Courtesy of Afrik.com

The AFP has been questioning people in Nigeria, which counts the highest number of Catholics in Africa, Uganda and Congo if such abuses have been endured by some members. The head of the Southern African Bishops Conference has, meanwhile, publicly acknowledged that the issue of paedophilia has truly inflicted African Churches and that about 40 abuse cases have been reported since the last 14 years.

News24, an online South Africa news source, quotes a former clergyman from Burkina Faso, Felix Koffi Ametepe as saying: “When I was in the church, I happened to discover some suspected cases of abuse, especially by foreign clergy. There’s a certain tolerance among African Catholic communities regarding priests who visit women. Even if people very well know that the priest has a child, or that he has ongoing relations with a woman, no one does anything about it.”

“Everyone accepts if a priest is with a woman, but no one would understand what he would look for in a boy. That means that no child would be believed if he said that a priest had touched him.”

Last month, the Kenya Catholic Church said it was investigating claims that three young men and a boy told the police that they had been sexually abused by an Italian Priest at a children’s home a few years ago.

Also last week, Mozambique state radio reported that an Italian Jesuit priest in Brazil was transferred to Mozambique following sexual abuse allegations involving eight boys and young men.

Archbishop of Johannesburg, Buti Tlhagale was quoted:

What happens in Ireland or in Germany or America affects us all. It simply means that the “misbehaviour” (sic) of priests in Africa has not been exposed to the same glare of the media as in other parts of the world