Superstition in Angola: Its Effects

Africa' cultures are anchored in spirituality; not in just Christian beliefs.  Animist beliefs in the supernatural are the basis of many Angolan superstitions or folk beliefs, just the same as the common superstitions here in North America.

For example, in Angola, the twitching in your lower eyelid signals that you will soon be shedding tears or when the upper eyelid twitches, it’s a sign you will meet someone unexpectedly.  Or additionally, when you you encounter a dead snake across the road is suspected as a sign that that fate will come to that person.

Though taken very lightly here in North America, the reaction to superstitions in Angola has real and tragic results. For example there is a growing trend in Angola of children being accused of witchcraft since there are so many superstitions against witchcraft.   What is the basis of this?

Unfortunately for many areas in Africa and elsewhere in the world, misfortune seems to be striking with vengeance. Particularly in country like Angola where the people have been scarred by war, famine, economic collapse, death, and HIV infections, there are many “why me?” questions to be answered.  Essentially,  'when AIDS or a disaster begins to kill, someone in the family gets blamed for it.' Other children in Angola have been accused of transforming into animals and eating crops at night. Yet scientific analysis found that late rains had caused poor crop yield during that period.

Some common traits in children accused to have witchcraft are: stubbornness, learning disabilities, physical disabilities such as epilepsy, unruly behavior and not taking school seriously. Many of these traits deemed “witch-like” are usually considered normal adolescent behavior in the West. Children suffering from disease such as AIDS and malaria are also prime targets of witchcraft accusations. Once accused of witchcraft, a child is punished, beaten, starved and sometimes killed to “cleanse” her or him of supposed magical powers. (UNHCR/Open Forum Report 2009)

As Christians, it is exciting to know that salvation through Christ can free Angolans from the bondage of these beliefs and free children from such accusations.  We look forward to bring this message once again to Angola.

A Real African Christmas Card

Here is an African Christmas card that I received last year from an African friend living in southern Africa.  Enjoy!


An African dog went to a telegraph office and wrote a Christmas greeting:  WOOF, WOOF, WOOF, WOOF, WOOF, WOOF, WOOF, WOOF, WOOF.
The Postmaster said, "There's only nine WOOFS here. You could get another 'WOOF' for the same price."
The dog answered, "But that would make no sense at all!"

Angola: Land of Beauty

Though there are many social, medical, and infrastructure challenges facing the Angolan nation as it emerges from past war conflict,  it is undeniable that the country possesses some of the most beautiful scenery in the region.   Here below,  is a small sample of the beauty of Angola. Enjoy!

The Great Healthcare Need

Having lived in Angola for many years in the'90s, I witnessed firsthand how the country's healthcare infrastructure and system was decimated by the multi-decade civil war. Before the war, the infrastructure of some 700 country-wide clinics developed by the Portuguese was reduced during wartime to a  few major hospitals functioning in the major cities. Though it is now some 7 years now since the civil war has ceased, roughly 50% of Angolans do not have access to healthcare.  The CEML Hospital is filling this need in the southern part of the country.

The state of Angola’s health care system is especially detrimental for children who suffer in large numbers from tetanus, measles, whooping cough and meningitis; among others, malaria is especially deadly, as this disease causes approximately 50 percent of deaths in children under the age of five.

Most people coming to CEML are extremely poor, and have virtually no other access to medical care. Many suffer from chronic diseases such as hypertension and rheumatic fever. Malaria is very common, as is TB and schistosomiasis, diarrhoeal disease, respiratory disease, parasitic infections, trauma, and nutritional deficiency disease.

Being staffed by very skilled Canadian surgeons and possessing one of the more advanced operating rooms in the region, the hospital receives many of the more complicated surgical cases that are not possible to be performed elsewhere; many fistula operations, complicated pregnancy and abdominal cases, as well as dealing with trauma incurred from landmines and accidents.  Shortly, CEML will embark on building project to add a state-of-the-art ICU unit, the only one in the region, to deal with the more urgent and urgent medical needs.  Currently, some of the more serious cases requiring ICU care are transferred/medivaced to hospitals in the neighboring countries of Namibia and South Africa.

Angola 'Did you Know2' - Landmines

Angola has one of the highest rates of landmine injuries per capita in the world. These mines were placed as strategic deterents by the fighting armies during the many years of civil war. Estimates for the number of landmines in Angola range from 6 to 20 million; nearly twice the population. According to the United Nations and the United States Department of State, Angola is the third most heavily mined country in the world after Egypt and Iran. (UN, Mines Awareness Project 2007, UNICEF ANGOLA)

The amputee population in Angola is 100,000, the highest in the world, of which 8,000 are children under the age of fifteen.

You can imagine how the threat of these mines directly affects the people; since civilians are the ones most injured by the mines, many millions of Angolans have been displaced to cities to avoid the potential death and terrible injuries caused by inadvertantly stepping on one.

Back in the '90s when I was previously serving in Angola, I can remember visiting a local church in a remote village that was surrounded by mine fields; the people had adapted to the threat of the mines and identified the locations of most of the mines.  While on the visit, the church leaders wanted me to inspect their well; their water source. Unbeknownst to me, we would have to walk on a very narrow path through one of the mine fields to reach the well.  I remember well the instructions given me by the leader before we set off on the path, "Trust me, I know where the mines are.  Just step in my footsteps and don't veer off the path!"  Wise words to follow indeed and they can also be directly related in a spiritual sense to my daily walk with God!

Luanda: World's Most Expensive City

The capital city of Angola, Luanda,  recently snatched the title of "most expensive city" away from better-known capitals such as London, Oslo and Tokyo, according to a number of international surveys. The survey measured the cost of food, basic items including drinks and tobacco, and other costs such as clothing and electrical goods.  A liter of imported milk is $5 and a can of locally produced Coke is $.90.

The tide of petrodollars surging into the once sleepy port has widened the gulf of disparity between the rich and the poor in the city and moreso in the whole country. More than three-quarters of Luanda's residents, nearly four million people, live in the informal settlements, and these are grim. Most have no sanitation services; people must buy water from tanker trucks for nearly $1 a bucket. Infant and maternal mortality rates are some of the worst in the world. Many of the slums have no schools; when they do, they lack teachers, desks and books.

What has risen most significantly is the cost of real estate. For sale in a mediocre neighbourhood of Luanda: pokey two-bedroom apartment in a Soviet-style 1960s apartment block, fourteenth floor, elevator last operated in 1990, erratic plumbing, no maintenance in the past 22 years. Asking $300,000 (U.S.) And that's about all you're going to get in Luanda for $300,000: any new one-bedroom apartment in this city starts at $1-million. (The Globe and Mail, September 9, 2009)

The rising cost of goods and land in Luanda directly impacts church activities.  More and more new and growing congregations are being pushed to the outer limits of the city in a quest to afford the rising cost of land.   Bare land that has been secured comes with the government caveat that a church building must be erected in certain period of time or else the land must be forfeited.  These are challenging, yet faith-building times for the Angolan Church.