woman who had left home to take her children to school. Upon returning and finding the elderly woman in her home, the young mother, along with six men, branded the older woman a witch whose flight to a witches’ sabbath had been aborted. She was forced to confess to various acts of witchery, then was drenched in gasoline and set ablaze by her captors. She was rescued by a bystander who took her to a hospital, but died shortly upon arrival. Her tormentors told police that they did not set the elderly woman alight but only poured holy oil on her to exorcise her of maleficent spirits. It was while praying for her, they claimed, that their continuous chants of “Holy Ghost fire” caused the woman to burst into flames. The victim’s relatives maintained that the elderly woman was an upright citizen who had recently developed incipient forms of dementia (“My Mum is Not a Witch,” 2010).

Case 5

In this case, two new military recruits arrived at the Military Academy and Training College in Accra at about 7:00 a.m. to find a nude elderly woman lying prostrate amidst two heaps of construction stones in the middle of their enclosed compound. They draped a cloth around the woman, then removed her from the premises, seating her outside the compound of the training school on a busy adjoining street. According to the soldiers, the woman claimed she was a witch who had crash-landed. She told them that she had been in the company of about 15 other witches who were flying to a clandestine nocturnal witches’ meeting when she came crashing to the ground. She reportedly had bruises all over her body and was so weak that she could not walk or sit up without assistance. She could not eat and only demanded water from her custodians. As a massive crowd congregated around her outside the school compound, the woman became agitated. Red Cross officials were called in to provide assistance to the woman, clothing her and transporting her to the police station. When the police turned her away claiming that she was not a criminal, she was taken to the psychiatric hospital where she was refused admission by medical personnel who claimed she was not psychiatrically impaired. Taken to another public clinic, she was again refused admission. However, it was there that a patient recognized the woman and called her relatives, who emerged on the scene, challenging the accusation of witchcraft. They told police that she was an eminent citizen who, over the past 3 years, had developed the symptoms of Alzheimer’s disease, including wandering away from home (Fiadzigbe, 2011; Ghanaian Chronicle, 2011).

Case 6

In this case, a 75-year-old man was presumed to be a flying wizard who crash-landed on the banks of a major river near Accra. The elderly man was described as “frail and pale” with “protruding breasts that looked like that of a teenage girl.” The two young men who were the first to chance upon the elderly man claimed that he asked for assistance, then confessed to being a wizard who had been flying in the company of witch colleagues—one of whom was a medical doctor—when their aircraft developed engine troubles after encountering an all-night prayer vigil of Christian worshippers. The man explained that he acquired his female breasts by spiritually removing them from his 16-year-old granddaughter, and regularly borrowed them for his nocturnal witch trysts. The men took the elderly man to a nearby commercial radio station where an announcement was made regarding the aborted flight of a wizard. The announcer asked for assistance in tracing the relatives of the frail, and by then incoherent man, which attracted hundreds of people to the radio station to see the suspected wizard. Law enforcement officers were dispatched to the radio station to rescue him from a raucous crowd. Investigations subsequently revealed that the man was a mental patient who had absconded from a psychiatric facility nearby (“Flying Wizard Crash-Lands,” 2013).

Case 7

On May 15, 2015, several Ghanaian print and electronic media sources reported the purported crash-landing of a witch in Accra. Some eyewitness accounts described sightings of a strange bird in morning traffic that later morphed into a woman. According to another group of eyewitnesses, the crash-lander originally appeared as a man dressed in full military regalia who upon standing up, morphed into a woman with sagging breasts, shriveled stomach, and a clean-shaven bald head. Other accounts described the putative witch as having a male upper torso and a female lower body. According to some accounts, the purported witch held a piece of red cloth in her hand—red signifying witchery in Akan symbolism. A crowd congregated around the woman, unclad her, and forced her into confessing to being a witch. She then claimed to the crowd that she was flying to Accra from Kumasi where she had preternaturally removed the uterus of a woman she had bewitched, and that the red piece of cloth represented the removed uterus. As news of the crash-landing spread, the crowd grew larger and more hostile, clamoring for the woman’s death. Anointing oil was poured on her to neutralize her purported witchcraft power. It took several contingents of police personnel to rescue the woman. Investigations conducted by the police later revealed that the elder woman was a Ghana-born, naturalized Canadian citizen. When she developed psychiatric problems in Canada, her relatives had returned her to Ghana for traditional herbal treatments. She had been living in Ghana for 3 years with her mental disorder and on that night, had wandered from home. Following her harrowing ordeal, she was rescued by family members who debunked the witch claim, explaining her behavior as symptoms of dementia (“My Mother Is Not a Witch,” 2015; Yeboah-Afari, 2015).

