Traditionalist appeals to Government for a national Holiday.

The Chief Priest of the Agide Shrine at Anlo Afiadenyigba in the Keta Municipality of the Volta Region, Hunor Torgbui Agide has renewed his appeal to government to expedite action on efforts to institute a national holiday for traditional religious practitioners in the country. 

According to Priest Agide, instituting a national holiday for their members is long overdue. He was speaking at a festival of the Hunor Torgbui Agide Shrine at Anlo Afiadenyigba.

The Hunor Torgbui Agide festival was instituted n the early 70s to celebrate the achievements of the Tsina god which is not only a war god but also over the years transformed into providing healing and protection for the citizenry and the sick through the use of traditional herbs. He mentioned stroke, fibroid, infertility in men and women as well as other forms of ailments as some of the achievements of the Shrine over the years.

The Tsina god is also said or believed to be responsible for a lot of rainfalls in the Anlo Afiadenyigba area over the years.

The weeklong festival brought together more than the sixty (60) members of the Shrine dotted in the Volta region and beyond including areas like Ashaiman, Accra, Ho, Aflao and Anloga. Some dignitaries also came from far and near to grace the occasion.

The Tsina god is owned by the late Hunor Nani Agide Balagator who had been credited to have cursed river snails out of the Keta Lagoon for almost two decades following an injury he sustained from the shell of one of such snails in the mid 80s. The injury therefore compelled the late Balagator to curse such river snails from the Lagoon until in the late 2000 when they began surfacing again after their extinction.

Speaking in an interview with our newsteam at Anlo Afiadenyigba, head of the Shrine, Hunor Torgbui Agide said instituting a national holiday for traditional religious practitioners in Ghana is long overdue.

 According to him, the role of traditional religious practitioners in the development of the country cannot be over-emphasized, adding that apart from playing spiritual upliftment and protection roles for their members, citizens and the country as a whole, they also complement the efforts of the Ministry of Health (MOH) and the Ghana Health Service (GHS) with their medications to provide cure to many ailments of Ghanaians through herbal medications.

The Chief Priest urged the young and up-coming Priests in Shrines across the country not only to be humble and learn a lot from their Masters but also show professionalism in the discharge of their duties as prescribed by the MOH through the issuance of the Traditional Medicine Practitioners Certificate.

The Chief Priest of the Kletsi Shrine at Anloga, Torgbui Danyo II rejected suggestions that traditional religion is fetish. According to him, such claims are only false and misconceptions based on emotions. According to him, traditional religious practitioners only depend on herbs for curing several ailments, emphasizing that these herbs are also creations of God.

Priest Danyo urged Ghanaians to appreciate traditional religion and its practices, saying these are part and parcel of the rich cultural values and traditions of the Ghanaian people.