comfort next time you point fingers at Igbos,you'll remember this thread.
see you tomorow

even the governor was a crook

Seven London bank account have been traced to the Governor of Bayelsa State, Chief Diepreye Alamieseigha, who is currently under arrest for money laundering in Britian, just as more shocking revelations have continued to emerge on reasons for his arrest. Governor Alamieseigha who appeared in court on Friday was said to have collapsed in court.
Sunday Tribune also gathered from top Presidency sources that the arrest of Governor Alamieseigha, in whose London house an unlicensed gun was found, might have enjoyed the tacit support of the Federal Government who had entered into an alliance with the British government on the need to arrest any public officer who is suspected to have engaged in money laundering.

only igbo people.from cannibals to drug dealers to  bakassi boys, from blood rituals  to osu caste to biafragroups,from selling babies to sex trade from rapists to kidnappings.i have diffrent news mix with all crime.only kidnapping you came off with in rivers state.

Many Nigerian doctors now engage in illegal sale of babies, taking advantage of helplessness of pregnant girls and the desperation of childless couples.

By Ademola Adegbamigbe,

All[b] passengers had settled on their luxury bus seats, expecting to embark on the tortuous nine-hour Enugu-Lagos trip. That Monday, 9 June, 2008, Mrs. Bene Aguocha was one of those who wanted to take off to Lagos from the Holy Ghost Park, Enugu.

As usual, every one on the bus was craning his or her neck, preening at the vast range of wares on display by hawkers, who were pressing their noses and faces on the bodywork and windows of the bus. Items on sale were ukwa, ugba, abacha, tapioca, achala, pear, kolanuts, akutu, walnuts, groundnuts, garden eggs and banana, most of which are food and fruits indigenous to the south-east. These wares make travellers salivate and look forward to such trips, especially after leaving home for a long time.
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Beyond these, there were also the antics of medicine hawkers displaying local herbs, ranging from cough concoctions, lotions for treatment of scabies, to aphrodisiacs. Street urchins, dancing vigorously to ear-splitting music, provided entertainment. Despite the raucous atmosphere of the park, anxiety of how the journey would end always settles on all travellers like a brooding hen. These are the bad roads that could break the spine or damage vehicles, and the menace of bandits who could snuff life out of travellers with no more effort than killing a moth. That day, Mrs. Aguocha’s apprehension at that Enugu park was more complicated. Beyond the bad road, the possibility of the vehicle developing a fault on the way without a refund of her transport fare and being attacked by robbers, the woman was afraid of what would happen if the bundle she was carrying, a day-old-baby, was detected. To banish fear from her mind, she made a sign of the cross, even as she listlessly shook her leg and sang a false lullaby. However, her prayer was not answered by the Almighty who prefers justice. An eagle-eyed female official of the Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps, NSCDC, accosted and questioned Aguocha why she was travelling with a day-old baby. The official asked her to prove ownership of the baby. She started stammering, even as her shaky palms became wet with sweat. Aguocha found it difficult looking at her accuser straight in the face. Earlier, as revealed by the Enugu State Commandant of the NSCDC, Mr. Desmond Agu, his men got wind of a lady who was about to make a trip to Lagos with a day-old baby that was not hers. When caught, the woman confessed that she bought the baby from one Dr. Kenneth Akunne, also known as Dr. Chukwu Uzoma, for N340,000. Akunne allegedly operates a maternity home at 3-6, Anyaegbunam Street, Uwani, Enugu. Consequently, security men swooped on Akunne’s hospital and stumbled on 22 pregnant girls whose ages ranged between 15 and 18 years. Sources close to the magazine disclosed that Dr. Akunne had a private clinic at Inyi Street, Ashara Layout area of the city, which was once closed down for a similar offence. That year, his certificate of practice was said to have been withdrawn by the Nigerian Medical Association(NMA). In recent times, cases of sale of babies have been increasing alarmingly. On the part of the buyers, they were driven by the desperation of childlessness, ritual for money, foreign welfare opportunities, and (cheap) child labour. For those who sell their own babies, a pattern has, in recent times, developed. They were driven to this madness by the excruciating economic climate, culture, rejection by their sugar daddies and the fear of what the future holds. The matter became so serious that the National Agency for the Prohibition of Traffic in Persons, NAPTIP, raised an alarm on the increasing cases of Nigerian medical personnel, parents and illegal children homes selling babies. Mrs. Carol Ndaguba, Executive Secretary, linked this to the rate of poverty in the country. She urged all states to sign the Child Rights Act to protect children. She revealed that her agency had received reports on the sales of babies going on, especially in the South East, and added that she had put her men on full alert. That Nigerians sell babies, in the words of analysts, shows that these are desperate times. At moments of great upheavals like famine, war, draught, earthquake, the reasoning faculty of many people would take a flight such that they indulge in terrible practices for survival. According to Joel Alebiosu, an Ibadan-based sociologist, that is why certain individuals indulge in self-castration, cannibalism and selling of their own children. He quoted what happened in imperial China, where the eunuchs, who were close to the rulers, had access to free food, shelter, clothing and power, even as their ‘complete’ compatriots wallowed in povety. Apart from many Chinese submitting themselves for castration, there were thousands of others who indulged in self-castration.“If you doubt that economic reason or the need for survival can drive people to cannibalistic level,” Omolo told TheNEWS, “I refer you to what the Cable News Network founder, Ted Turner, said recently that there would be catastrophe if global warming is not addressed by world leaders. In the words of Turner: ‘Not doing it will be catastrophic. We’ll be 8 degrees hotter in 30 or 40 years and basically none of the crops will grow. Most of the people will have died and the rest of us will be cannibals.’” Omolo told this magazine, therefore, that the same desperation that drove people to castrate themselves and cannibals to eat human flesh is the same expediency that could “make a woman sell the bone of her bone, flesh of her flesh and for a doctor to be a facilitator”. True. Investigations revealed that sale of babies is booming among medical doctors and nurses with their large number of customers. TheNEWS reliably gathered that a baby girl now goes for N250,000, N300,000 or N400,000, depending on how a buyer could bargain or how well the doctor could exploit the desperation of the prospective buyer. Dr. Akunne, who had turned his Hippocratic oath upside down, claimed that he was running a non-governmental organisation. But Agu, Enugu State Commandant of the NSCDC, said the medical doctor should tell that to the marines. Even residents of Anyaegbunam Street said Akunne’s maternity home had been notorious for child trafficking for the past three years. This medium gathered that there were two young lady canvassers who lured girls, mostly students and house maids, to the home on commission basis. Two bouncers were also on the payroll of the doctor to deter girls that may wish to abscond. TheNEWS further gathered that the 20 pregnant girls found in Akunne’s hospital confessed that he used to have unprotected sex with them.[/b]There was, however, a curious twist to the drama when cops from Uwani Police Station arrived to intimidate officers of the NSCDC, asking why they did not consult them–the police–before taking action. This raised a question whether the police were not on the payroll of the baby sellers, an allegation denied by the police authorities in the state, which intervened in the conflict. Also on 6 June 2008, an 80-year-old grandmother, Mrs. Grace Erondu, was paraded in Abuja for allegedly conspiring with some other persons to engage in child trafficking, the handmaiden of baby sales. Among the 13 girls, aged between 19 and 26, found in her custody in Umuahia, 11 of them were at various stages of pregnancy. Two of them were delivered of babies, but did not know their babies’ whereabouts.

