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If Baby Monday is not Kirikiri

Minimum Prison‘s youngest inmate, he will certainly be one of the youngest. Her mother is being detained in the prison and was delivered of him only 13 days ago.

For obvious reasons, Monday’s arrival could not be marked with any fanfare. There were no visits from friends and relations and there were no shouts of congratulations or offer of gifts.

Baby Monday was born at the Lagos Island Maternity, where officials of the prison had taken Comfort, his mother, as soon as she went into labour on August 1, 2010. Comfort is awaiting trial for allegedly stealing the sum of N200,000 belonging to her boss, but she insists she is innocent of her alleged crime.

Spokesman of the Nigerian Prisons Service, Mr. Ope Fatinikun said the prison was well equipped to take care of nursing inmates and their babies. ‘‘There are so many inmates who come in here pregnant, although they might not know it. As a matter of fact, we do conduct pregnancy tests for them immediately they are brought here and the results are shown to them. So, we are equipped to take care of them and their babies. There is a clinic attached to the prison and in case of any emergency, we do refer them to the General hospital,‘‘ Fatinikun said.

But he added that the baby could only be kept in the prison for 18 months. ‘‘The law states that it is not in the best interests of the child for him or her to discover that they were born in the prison. So when the child is 18 months old and no relative has come to take them away, the prison is empowered by law to take them to the SOS children‘s village where they might be put up for adoption,‘‘ he said

Comfort‘s journey to Kirikiri began when she met her former boss, Nwitua Nadum, at Elele Alimini, Rivers State sometime last year. ‘‘I knew him as my landlord‘s friend,‘‘ she said, adding that she was then selling sachet water otherwise called pure water, having had to halt her education at Primary Four because of financial constraints.

She said, ‘‘I am the fourth of seven children. We have always struggled to survive. But things became particularly bad after my paternal grandmother died. My elder siblings didn‘t have much of education either, so they are not better off. My eldest brother pushes a wheel barrow in the market for a living while my father is a farmer. I was fetching water one day when Nadum came around. He asked what I was doing at home and I said I had to stop school because there was no money. He then said it was a pity that a pretty girl like me was suffering when someone could have helped me to live a better life. Later, my father told me that I would go to Lagos with Nadum to be his house help, and in return, he (Nadum) would send me to school.‘‘

Nadum lived alone at his 2 Owode Street, Abule Egba, Lagos residence, while his wife and children lived abroad. Comfort said apart from household chores, she also assisted with the sale of compressors and air conditioners at Nadum’s shop. She said that contrary to what her father had told her, she only attended school for a month after which Nadum ordered her to withdraw. ‘‘My boss pulled me out of school when he started molesting me,‘‘ she alleged. ‘‘I called my father and told him that he should come here and take me away, but he told me that he had no money to travel down to Lagos.‘‘

When our correspondent called Comfort‘s father on the phone and told him that his daughter was being incarcerated in Kirikiri Medium Prison and that she had been delivered of a baby boy, the man went hysterical. ‘‘I don‘t know why Nadum would do that to my child. I can never do such a thing to somebody else‘s child. I leave everything in the hands of God. He did all this to me and yet I didn‘t get a penny from him,‘‘ he said.

Asked if he intended to claim his grandchild, Comfort‘s father replied, ‘‘I don‘t have any money to come to Lagos.‘‘

Comfort claimed she had cried to her boss‘s wife for help when the lady came to Nigeria. ‘‘I told her what I had been passing through in the hands of her husband. To my surprise, she felt unconcerned. She just told me it wasn‘t her business.‘‘ She said that Mrs. Nadum concluded her business in Nigeria and travelled out again without addressing her husband‘s alleged offences. ‘‘When I discovered that I was pregnant a few months later, I was scared. I confided in a neighbour who everyone called Mama. She told me to abort the baby, that I was too young to bear the responsibility of bringing up a child.‘‘

Comfort said although she was terrified by the pregnancy she feared abortion. ‘‘I asked her what would happen if after aborting the baby I discovered later in life that I couldn‘t have children anymore,‘‘ she said.

She also said that when she told Nadum about the pregnancy, she denied it. ‘‘I told my boss I was pregnant and he told me it was none of his business,‘‘ she said, adding that she had to bear the shame of a growing tummy and curious stares of neighbours.

Recalling the circumstances in which she landed in prison, she said, “I think it was around January 10 when my boss called me on the phone to attend to a customer who had come to buy compressors. He had travelled out of Lagos. I went to the shop and met with the person. We negotiated a price but the customer didn‘t have the whole amount. I called my boss and told him, and he told me to collect what the man had and give it to the gateman. I counted the money, it was 95,000 naira, and I gave it to the gateman.‘‘

The next day, Nadum returned home but the gateman did not report for duty. ‘‘I went to a phone booth and tried the gateman‘s phone number several times but it was switched off. When I told my boss about it, he was very angry. The next day, policemen from Oko Oba Police station, Abule Egba came to the house and arrested me.‘‘

At the police station, another drama played out. ‘‘My boss told the policemen that he had lost N200,000 to me. He told them that it was because I had stolen the money from him that I started saying he was responsible for my pregnancy.‘‘ Comfort said she was three months pregnant at the time she was arrested.

The 17-year-old was arraigned at the Abule Egba Magistrate Court on January 26, 2010. Unfortunately, she had no one to pay for her bail in the sum of N50,000. Copies of the charge sheet made available to our correspondent revealed that the initial age filled for comfort was 17 years before it was cancelled and replaced with 18. But Comfort herself insists she is 17. The only person who can come forward with proof of the girl‘s age is her father in Rivers State who claims he is cash strapped and unable to make the trip to Lagos.

Efforts made by our correspondent to get Nadum’s reaction yielded no result as the voice that answered the calls our correspondent made to his phone repeatedly claimed it was wrong number. He also did not respond to text messages sent to his phone, forcing our correspondent to visit his residence at Plot 2 Owode Street, Abule Egba, Lagos. While the place looked deserted, two children who opened the gate after persistent knocks and and claimed to be Nadum’s niece and nephew, told our correspondent, after asking what her mission was, that Nadum was not at home.

Further effort made to get him on his MTN and Zain lines also yielded no result. “I am not Nadum,” a voice said on the phone and hung up.