ACQUAH J.: This is an interesting case which deals with beliefs and practices in juju, fetish and trial by ordeal of the people of the Dodome Traditional Area in the Volta Region.
One Vincentia Dogoe, a fairly elderly fetish priestess of Dodome Awiasu, died in February 1989. Soon after her death, an eighteen-year old mother of two children called Esi Bisi rushed to the chief and behaving as if possessed by some spirit said that she had something important to tell the chief and his elders, and that the plaintiff and one Ahele Kwamla must be called to listen to her message. When the plaintiff and this Ahele Kwamla came, Esi Bisi said that it was Ahele Kwamla who killed Vincentia Dogoe by juju, and that the plaintiff too was using juju to render ineffective the hospital mortuary where the dead body of Vincentia Dogoe had been deposited, so that the deceased would not have a decent burial.
The chief felt that the allegations of Esi Bisi were too serious for his private consumption and so mo…