Miss Mary Ibe, a victim who hails from Afikpo Local Government area of Ebonyi State, lamented: “The person who directed me there said there were doctors and nurses there to take care of us. I went there one Sunday in April. When I got there, I was told that three people delivered all boys and the children were taken away.” On 29 May 2008, Jabuken Hospital, located at Umode in Osisionia council area in Aba, Abia State, was raided by the police. Although the proprietress, Mrs. Ijeoma Ibekwe, had voted with her feet, the cops arrested two men and nine girls and six of them, between 15 and 20 years of age, were in different stages of pregnancy. The pregnant girls included Chinonye Isaiah,19, from Ovim–Isikwuato Local Government Area in Abia State; Chinelo Okoro,15, from Umualuwakum Mbano, Imo State; Nkechi Njoku, 20, from Asa-Nnesu LGA, Abia; Odiwomma Okafor,17, from Obowo, Imo State; Ndidi Monday,15, from Uruan-Iyan, Cross River State; and Blessing Achurumba,15, from Ala-Oji, Abia.  Others were Goodnews Jombo, 26, from Obingwa LGA, Abia State; Ogochukwu Onwumere, 23, from Umuorie-Aku, Ikwano LGA, Abia; and Amarachi Njoku, 17, a native of Agbor in Delta State. The men were Joshua Ibekwe, 28, Umuajameze Umuopara and Levi Ibekwe, 31.

