Edikan…"child witch" film premieres in Lagos

As some of you may already know, I am a huge Nollywood fan and have been in the business of collecting and watching these films since time immemorial… If you don’t know, any time you see the name “Isong” attached to a film, expect a well-produced film. Time and time again, I have been simply dazzled by Emem Isong films.

Just as of today, I learned of another Isong in the film industry, Uduak Isong Oguamanam, the mind behind the blog, Artsville. With Desmond Elliot as director, she and Emem Isong co-produced the “nocumentary,***” Edikan, a film highlighting the ills of the “child witch” phenomenon in Akwa Ibom. The film premieres Friday, July 17th at Terra Culture by 5:30pm. The film “attempts to enlighten the parents of affected children who are themselves victims of the greed and wickedness of some fake pastors. …” I can’t imagine that the film will be anything less than amazing and kudos to the director and producers for highlighting such an important issue in a format that I am sure is accessible to the Nigerian audience. Hoping that the film will soon cross the Atlantic for my…I mean, our…viewing as well…(hint, hint…).

Below is a youtube preview of the film (Uduak, hope you don’t mind)…

***Nocumentary = Nollywood meets documentary

"child witches" participate in peaceful protest

I have been following the Akwa Ibom child witch phenomenon for some time now. unfortunately the only time i mentioned their plight on this blog was in reference to Maduekwe’s incredible denial of their existence. For more information and the organization that seeks to protect our society’s most vulnerable members, Child’s Right and Rehabilitation Network (CRARN), I would check out the following posts from members of the Nigerian blogosphere…

naijablog – has been following the story since 2007
bellanaija – her personal take on the situation
Nigerian Health Watch – a more recent piece on the CRARN attacks

Fortunately, the children of CRARN are taking matters into their own hands, peacefully, and protesting police brutality against the children and staff members. See the article here. Inspiring. However, I went to the comments and found that one particular fellow seemed to deny the existence of maltreatment of these children. Of course I reacted (hopefully 234NEXT will publish my comments soon). However, I began to wonder, beyond Maduekwe, how widespread is this attempt on the part of Nigerians to close their eyes to the horrible “child witch” phenomenon in Akwa Ibom? I have talked primarily to my fellow Naijamericans here who do believe that such is happening and needs to be addressed promptly (however, I have noted that many have used it as a platform to rehash their horrid stereotypes about the perceived backward-ness of some ethnic groups in the South-South – to which I whole-heartedly disagree with….).

Anyway, it may be my naivete….but how and why would someone read about the plight of these innocents and then figure that such news is not real? Am I missing something?