Case 8

In this case, the residents of a village discovered a distraught, disheveled, and bruised 56-year-old woman at dawn. The woman allegedly confessed to being a witch whose aircraft had crashed to the ground. She claimed she had been flying with her husband and their two sons, aged 9 and 10 years old, from a town in another part of the country. She professed to be the flight captain of their aircraft, which consisted of a plantain tree stem, en route to kill a woman. As they flew over a Seventh-Day Adventist church, the power of the church tower caused their aircraft to malfunction, then crash. Her husband and sons disappeared, abandoning her after the crash. Eyewitnesses recounted that upon first encountering the woman, she was reciting some incantations intended to resume the flight but was unsuccessful. She confessed that the bruises on her body were injuries sustained from the crash. She was brought to a radio station where she repeated the story. She was later released to a police station (“Flying Woman Crash-Lands,” 2016).

Case 9

In this case, a 37-year-old woman was reported to have fallen from the sky onto the compound of a cement factory in Kumasi at 3:30 a.m. Her flight was allegedly forced to abort when she flew over a radio station where a group of Christians were praying on the air. According to one account, workers at the factory heard a thunderous sound and went to investigate. They asserted that they saw a woman wearing a “shiny-looking dress and with blood-stains on the face lying there.” Another account indicated that the alleged witch was virtually nude when they encountered her. Yet another account indicated that the woman fled as a curious crowd assembled, taking cover in a nearby house. A newspaper reporter noted that eyewitness accounts “were full of inconsistencies in the narration of the strange event, raising suspicion that perhaps the alleged witch was suffering mentally” (“Witch Crash Lands in K’si,” 2016).

Case 10

In this case, a woman in her mid-fifties allegedly crash-landed in a house situated near a cemetery in Tema. According to witnesses, around 2:00 a.m. that morning, residents of the house heard a loud bang in their compound. One resident, not knowing the source of the noise, started fervently praying, asking the Christian God to strike any evil that had befallen her abode. Upon venturing out to investigate, the residents discovered that a bird had crashed into the house. The bird reportedly morphed into a woman who took refuge in a bathroom in the compound of the house. The residents dashed after her, pouring “anointing” oil onto her, whereupon she began to confess to being a witch whose aircraft had crash-landed. She claimed that other members of her witch flight took off following the crash, leaving her behind. Upon hearing news of a crash-landing witch, a massive crowd congregated to catch a glimpse of her, but she soon escaped through the cemetery as the crowd grew more threatening (“‘Witch’ Crash-Lands at Tema,” 2016).

Discussion and conclusion

This first systematic study of purported crash-landings of flying witches in Ghana highlights the overlap between Ghanaian notions about manifestations of witchcraft and common presentations of mental illness. Persons labeled as witches in crash-landing cases were invariably psychiatrically impaired, suffering from conditions such as depression and dementia. Their purported confessional statements were symptoms of their mentally disordered states. The cases described typically involved mentally impaired elderly women found isolated in unusual locations at odd hours. Upon discovery, the women were accosted by bystanders who accused them of being witches traveling to or from witches’ assemblies. These findings regarding the psychiatric impairment of those who confessed to being witches confirm the results of prior studies. Both Field (1955, 1960) and Osei (2011) have previously suggested that self-proclaimed witches in Ghana are frequently psychiatric patients in need of treatment.

Tragically, the mistreatment of supposed crash-landed witches documented in this study represents only a minuscule proportion of the total volume of cases involving aggression directed against putative witches. Each year, hundreds of elderly Ghanaians, primarily women, become victims of witchcraft accusations and are quickly dispatched to Christian prayer camps, traditional fetish shrines, and the abodes of herbal practitioners for an exorcism (Adinkrah, 2015). Here, many are coerced into confessing to malevolent acts perpetrated with their witchcraft. In some communities, suspected witches are banished from their homes in perpetuity, consigned to lives of destitution in witches’ camps—sanctuaries for accused witches fleeing death (Badoe & Mama, 2010).