Investigations revealed that the hospital was not only unregistered, but an antenatal home where unmarried girls and victims of unwanted pregnancy were camped.  Through contacts, Ijeoma allegedly recruited the girls into her hideout from rural areas and among salesgirls and house-helps in big towns across the country. Other recruitment grounds include post-primary and tertiary institutions, where female students are afraid of the great taboo in most Igbo cultures on unwanted pregnancy. Affluent Ijeoma, fondly called mummy by her clients, was reported to call the shots in the camp. She partially undertakes the inmates’ upkeep. At her expense, she provides them with orthodox and traditional modes of antenatal care. Thus, their relationship gets chummier.  To consummate her ploy, she plays midwife during labour and delivers them of babies free of charge.

Ijeoma, a hard-nosed businesswoman, would, thereafter move to recoup her antenatal and postnatal bills by selling babies in her care. She allegedly did this by negotiating with ritualists, child traffickers and adopters through sale at huge prices. A source told TheNEWS that she would give part of the money to the girls to make them keep quiet. But nemesis caught up with Ijeoma recently. Levi Ibekwe, a deportee and one of the male suspects in the custody of the Abia State Criminal Investigation Department, SCID, Umuahia, disclosed to the magazine that Ijeoma was his wife. Levi revealed that trouble ensued when his cousin, Miss Ahuruchi Peace Iroegbu, reported to the police that her own mother and his wife conspired to sell her baby. Asked if he was aware of the ‘business’ between his wife and Ahuruchi’s mother, Levi said: ”I don’t know anything about the business. But anything the police can do to recover the baby is my concern.” Close sources, however, alleged that he had a record of criminality. They revealed that his wife was using him as a child trafficking mule. Meanwhile, the police are still looking for Ijeoma and Ahuruchi’s mother. In Aba town and its environs, most unsuccessful doctors, midwives and homoeopaths have thrown medical ethics to the wind and indulge in gross misuse of their registered medical outfits. Prior to police discovery, some of the babies belonging to the girls had been sold. Also, Lillian Achomba, 42, was arrested at Umukpeyi Nvosi, in Isiala, Ngwa South LGA of Abia State. She was arraigned before an Umuahia magistrate’s court in March for running a unisex camp, with 43 young girls and 11 robust boys for premarital procreation for commercial interest. When the camp was raided on a tip-off, about 31 girls were already heavily pregnant. Yearly, Lillian acquires about 40 babies for sale, which yields copius amounts of cash.

On 4 December 2007, some policemen from Aba Central Police Station arrested Dr. Orikara Hyacinth, 42, at 3 Brass Street, off Owerri/Aba Road. They also arrested Mrs. Ayodele Okeke, 38, at 10 Woji Street, Port-Harcourt in Rivers State. Mrs. Okeke runs an unregistered maternity home without even a signpost. It was alleged that Orikara was trafficking in new-born babies as well as recommending pregnant girls to Ayodele.  When the police swooped on the maternity home, a one-day-old baby was discovered with one Madam Jennieve Orjie, a 39-year-old indigene of Calabar, Cross River State. Under police interrogation, she claimed maternal ownership of the baby, believed to have been abandoned by a girl on a safe run. However, to unravel the riddle, a DNA test was carried out at the Abia State University Teaching Hospital, Aba, which proved that the claimant had no blood relationship with the baby. Jennieve was prosecuted alongside Ayodele and Orikara. So strong is the interest in this trade that is has become attractive to the most unlikely people. In May, an Aba-based pastor was handcuffed for keeping and offering antenatal care to 15 pregnant girls in a hideout adjacent to his ‘divine’ house of God. He explained that he engaged the pregnant girls to work for him on his private farm. On investigation, it was uncovered that the pastor had no farm. Sources revealed that the pastor was exploiting contacts of branches of his church across the globe to perpetuate this illicit trade.

Discreet checks conducted by this medium revealed some factors promoting human trafficking in the state.  Across the Igbo ethnic nation, it was gathered that most victims of unwanted pregnancy are faced with rejection by their parents. Lack of parental love and care also count. An average contemporary girl is materialistic, thus, most girls become prey in the hands of randy men in both rural and urban areas.  When impregnated, the philanderers turn their back on them. Nemesis also caught up with one Dr. James Babatunde Adeyemi in August 2007 in Calabar. As reported by TheNEWS last year, his Mambo Clinic, located at 12 Atamuro Street, Calabar, was invaded by the police, upon information that the doctor indulged in illegal abortion, baby sale and sundry vices. Adeyemi was arrested for allegedly selling one David Joseph Edem, the son of a 17-year-old girl, Miss Sarah Joseph Edem, to a woman based in Sapele, Delta State. The buyer, identified as Helen, curiously absconded from police custody.  

