Thursday, March 26, 2009 at 10:00pm
Thursday, 26 March 2009 00:00
Nigerian Compass
•Court orders her release •Community cries out for help
Lateef Ibrahim, Abuja
WHAT could a woman be doing in her house with 42 pregnant teenagers? . This is the question operatives of the anti-human trafficking unit of the... Force Headquarters, Abuja, are trying to find an answer to, as they arrested the suspect (names withheld).
The victims, aged between 13 and 18, were allegedly found in the woman’s house in Abia State.
The suspect, the Nigerian Compass learnt, had earlier been arrested and paraded by the Abia State Police Command for allegedly trafficking in children, only to be released based on intervention from “high quarters”.
It was gathered that her latest arrest followed a tip-off from the people of Umunkpeyi Nvosi village in Isiala-Ngwa South Local Government Area of Abia State, where she resides.
It was further learnt that the policemen stormed the village and raided the home of the woman during which the 42 pregnant teenagers and some able- bodied men were reportedly arrested. The woman was alleged to have recruited the men for the purpose of kidnapping the teenagers and having immoral relationship with them, which resulted into the pregnancy.
It was, however, not clear what she uses the babies from the pregnant girls for.
“These young men were recruited to abduct the young girls, put them in family way and kidnap any member of the community who voices opposition to her nefarious activities”, the people of Umunkpeyi Nvosi community said in a letter signed on their behalf by Iheanyi Achoromadu and Pastor Charles Ukoh.
The letter, a copy of which was obtained by the Nigerian Compass in Abuja, was addressed to the Chairman of the Civil Liberties Organisation. The community noted with regrets that the police in Abia State were very complacent on the issue.
“It is quite regrettable that notwithstanding the gravity of the said atrocities, the police in Abia State are still very complacent on the issue”, the community declared in the letter.
The people expressed happiness that the Force Headquarters have “renewed investigations on the subject-matter and in the process, arrested some pregnant girls from the said camp.”
The community further implored the CLO to “come into the matter fully so that appropriate government agencies and all other parties that should be involved in this matter are made to live up to expectations to save us from this ugly situation”.
The Nigerian Compass, however, gathered that before the suspect could be brought from Abia State to Abuja, a court injunction restraining the police from arresting her was already waiting, following which she was released.
When contacted on his mobile phone yesterday, the Force Public Relations Officer, Mr. Emmanuel Ojukwu, who neither confirmed nor denied the story, merely said: “I don’t have the details now”.
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