DEATH IN GHANA MARTIN McCLUSKEY finds a Ghanaian funeral riddled with contradictions
DEATH, ALTHOUGH WE’D rather not think about it, comes to us all. Constantly, it seems, we’re bombarded by images of starving children, bloodied corpses or views across dusty plains to the killing fields of the world’s most recent genocide. Death is something that happens to other people, in places far from here.
The truth, we know, is quite different. I’ve had the misfortune of sitting in quite a few cars in funeral processions over the years; a quiet, mournful hush surrounding the entire event broken only by uncomfortable mumblings and quiet sobs.
Yet one funeral broke the mould. Instead of a silent convoy of darkened limousines, I followed a coffin from the back of a pick-up truck – part of a convoy stretching for about a mile behind me. The funeral in Wa, Ghana, of a prominent local priest attracted crowds from the town and from villages miles into the bush,many of whom lined the route to the funeral grounds.
In Africa, death is a communal experience. Most people I knew would spend their weekends during the Hot Season (when deaths inevitably increased) at the funerals of at least one or two relatives or friends. They are public events, taking place in village squares: corpses are exposed to the mourners – often in a gruesome fashion, propped up in a chair – surrounded by their possessions. Dirges are sung and women sob, sporadically letting out piercing wails – part emotion, part symbolism.
To outsiders, the scene is disturbing and disorienting. There’s a perverse fascination among Westerners with the dead. I found myself drawn to look at the corpse: this strange remnant of a human being, displayed for all to see. It was clear that I was the only one shocked at this sight. For the rest it was just like every other weekend.
This openness has a lot to teach us. Death isn’t sterile, it’s not clean, but we like to give that impression. The Ghanaian approach communicated the realities and, in many ways,made it easier for people to move on.
Yet the process was full of contradictions. Whilst the body lay there for all to see in an apparent triumph for transparency, the cause of death would rarely be mentioned as families tried to keep the truth from emerging. Doctors would be encouraged to sign off a medical certificate for ‘Tuberculosis’ – probably one of many that week – to avoid penning the letters AIDS.
This is Africa’s hidden scar – a very public pandemic whose name cannot even be whispered for fear of the stigma and shame that would befall families and relatives. For us in Britain, AIDS is inextricably associated with Africa. But despite frequent national campaigns, newspaper headlines and government statements, the people don’t want to talk about it. It is seen as dirty. It spells infidelity or sexual ‘deviance’.
This phenomenal stigmatisation in many ways can be attributed to the Catholic Church. Condoms, they say, are wrong.While the government’s A-B-C method promotes Abstinence, Being Faithful and Condom Use, the church lives in denial, refusing to admit that the children they teach about the wrongs of contraception are having sex.
In Catholic schools, AIDS is rarely mentioned. One boy told me that AIDS stood for “American Idea to Discriminate Sex”.And while the West throws money at Africa to combat the problem, the director of the small church-run AIDS project in Wa told us how she could no longer deliver the food aid that was piled in warehouses surrounding the regional Catholic headquarters.
Money can be thrown at this problem time and again, but only once the social mindset shifts from stigma to acceptance – and the church allows that shift to take place – can the problem be solved.