Distraught Sarah told TheNEWS in Ikot Ansa, a suburb of Calabar, that sometime in 2006, she was pregnant and after confronting her boyfriends, none of them was willing to accept responsibility for the pregnancy and to avoid the trouble of her mother and elder sisters, she concealed it for about four months. The pregnancy was discovered by her elder, whom she said was furious. As an apprentice with Rainbow Garment, a fashion designing firm, the pregnancy was going to put paid to her acquisition of the trade, since she had dropped out of school. Her elder sister, Imaobong, concerned that the N10,000 paid for her to learn the trade would be wasted, decided to pay another N10,000 to have the pregnancy terminated. ”When Imaobong discovered that I was pregnant, she was furious with me. She, however, calmed down and decided that I should have the pregnancy ternminated. Somebody directed us to Dr. Adeyemi, who demanded for N10,000, which we paid. But the doctor said the pregnancy had escaped to my back so he could not trace it. He advised that I should keep attending prenatal care for him to study the pregnancy to know what to do,” she said. She kept visiting the hospital to have the pregnancy removed, but the doctor only kept asking her to repeat her visits until the pregnancy became too advanced and thus risky to abort. She then accepted her fate as her mother too was against the idea of an abortion from the start. With the idea of an abortion shelved, the doctor opted to be ‘monitoring” the progress of the pregnancy, so that he would know when she would put to bed. “I did not attend antenatal in his clinic, but occasionally, he would send for me to ask how I was doing. Because I did not have money to go to hospital, my sister took me to a midwife at RCC Road where I delivered on the 29th of April 2007,” Sarah said. A few days after delivery, Adeyemi called Imaobong to “find out about my patient”. He was informed that the girl had delivered and was in the house. On Friday, 5 May 2007, Adeyemi visited their home in the company of a nurse with the University of Calabar Teaching Hospital, UCTH. “The nurse gave Imaobong N200 to buy me drugs when my sister went out. Adeyemi took me to a corner of the house and told me to come to see him on Sunday in his hospital. That I should not allow anyone to know that I was going to see him,” said Sarah.

She said Adeyemi repeated the visit to further instruct her to ensure she showed up in the hospital. As agreed that Sunday, she went to see Adeyemi. “After my sister had left for church with Emem, our last born, and my mother was off to her farm in Odukpani, I went to Mambo to see Adeyemi,” she explained. Her stay in hospital took her far into the night. Her absence agitated the minds of her siblings. Later that evening, Imaobong received a call from someone claiming to be the step-sister to the boy who impregnated Sarah. The caller, Imaobong said, told her that Sarah was with her in Uyo, Akwa Ibom State, and that she was the step-sister to the boy who impregnated Sarah and would now take care of David. “I was mad. Who is that boy that throughout Sarah’s pregnancy never showed up. It is now that he knows Sarah should be taken to his step-sister. I warned the woman to return Sarah immediately or I would raise an alarm,” she told TheNEWS last year. The caller, Imaobong said, hung up and when she called back, she refused to answer the phone. Meanwhile, Sarah said, when she got to the hospital, Adeyemi gave her some drugs to take which made her feel dizzy. “After taking the drugs, he drove me in his car to White House Street where Mary Okon lives and collected the baby in the car and handed  him over to the nurse. I was feeling too weak and confused and could not do or say anything,” she narrated. Back to the hospital, Adeyemi, she said, gave her the key to his office to go in there and wait. “After I waited for a long time in his office, he did not come. I decided to come out when my head cleared a little. When he came back, he was very angry and ordered me to go inside the office and he locked me up,” Sarah said tearfully. The girl was locked up in the office until the following day. According to her, the doctor wrote a letter, a copy of  which she was given. That copy was later dispatched  to her sisters in Ikot Ansa. The letter pleaded for forgiveness from her mother and sisters for handing over “David to his father’s step-sister to take care of since we cannot take care of him alone”.

Imaobong got the letter and became furious. She went with her mother to Mambo Clinic where they met Adeyemi and two ladies. Her mother, she disclosed, started screaming. Sarah said the doctor pleaded with her mother to stop screaming and that David had been taken to the motherless babies home and he would soon go and bring him. He claimed that the women in charge of the home went for a burial and would be back two days later. “When my mother heard this, she fainted,” Imaobong told TheNEWS. Imaobong, who said she missed that year’s Universities Matriculation Examination because of the matter, said they went back two days later but Adeyemi was nowhere to be found. They then reported the matter to the Ministry of Women Affairs and Social Development, which advised them to go to the police. At the police station, they were directed to the anti-human trafficking unit.

