Juliana Dogbadzi


Juliana Dogbadzi is a Ghanaian human rights activist, a victim of Trokosi who now campaigns against this secular practice that sends young women into forced labor, making them live under conditions of slavery to redeem the sins of their relatives. She established a non-profit organization, International Needs Ghana, that has been actively working for the release of Trokosi victims. Through this organization, over 1,000 slaves have been freed from 15 shrines.
In 1999, she received the Reebok Human Rights Award.

Biography

When she was seven years old, her parents abandoned her at a shrine to pay for the theft committed by her grandfather, according to the Trojan tradition. She was made to believe that serving as a Trokosi will stop a string of misfortunes from befalling her family. She served under conditions of slavery for about seventeen years, where she was starved, overworked, beaten and prevented from attending school. Around the age of twelve, she was raped by the 90-year-old fetish priest who was the father of her first child.
At age 25, she escaped and started a campaign to fight against the practice of Trokosi which had become the target of a national debate in Ghana.
She established a non-profit organization, International Needs Ghana, that has been working for the release of Trokosi victims. Through this organization, over 1,000 slaves have been freed from 15 shrines. In 1999, she received the Reebok Human Rights Award.