The Famous Christian Village in Accra

The Famous Christian Village in Accra

Written by: Prince Kweku

This famous ‘village’ with a population of almost two thousand is sandwiched between the University of Ghana, Legon and the Achimota Secondary School. Its location is four minutes’ drive from the Legon campus. The inhabitants are predominantly Ewes. The young men are mainly golf caddies while the women are engaged in a variety of activities to support their husbands and family. Interestingly, most of the inhabitants come from Adangbe in Togo which is two hours’ drive from the Aflao border. Recently, there have been huge migrations of Nigerians who are there for several reasons.

The ‘illage’ is between Kisseiman and Dome, all suburbs of Accra. Although the village is associated with Christians, the behavior and attitude of the people do not conform to Christian standards. This famous village is known as the “Christian Village.”

Let me proceed to justify the position I take that the village does not befit its name.

1. Smoking of weeds (‘Wee’) or Ganja

This is one of the main activities most of the young men engage in the village during the day. They crowd in individual rooms and under trees to smoke in turns. Most times, sharing of weeds is popular among these young men because they believe the people they share with will return the favor the next time.

2. Engaging in homosexual /bisexual activities

The people in this village are believed to engage in homosexual activities among themselves and also with foreigners or tourist from mostly European countries. They prefer engaging in these acts with their foreign partners rather than among themselves since the act is stigmatized within the community. Secondly, these young men are engaged with women they call wives. They have sexual interaction daily with these women and sometimes stay with the women in the house and still practice homosexual acts with their partners.

Interestingly, these women even though know that their husbands engage in such activities, do not condemn them because their husbands bring income from such. . These men therefore become bisexual men, having both wives and boyfriends outside their matrimonial homes.

3. Blackmailing, Extortion, Harassment and Beatings

Though there are lots of fabulous people in this town, it is known to most gay people I spoke to as dangerous grounds for gay visitors in the country. First, the inhabitants invite both Ghanaian and foreigners to the town and then try to engage in sexual activity with them, only to raise an alarm that these people want to have sexual intercourse with them and so get support from the other men to rob, beat and sometimes take the victim to the ATM machine to pay them charged amounts mainly in dollars or pounds, depending on the country of origin of the victim.

Secondly, they invite people from abroad to visit the village for homosexual acts. On the way from the airport, they pull either knives or arrange with fake police to pull a gun and ask the victim to come down from the car leaving him hopeless without any funds and luggage.

Ghanaian gay men are invited into the village and when they realize the invitees sense danger and so will want to leave, they rob them of their possessions and sometimes subject the individuals to severe beatings while they undress the victims. They make sure they collect everything they are interested in from the victims.

My experience

Firstly, a friend called that he had been blackmailed by someone in the village considered to be my very good friend. I drove from the beach to meet this man from the US at the Accra Mall and after a detailed explanation, I called my friend in the Christian Village to plead on the victim’s behalf only to be told “it’s a game” and so nothing could be done about it. I cried and regretted knowing them. I regretted having supported them in the past and all the love I had for the people vanished.

To conclude my piece on the famous village, I must commend the few people who live in this village and make sure that innocent people get justice from time to time. I hope funds received from their dubious activities will be channeled into community development programs in the neighborhood. But my hope is based on a thin thread. Fact is since they think it is an ‘easy’ way to meet economic needs; it will take external intervention for the perpetrators to break out of this canker. Such intervention may be in the form of the government or non-governmental organizations creating employment opportunities for the teeming youth through skills acquisition and further education. The youth engaged in such nefarious activities may also need counseling. It is only when such interventions take place that there will be hope for a brighter future for the inhabitants. Anything short of this paints a bleak future indeed for Christian Village.