This testimony was given by one of the 352 residents living in the Delwende centers, located in the neighborhoods of Tanghin and of Paspanga in Ouagadougou, the capital of Burkina Faso. These centres welcome women excluded from their community due to allegations of witchcraft.

The UNESCO Regional Office in Dakar supports these centres, founded in 1963, in its project entitled “Mainstreaming vulnerability in public policies to promote the social inclusion and the fight against poverty and discrimination of the most disadvantaged groups, including women and men with disabilities, in West Africa”. The Office offers its expertise in social inclusion and coordinates a network composed of the Government of Burkina Faso, the National Commission of Burkina Faso for UNESCO, religious authorities, traditional leaders, as well as NGOs and local associations.

An advocacy event will take place on 7 May 2015, in the Delwende centres, bringing together the various partners to draw the attention of the local population and the international community on the fate of these women condemned to loneliness and misery.

Who are these witches?

In Burkina Faso, this kind of social exclusion is based on the popular belief that older women, who are outliving their relatives or are jealous of not having been able to have children, may have the power to steal the lives of young people. Accusations of witchcraft often follow a sudden death that is viewed as suspicious. These women, defamed as “soul-eaters,” are forcibly banished from their community and lose any right to assistance despite their vulnerability.

The accused women all have a similar profile. They are illiterate, past childbearing age, and often widowed. Many have children who no longer live in their villages, and therefore cannot protect their mother from allegations of witchcraft. Once excluded, these women are forbidden from any contact with their progeny.

The economic condition of banished women is incredibly strenuous, and the intense hardship inevitably leads to the decline of their mental and physical health.

This kind of social exclusion is more often practiced in animist and Christian Mossi communities.

Social rehabilitation of those women

The UNESCO project launched in September 2014 aims at the socioeconomic reintegration of victims of witchcraft accusation. Thus, the centres have been arranged to enable the production of soap and soumbala (a spice eaten in West Africa and baked from néré seed).

In partnership with development NGOs, UNESCO also provides expertise to lead advocacy actions involving religious authorities, traditional leaders, and the Government.

“Traditional perceptions toward these women must be changed in order to enable them to sell their productions, and escape extreme misery,” explains Marema Touré Thiam, Programme Specialist at the UNESCO Regional Office in Dakar. “In the long term, we expect their return to their respective community.”

This initiative illustrates the concern that the international community has for promoting sustainable development for vulnerable and marginalized people.

* Account from the registrations of Delwende center, abstract from James Shepley, (2007) The women accused of witchcraft in Burkina Faso : Parameters of exclusion, master thesis in Administration science, Andrews University, p. 39.