It is quite common to see women with twins, triplets and quadruplets (multiple births) on the streets of the regional capital beg for alms not just to survive but because a fetish priest somewhere has asked them to, for the wellbeing and survival of these gifts from God (children).
Many of these women seen with their babies either strapped at their backs or sitting in the sun all day are made to believe an old age traditional myth which has been disputed on many occasions by traditional rulers that twin, triplets and quadruplets are spirits and the only way they can survive is for their mothers to beg for alms. This association of myth and misconception surrounding the birth of twins, triplets and quadruplets has sunk so deep in the minds of many women and even men that they will ask their wives to send their kids out for begging so they are not killed by some gods.
A young woman who could not bear the pain broke down in tears when confessing that she now lives in her father’s house with her twins because the husband divorce her (). She made this known during a twins and triplets party organized by Kiddy Care (KiC) Foundation in Tamale. These children are put out there at the mercy of an unhygienic environment with flies hovering around them which are detrimental to their health and personal development. Some mothers of twins and triplets risk the lives of their kids on the streets and from house to house beg for alms for their upkeep and yet in some communities, society finds a way to glorify it with spiritual connotation.
The misery about this whole mystical myth of twins, triplets and quadruplets is the fact that educated and well to do women in the society are not compelled to beg for alms when they have multiple births.
Illiteracy
Illiteracy rate in Ghana is quite rife with Northern region as a constitute is no different. Most women in Northern Ghana are affected by the old age perception that women belong to the kitchen though successive government over the years have done something in the educational sector but girls are not given equal opportunity and attention to education accounting for high illiteracy rate on the part of women than men. Most of these women seen begging for alms on the streets are illiterate thereby subject to manipulations by fetish priests and partners. It will be very difficult to see an educated woman with twins begging for alms in northern Ghana.
Poverty
My grandmother has got a saying that “born pikin no be problem but money for koko” which translates child birth is not as difficult and demanding as child rearing. So could poverty be the basis for this unfounded twin’s myth? Raising a child from infancy to adulthood where he or she can take care of himself or herself in an African society involves a lot of resources. In Ghana, raising a child mostly rest on women and thereby not surprising women are the ones found on the street begging for alms. Most of these women are peasant farmers and even do not own the lands they farm on thereby limits their income when such lands are taken from them and farming season is over, making them handicapped financially. Raising a child is no joke, let alone twins or triplets, so most of these women are on the street not because of any fetish priest telling them to but for financial gains.
Conclusion
It is the right of everyone to get access to education both boys and girls thereby the need for us to encourage the enrolment and retention of girls in school so we can have assertive, capable and conscientious women to develop the north.
Traditional rulers should do more beyond the talks and take drastic measures against the fetish priests who lure people and those who engage in this inhumane act of survival. Non-governmental organisations such as KiC Foundation that exists to create a medium of intervention to support better living conditions for under-privileged children by respecting children’s right to healthy life and total development should be encouraged and supported.