Anecdotal evidence suggests that while accusations and abuse of purported witches remain extensive, they have moved from the public realm into underground spaces as accusers fear potential prosecution for inciting mob violence. This is attributable, in part, to concerted efforts by successive governments to combat vigilante violence. While vigilante murder has not been eradicated (Adinkrah, 2005), it has likely declined as a result of government action. However, it is notable that three of the crash-landing cases occurred in 2016 alone. Some analysts (Adinkrah, 2011, 2015) have attributed this recent spate of violence against putative witches to increased coverage of witchcraft phenomena in Ghanaian mass media. At present, three major radio and television programs in the country focus exclusively on witchcraft phenomena. For example, Etuo Mu Wo Sum is a Ghanaian radio program broadcast weekly on a radio station with the most extensive coverage in the country. The program features guests who include self-professed witches, self-described victims of bewitchment, pastors, witch finders, diviners,⁴ and exorcists. Topics covered range from the physical and behavioral characteristics of witches to the ways listeners can fortify themselves against witchcraft. Radio and television programs also receive calls from listeners and viewers seeking advice or consultation on witchcraft matters or describing subjective experiences with bewitchment or encounters with purported witches. It is speculated that the plethora of information now available about witches has made people more fearful of bewitchment and vigilant about the presence and activities of witches. This has likely fueled public perceptions and interpretations of encounters with older women as evidence of crash-landings (Adinkrah, 2015).

A prominent observation from this study is the disproportionate representation of women among purported crash-landed witches, with 9 out of the 10 accused witches being women. This finding is consistent with earlier studies on witchcraft accusations in Ghana (Adinkrah, 2004, 2015). In Ghanaian witchcraft discourse, most accused witches are women; female witches are also presumed to use their power malevolently. This speaks to the misogyny that underlies witchcraft ideology (Adinkrah, 2004, 2015; Bannerman-Richter, 1982). Women are more likely to be accused of being witches because they are considered spiritually weaker than men and, thus, more likely to be used by malevolent forces to enact malevolent deeds. Women are also believed to be more envious and covetous than men and these characteristics are often motivating factors in bewitchment. Women who transgress certain gender norms are often accused of being witches. Older women are believed to have certain physical and, in some cases, behavioral characteristics that are defined as characteristic of witches. But here it is also important to address the accusers. Those who make accusations of witchcraft are typically young males. In the crash-landing cases profiled in this study, young males raised the alarm about flying witches, particularly in cases of mob sightings, and it was their narratives that created the grounds for violence.

From a cultural standpoint, it is not difficult to understand how violence and aggression become directed towards purported crash-landed witches. In Ghana, there is a fascination with witchcraft and the depredations of diabolic witches. From their formative years up through adulthood, Ghanaians learn about the corporeal and behavioral characteristics of witches through formal and informal interactions at home, school, church, and the workplace, as well as mass media. Yet very few Ghanaians can claim definitively to have seen a real witch. This is attributed to the fact that witches and witch covens are clandestine and impossible to observe unless one belongs to the small cadre of individuals spiritually equipped to see them. For this reason, many Ghanaians are eager to physically encounter a witch and may seize the opportunity when stumbling upon or learning of a person who exhibits characteristics of a witch. These same people may also advocate instant justice against the witch, whom they cannot ordinarily see but they believe secretly harms them.

The present study has serious implications for the care, custody, and treatment of the mentally ill in Ghana. In one profiled case, a psychiatric patient wandered away from a psychiatric hospital where he was receiving care when he was accosted and attacked by a mob. In three other cases, people with apparent mental illness were targeted when they wandered away from their homes. Given these findings, it is recommended that psychiatric hospitals improve the security of their facilities to prevent resident patients from leaving prematurely. Also, families must be vigilant about the movements of their elderly, mentally ill relatives. Educating the public about psychiatric disorders, including geriatric psychopathologies, may promote recognition of and appropriate interaction with persons with psychiatric disorders.

