Python `god` swallows priestess

I hate to find humor in the death of a person, but irony is in many cases a form of humor itself.
Here we have a python "god" who devoured his priestess, the person who he was supposed to speak through.
Was this his divine punishment for not delivering his message properly? Perhaps he decided to sacrifice his aging priestess in hopes of trading for a newer model.
Rather than accept their "god's" decision as divine however, the villagers kill him and open his stomach in search of the priestess. Tough being a god over there I suppose, as soon as you do something they don't like they turn on you. Poor choice of diciples on the snake's part.
Funniest was their deciding to ask the snake god where the priestess was. I can see the snake now, glancing around avoiding eye contact, "Uhh, nope, haven't seen her. Hey, how about sending that cute chick down the street over to change the old water bowl from now on?"

Accra, Ghana, 07/04 - A python revered as a god in the Sapeliga community, near Bawku, in the northeastern corner of Ghana, has swallowed a 55-year-old fetish priestess assigned to be its mouthpiece, media reports said here Monday.

The priestess had been missing for three days and the inhabitants suspected the god had swallowed its mouthpiece, the Ghana News Agency (GNA) reported.

The people performed rituals and killed the snake, only to find the badly decomposed body of the fetish priestess when its belly was split open, the report quoted Sunday Ali, son of the deceased, as saying.

Ali said he visited his mother last Saturday on his way to Bawku and promised to bring her some items she had requested.

On his return Tuesday, he found the mother`s door ajar, which suggested she had not gone far, so he decided to wait for her but she did not show up after waiting for over two hours.

Ali and other neighbours combed the surroundings in vain before one of the elders of the oracle suggested that they consult the `god` to tell them Ali`s mother`s whereabouts.

According to Ali, as soon as the elder entered the python`s enclosure he realised that the `god` was bloated and called the attention of the others.

This aroused suspicion that the serpent might have swallowed Ali`s mother, and this proved true when the python was killed after performing some rituals and the belly opened.

Assemblywoman Madam Elizabeth Awini said she had made several pleas to the community that it was dangerous to keep the python but they did not heed her advice.

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Clay, he did not devour his priestess, as you stated - he "swallowed his mouthpiece"...a big difference

Originally Posted by Clay Davenport

Tough being a god over there I suppose, as soon as you do something they don't like they turn on you. Poor choice of diciples on the snake's part.

Hmmmmm - sounds an awful lot like the job of a certain site admin, whom I won't name. (rofl)

I guess if they include reincarnation in their religious beliefs, the python god had decided to bring her back snake poop in her next life.
She must have had some bad karma hanging over her.

I wonder how long the snake was?

Sapeliga Python Story Challenged
Thursday, 06 July [GNA]

Bolgatanga, July 6 GNA - Mrs Elizabeth Awuni, retired Editor of the Ghana News Agency and native of Sapeliga in the Bawku West District, has challenged the authenticity of the story about a fetish python swallowing up a priestess serving at its shrine at Sapeliga.

Speaking to the GNA in Bolgatanga Mrs Awuni, who was featured in the story, said the story given to the GNA was not accurate. She related that last Saturday the Chief of Sapeliga, Naba Baba Ayagiba, who happens to be her brother, sent two men from the village to enquire from her in Bolgatanga how she came by that information and whether she was aware of the publication.

"He said as a Chief of the village he would have been the first person to know if anything of that sort had occurred in the community, but that he only heard of it for the first time on the national radio," she said.

Mrs Awuni said the publication came as a huge surprise to residents of the village, and cautioned journalists to be careful about people, who came to their offices to tell such stories. Meanwhile, the Bawku Police, the source of the story, said when they heard about the incident and rushed to Sapeliga they discovered that the woman had already been buried and nobody was ready to talk about it.

to be its mouthpiece.

While looking for the priestess, who had been missing for three days, the inhabitants decided to slash the python into two, only to find her badly decomposed body.

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