Her name is Pwashikai Nideno; aged five. She is the survivor of a brutal attack by suspected ritualists in Dong Village of Adamawa State, which resulted in the mutilation of her vagina and intestine by her assailant, now in police net.
The child is currently hospitalised at the Yola Specialist Hospital’s children surgical ward and needs half a million naira for a vaginoplasty, a procedure to reconstruct her private part and rectum.
Even the doctors who treated little Pwashikai, who was brought to the hospital soaked in her own blood and her intestine dangling outside her body, have expressed amazement at her tenacity for life. But then, the doctors are worried that even though the child has turned the corner physically, she might have to live with the psychological trauma of the incident.
Chuks Azubike, who led a team of doctors who carried out a set of two operations on the little girl, said she would need psychological therapy to lead a normal life.
“It would be hard for her to accept any man,” he said. “Any attempt from anyone to open her up, particularly her legs, will be resisted,” Mr Azubike said.
The last surgery to reconstruct her vagina is, however, too expensive for the hospital to bear on its own. The hospital has solicited for help, but it only has been able to raise N20,000.
Little Pwashikai’s misfortune seemed to have occurred at the most inauspicious time, as her father himself is currently hospitalised and at the fringes of death.
A relative, Zidon Diga, who said he is the family’s benefactor and uncle to Pwashikai’s mother, said he could not overcome his shock upon sighting the little girl in her own pool of blood after a woman going to fetch firewood in the early hours of May 7, found her in a crouched position in the bush.
Mr Diga, a retired police officer, said he had supported his niece by taking care of the bill of her sick husband who is hospitalised at the Numan General Hospital. The tearful man, who said he sometimes had to even borrow money to offset the bills, noted that it was under such circumstances that he awoke to Pwashikai’s own “misfortune”.
He said the family has spent well over N100,000 to pay for Pwashikai’s medical bills, mostly from financial contributions of kind-hearted people.
“She simply refused to die,” he said. “She just wouldn’t die. It’s a miracle of God.”
Mr Diga refused to allow NEXT to speak with the girl’s hospitalised father on the grounds that his knowledge of the incident might further aggravate his already deteriorating medical condition and possibly hasten his death.
He, however, said her mother was aware of her daughter’s condition, but has asked that it be kept away from her sick husband.
Mr Nideno was said to have been admitted for appendicitis by the hospital. But his condition did not improve after doctors performed the operation. A second operation has been performed; but it doesn’t appear to have, in any way, ameliorated the health condition.
“Pwashikai is missing”
Mr Diga said on the 7th of May, Pwashikai’s other siblings awoke around 5am that morning only to discover she was missing. What further compounded their fears was the discovery that the door to their hut had been cut-off. He said Pwashikai’s elder sisters quickly rushed to his house to inform him about the disappearance of their sister. He recalled that the little children ran to his place, saying “Papa, Papa, Pwashikai is missing”.
A search party was organised immediately following the alarm. Then a woman (name not given) who was going to fetch firewood later raised an alarm that she found little Pwashikai crouched on her feet and arms, drenched in blood.
The woman was said to have informed the community that she first sighted the girl about 500 metres away from their hut. She wondered what a child could be doing in the early hours of the morning in a bush.
“In her explanation, the woman said she suspected little Pwashikai must have crawled on her own to the foot path,” Mr Diga said.
He said on getting to the scene, he quickly carried the little girl, as every other person was afraid to touch her. Being a retired police officer, he said, and conversant with the requirement of the law, he reported the incident to the police and arrangement was made for a vehicle to convey the girl to the hospital.
At this point, he said, they were faced with a dilemma. Since the girl’s father was himself hospitalised in the nearby Numan General Hospital, they consequently proceeded to the Yola Specialist Hospital to prevent news of the incident from filtering to Mr Nideno, the father of Pwashikai.
How Pwashikai cheated death
When NEXT visited little Pwashikai, two days after running a story on her encounter with the assailant, who is now in police net, there was a quiet determination to live on her face. Lying on her back, she made attempts to sit up as the reporter approached her bedside.
The look in her eyes this time, compared to the first visit, looked more engaging and it shone with optimism and hope.
Surprisingly, she was still conscious at the time she was brought to the Yola Specialist Hospital, Dr Azubike said. The doctor, however, said there was some initial complication because of contamination of the intestine.
“The thin layer separating her vagina and rectum was also mutilated,” he said. “The second operation we carried out was to pass a tube through her intestine because she cannot pass faeces through her rectum. A third operation is needed to join the vagina and rectum together.”
The commissioner of police in Adamawa State, Adenrele Shinaba, last week paraded one Kunini Jacob and a herbalist as the attackers of the child.
Mr Jacob (23), who was arrested along with his mother who was allegedly shielding him from security agents, told journalists his action was “the work of the devil” and that he was acting on the instruction of a herbalist who told him to procure the intestine of a virgin along with her private part for ritual to give him instant wealth.
Incidentally, the suspect was only recently released from jail after serving a three-year jail sentence for a related offence.
Police investigation led to the arrest of the suspect, as well as the herbalist, Mijinyawa Bala, of Dong village. But Mr Bala distanced himself from the crime, saying he did not instigate the main suspect to commit the crime.
The police boss said the suspects would soon be charged to court for criminal conspiracy, house trespass, kidnapping, rape, and attempt to commit culpable homicide.
NEXTCARES: To help with the cost of little Pwashikai’s surgery, please pay to: Specialist Hospital, Yola Relief Account. First Bank of Nigeria: 3602040000842. Yola Specialist Hospital Tel: 07034859567.
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