Trokosi, also known as ritual servitude, is a tradition practiced among the Anlo in the Volta region of Ghana. Traditional or religious shrines take young girls as young as five years old in religious atonement or as payment for an offense committed by a family member. The offense can be as small as petty theft or as criminal as murder. The punishment for either is the same: a virgin girl is sent to the shrine to serve for the rest of her life as trokosi. This is also called fiashido or voodoosi by other tribes in Togo and Benin who are also involved in the practice.
The girls and women, no matter how young, are sexually abused and labor everyday on the farms owned by the traditional chief and fetish priests without compensation. They suffer harsh punishment and are denied an education and human affection.
Once they reach puberty, most of these girls become pregnant by the numerous priests who take turns sleeping with them. A female child born into the shrine becomes a trokosi by birth. A male child is raised by the shrine priest and is a freeborn. The trokosi are at constant risk of STDs and other communal diseases.
Christian NGO’s and other human rights organizations are fighting the practice. Some have openly labeled it slavery, although this term is disliked by traditional advocates of the practice. The NGO’s use of the term slaves comes from former trokosi who have been liberated. These groups have actively sought to liberate girls held in ritual servitude. Please visit www.innetworkusa.org for more information on trokosi and to read testimonies of liberated trokosi slaves.
TULIPS is funded by the Turning Point Film Fund, the financial section of Turning Point Pictures and is produced by Calabash Images Ghana.