The misidentification of psychiatrically impaired elderly women as witches and their concomitant victimization can also be seen as a manifestation of the lack of mental health care for elderly citizens suffering from undiagnosed and untreated depression, dementia, Alzheimer’s, and other mental disorders. As Ghana’s population ages, the need for mental health care services for the elderly will increase. The government must give priority to the provision of these services by increasing the budgetary allocation for mental health. As noted above, psychiatric care delivery in Ghana is hindered by the scarcity of psychiatric professionals, chronic undersupply of psychiatric medicines, old and dilapidated infrastructures, and overcrowded and underfunded psychiatric hospitals. Medical researchers must also investigate the potential causes and contributing factors of psychopathology in older people, while psychiatrists and mental health personnel must endeavor to address depression in the elderly population with appropriate therapeutic and pharmacological strategies. The findings of this study also suggest that many Ghanaians would benefit from more information on the physical, social, and psychological aspects of aging, including such cognitive declines and impairments as depression, dementia, Alzheimer’s, and symptoms of senility. At present, if an elderly individual has a debilitating psychiatric illness, many in her immediate social circles or who encounter her will consider her a witch. An aged woman in need of a nap or who wakes up in the middle of the night and wanders out of her home may end up facing an accusation of being a witch who crash-landed. The study also has implications for family and professional caregivers for the aged. These individuals require thorough and substantive advice and information on the complete range of psychological issues that afflict the elderly.

Although the current study focuses on Ghana, findings may be relevant for the prevention and control of violence against alleged witches in many societies in sub-Saharan Africa. During the past few decades, virulent mob actions against elderly women and children imputed to be witches as well as crash-landings of putative witches have been documented in several sub-Saharan African countries (Ademowo, Foxcroft, & Oladipo, 2010; Ashforth, 2005; Chavunduka, 1980; Makoye, 2015; Ter Haar, 2007). Indeed, the circumstances of crash-landings and characteristics of the people accused of witchcraft are similar throughout the continent. Accused witches in Nigeria, South Africa, Tanzania, Uganda, Zimbabwe, and many other sub-Saharan African countries are usually women, elderly, widowed, and poor (Ashforth, 2005; Chavunduka, 1980; Makoye, 2015; Ter Haar, 2007). In these societies, too, the symptoms of geriatric psychiatric pathologies parallel the cultural template for witches, resulting in accusations and persecution of older women. As in Ghana, many sub-Saharan African countries face formidable challenges in efforts to tackle the problem of mental illness (Akyeampong, 2015). These challenges include the scarcity of trained psychiatrists, with general physicians often resorting to doubling as psychiatrists, overcrowded facilities for the mentally ill, understaffed hospitals, and chronic shortages of psychotropic medications for patients.

This study has a few limitations worth stating. First, it relied on media reports as the primary data source. Although media reporters in Ghana work to ensure the completeness and accuracy of their information, they are limited by what information they are given by witnesses and other informants. Also, as is true of any media reports, the stories may be colored by the personal perspectives, beliefs, and biases of the reporters themselves. A second limitation is the absence of information about the final resolution of the cases. The data would have been enriched by the inclusion of information regarding the final resolution of each of the cases, including the outcomes of the mental status evaluations, diagnoses, and treatment of purported witches referred to mental health services. These were not available in the media reports identified. While effort was made to obtain such information, issues of privacy precluded psychiatric authorities from sharing such information with the author.⁵ Despite these limitations, the study elucidates the relationship between witchcraft ideology and mental health in a West African country.

Footnotes

Acknowledgements

The author wishes to express his sincere gratitude to Dr. Carmen M. White, Professor of Anthropology at Central Michigan University, who offered invaluable comments on an earlier draft of the article. The author also wishes to thank three anonymous reviewers of Transcultural Psychiatry for comments which helped to improve the overall quality of the article.

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Notes

Mensah Adinkrah, PhD, is a Professor of Sociology and Criminal Justice in the Department of Sociology, Anthropology, and Social Work at Central Michigan University. Dr. Adinkrah researches witchcraft, homicide, suicide, and violence against women and children from a comparative perspective. His published works focus on crime and criminal justice issues in Fiji, witchcraft-related violence in Ghana, homicide and suicide in Ghana, as well as violence against women and children in Fiji and Ghana. He was a United States Fulbright Senior Research Scholar to Ghana during 2003–2004. Dr. Adinkrah is the author of Witchcraft, Witches, and Violence in Ghana (Berghahn Books, 2015).

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