The evil spirit of Zozubona-Fato

One of a Missionary’s duties is to convert others to whatever faith group they are commissioned from. With some groups that is the standard by which their success is measured- how many converts they made during the year. However every once in a while a Missionary will see one from their own flock convert to animism or fetishism. This is one such case from the country of Burkina Faso in which the end results were both startling and terrifying.

Mamadu was the grandson of a local Shaman who had converted to Christianity in the late 1950’s. His father was raised as a Christian and had become a church leader, helping with famine relief efforts in parts of the country plagued by drought. Mamadu was brought up in the church also but was very defiant and bullied peers that could not defend themselves. He amused himself by torturing stray dogs that would wander into the village looking for food.

As a young teenager he left his fathers house and went to the city of Bobo-Dioulasso. While there it is said he became friends with a Shaman of great power, a sorcerer who served gods that were malevolent and violent. This Shaman-Sorcerer had a group of young disciples whose goal it was to gather power by blood sacrifice and fearless acts of cruelty. These ancient gods of wrath demanded sacrifices of animals and it was rumored of humans as well. There is a small grove of trees that edge the southern road exiting Bobo-Dioulasso where travelers occasionally disappeared. Sometimes body parts would be found in a local field, but never whole bodies. It was common knowledge that the cultists which Mamadu had joined were the ones perpetrating these acts for the favor of their gods of power. But the ones who went missing were travelers from other villages and the police were too afraid to pursue any investigation. Evil would befall anyone who dared to challenge the will of the sorcerer Shaman and his followers. Mamadu’s father and many of the church elders tried to visit him, but he shunned them off shouting curses and profanities. Later strange things began to happen to those who visited him at the Shaman’s camp in Bobo. Their flocks would be attacked by strange animals during the night, slaughtering them all. Pots and other utensils would fly off tables and hit the people of the household who had dared to come to the camp. Evil spirits would frequently attack Mamadu’s father and mother in their sleep.

The local residents and police learned by experience to never cross the Shaman and his followers. But the mysterious deaths did not go unnoticed by the military government of Burkina Faso.

So one evening the compound of the Shaman was surrounded by heavily armed soldiers, and in the fighting many cultists were killed, including the leader. They found human remains mixed with vile ingredients in pots throughout the main building. Gnawed bones with human flesh still attached were found on ritualistic plates surrounding a large wooden idol covered with mud and cloth that dominated the center of the camp. Two of the cultists were wounded but still alive and taken prisoner, one of which was Mamadu. They were chained and taken to a government prison in the capitol of Ouagadougou.

During the trial, Mamadu’s own father had to testify against him, telling of his fall from grace and his increasing erratic and violent behavior. He screamed curses at his father as he testified, and this only reinforced the courts decision to find him guilty and put him to death.

In the time between the trial and execution date strange things began to happen in the Christian community of Mamadu’s former village.

Jenny, a single female missionary nurse who cared for the sick and elderly of the village awoke one night to see a naked man standing at the doorway to her bedroom. He was covered in blood and held a long knife in his right hand. She knew him. It was Mamadu.

Quickly she sat up in her bed and in a stuttering half scream she prayed aloud.

The figure darkened and faded away with a deep growling sound.

They had wondered if he had escaped and in the excitement of the moment Jenny had hallucinated. But a call to the prison from the mission let them know that he had never left his cell. In fact he was still bound in chains since he had made every attempt to either harm others or himself since the end of the trial.

But the paranormal visitation of Mamadu did not just limit itself to the Missionaries. Herdsman in the field claimed to have encountered a wild man drenched in blood who screamed at them as they came upon him while crouching in a field. This “Zozubona-Fato” (or blood crazy man in English) ran after them in the broad daylight only to fade and disappear in a smoke as it ran across a small stream. A young woman claimed she was sexually assaulted by the same apparition one night as she slept alone in her mud brick hut.

Within 7 days of his conviction Mamadu was drug out into the courtyard of the prison. He was fastened to the wall and shot by firing squad. Witnesses say he laughed as the bullets ripped through his body. But after a few well placed shots, the laughter ceased forever.

But the apparitions did not.

Three days after his death, he once again appeared to Jenny the nurse. It was dusk and she was looking out the window as the sun set in the west. A black shape appeared to come from behind a tree and started coming toward her house. It was the naked form of Mamadu, this time his skin was ashen and the blood that drenched his body came from the bullet holes made by his executioner’s guns. Once again she prayed but the figure did not disappear as before. Instead she saw it grimace and made an attempt to reach out from where it stood, as if held back by some invisible force. After a few vain attempts, it turned and walked back into the oncoming darkness.

Later that night, Mamadu’s father was walking back from a church meeting with an elder of the church. In the darkness ahead of them they saw the figure of his son walking toward them in the path. They screamed and prayed that God would take the demon away from them. It stood there for a second and attempted to say something, but all they heard was a garbled muttering as if someone was trying to speak with a mouth full of water. This seemed to frustrate it. Enraged, it ran away from them back down the path from whence it came.

The next day the church leaders gathered together in prayer in order to rid themselves of this frightful vision from beyond. As they prayed one old woman told them that God had given her a vision. They were to go into a field beyond the home of the missionary compound where Jenny had seen the specter the night before. There God would show them how to get rid of the evil that plagued them.

So as a group they traveled the few miles to the edge of the compound following the woman who said she was directed by God.

And in the middle of the field by the nurse’s home there was a tiny fetish pressed into the rock hard earth. It was a tiny wodden idol covered in mud and cloth. A miniature version of the fetish the police had found in the sorcerer’s compound. She told them they had to burn it and pray over it to release the soul of Mamadu, and God can make His final judgment of him on the last day.

They poured petrol over the fetish and praying in unison, set it ablaze. They say they heard an unearthly screaming as it went up in smoke. And many there said they thought the smoke itself attempted to take the form of a human body.

But the wind blew it into nothingness.

I was told the basics of this story from Missionaries that I visited with in Africa. I do not know how accurate all the facts are, I never witnessed any of this. But when I asked others if they had heard the story of Mamadu and the apparitions, they always gave me either a frightened look and walked away or refused to talk about it. Some younger Missionaries who were not there at the time just say it was an old folk tale.

I have no idea. But I see a lot of the fetishes stuck in the ground like the tale described when I visit Burkina Faso.

I give them a wide berth.

Until next time,

Pastor Swope