Bare-chested and with leaves wrapped around their necks, a small group of voodoo worshippers emerges from a dense forest in southern Togo.
The oldest among them, a man in his sixties with decorative beads around his neck, carefully holds up a blue stone and closes his eyes.
“We started the ceremonies six months ago,” says Nii Mantche, the high priest of the sacred forest, from his position on a wooden stool.
“Today is the climax — the release of the sacred stone. I am the only person to take out this stone from the depths of this forest.”
The nature-based belief system emerged at the end of the 16th century in the town of Tado on the Mono river, which separates the country from Benin to the east.Voodoo has a special place in the life of the people of Togo.
Followers worship a single god, the Mahu or Segbo-Lissa, through more than 200 deities who are represented mostly by clods of earth.
The tiny West African nation may have only seven million people but 51 percent practise voodoo, which has multiple forms — more than those who follow Christianity and Islam combined.
In the south, voodoo shrines dot the countryside where most Togolese live, guarded by high priests and priestesses.
In Lome, the fetish market is renowned across west Africa and is home to traditional healers using objects from skulls and dried animal skins to bones, features and statues to treat ailments.
– Voodoo new year –
For the Guin people of Aneho, Togo’s second city some 50 kilometres (30 miles) east of the capital, Lome, the annual Epe-Ekpe or Ekpessosso festival in September marks the start of the new year.
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