INFERTILITY a touchy issue

Not having children has never been good news in most African communities that I know of and in some cultures it is regarded as a crime against humanity.

Senseless as it may sound such a person is thought of as unworthy of any respect.

In fact, some tribes in Bongo the blame is such belittling burial ceremonies are held for a person who remained fruitless in life.

Clearly to me if one should or shouldn’t have children is none of anyone’s business except the individual whether it’s out of choice or otherwise.

The story is even worst when the barren person is a woman.

You get all sorts of tales of why someone doesn’t have children, but some also have come with very weird solutions to the problem.

And in a society where belief in witchcraft and superstitions is still a common way of life solutions to such a problem can be really scary if not outright ridiculous.

Maria is a very attractive woman by all standards at 40 plus she stills makes necks crane with her slim well curved figure and her pretty face like Marylyn Monroe.

In addition Maria is quite educated by Bongo standards. She belongs to the old Pre- Zombie Form Four classes that few women at her time managed to graduate.

In fact, from those classes division zero that are so common these days were very rare.

Besides Maria and her beloved husband for 20 years Musa jointly own a string of successful businesses in town.

So as far as material wealth is concerned Maria has the world at her feet.

But she has one problem that continues to haunt her; barrenness.

At first she thought she had a medical condition to her condition. Then she was told that her mother-in-law was a witch and that she had cast a spell on her.

When the old lady died the story changed. She was at that point told she had a jinni that didn’t want her to bear children.

She got so desperate that she fell into one depression after another.

“Oh, I have tried everything I would. I have joined all sorts of religious faiths crying to God hoping he would open my womb but I still remain barren,” she laments bitterly.

She continues “I have visited countless doctors and clinics, taken all sorts tests but that hasn’t helped either.”

She describes how she has paid astronomical sums of money to traditional healers from as far as Kinshasa but all in vain.

“Some of these witch-doctors have made me do terribly shameful things,” she narrates.

She tells a tale of one witch-doctor who ordered her to walk naked to the top of a hill at mid-night carrying a pot of some concoction on her head.

When she got there to her shock and dismay she found the doctor whom she had left at the foot of the hill was already there at the top.

“It was a moonlit night, so I could see his shadow against the background of the dark sky. It was as if I was in a dream. Then I heard him ordering me to put the pot down on a rock near me.” Maria spoke a low voice.

She had been recently introduced to this Nigerian fellow whom she was told would do miracles. According to rumours he has already helped many women conceive.

She was even taken to meet a couple of women who claimed to have found salvation of being mothers though the doctor’s magic cure.

“Come on my daughter take off your clothes,” the doctor said.

The doctor then started feeling her sensitive areas as she lay on her back.

Maria knew she was about to be raped and she had to react immediately.

As we speak no one knows who is infertile between Maria and her husband.