Meanwhile, a nurse at Calabar’s General Hospital had observed the suspicious movement of two women and called the attention of a doctor to them. The women claimed they wanted to “spend the night in the hospital”. This allegedly raised the suspicion of the doctor, as one of them had a new-born baby wrapped around her waist like a woman who had just put to bed. When the doctor examined them, it was discovered that none of them had just put to bed. They were subsequently accosted and handed over to the police at the Akim Police station. There they were said to have made some useful statements to the effect that they bought the baby from a medical doctor and were at the hospital to “procure” another baby to take to their husbands since they had been without children after 30 years of marriage. They were able, however, to bolt after the confessional statement, but without the baby as he was with the doctor.  

When Adeyemi was invited by the police, he said Sarah came crawling to him to assist in taking care of the baby since she was not able to care for the baby alone. When asked to get the baby from his wife’s friend, he could not. He was subsequently taken into custody by the police. He was held for over five days before he was released him on bail. When contacted in his hospital, Adeyemi said he had no time to talk to the “press because the matter, as you have said, is an allegation. The matter is with the police and if you want to know what happened get my statement from the police. Now please leave my office as I have patients to attend to.” The Chairman of the Nigeria Medical Association, Dr Ikpeme Ikpeme said that a panel would be set up to investigate the case against Dr Adeyemi. Several months after, nothing has been heard of the investigation and Dr Adeyemi is still in practice. When contacted, the Police Public Relations Officer for the Cross River Command, ASP Thomas Okpene said: “The man was asked to be released on bail by AIG Zone Six. When the Commissioner asked for the file because of the shoddy way the case was handled, it was reported that the AIG had given instruction that he should be taken on bail.”

Residents of the state are worried that if Adeyemi is allowed to continue to practice without any sanction, he would inflict more damage. Other cases abound. In May 2005, the Nigerian Newsday, a weekly newspaper owned by the Nasarawa State government, reported how a medical doctor in a private medical clinic in Kaduna delivered pregnant ladies of babies that he sold to sterile couples. He sold each baby for N20,000. On 19 October 2003, one of a set of twin baby boys was allegedly stolen during a Caesarean operation in which the mother, late Mrs. Chinwendu Ukwuoma, died of alleged negligence and recklessness at Jeno Hospital, Trans Ekulu, Enugu. Two medical doctors – J.E.N. Okonkwo and Christian Ogbuokiri – are being accused of negligence, recklessness and collusion in the theft of the baby boy. The case is before the Medical and Dental Practitioners Council for disciplinary action.Part of the charges read: “Dr. J.E.N Okonkwo, as the proprietor and the medical practitioner in charge of the said JENO HOSPITAL, failed to issue any standing order or guidelines for the management of handling of emergency situations such as the admission and management of Mrs. Chinwendu Ukwuoma in your absence, and consequently led to the mismanagement of the said Mrs. Chinwendu Ukwuoma in your said hospital. “That you, Dr. Christian Ogbuokiri proceeded to carry out Caesarian section on the said patient without ordering necessary laboratory investigations and also ensuring that duly cross-matched blood or any blood at all was available in the theatre for the use of the patient in case of need in the course of surgery, “And that by the said fact you have conducted yourself infamously in a professional respect contrary to Rule 10 of the Rules of Professional Conduct for Medical and Dental Practitioners in Nigeria (1995 edition) and … CAP 221 Laws of the Federation of Nigeria 1990.”But the father, Okechukwu Ukwuoma, with the assistance of NAPTIP, on 9 November 2007, four years after, recovered the child from one Mrs. Yashi in Trans Ekulu, Enugu metropolis. She was detained by NAPTIP and later released. Mr. Ukwuoma was, however, anxious about her possible escape. In a petition to NAPTIP, Enugu Zonal Office, counsel to Ukwuoma, M.O. Udeh Esq argued: “It is not even safe to grant her bail because she may jump bail. The safest way out of the situation is to arraign the woman before a court, and it will be left with the court to decide the issue of her bail, in view of the fact that she has not supplied any reliable clue to explain how she came in possession of the stolen child.”

However, in a chat with the magazine, the Zonal Director of NAPTIP South-East, Enugu, Mrs. Ijeoma Okoronkwo said that the Agency is empowered to arrest and release on bail suspects in the course of investigation. She however explained that NAPTIP would not be compromised on the matter. “The aim is to unravel the true parent. We are very much interested in how the boy was removed from his parents.” According to her, investigation is on in collaboration with the state Ministry for Women Affairs, Police and other security agencies involved.  If found guilty, Mrs. Yashi would face imprisonment for 14 years without the option of fine for contravening Rule IX (e) of the Offences and Punishment Act 2003 establishing NAPTIP which frowns at depriving any parent of possession of any person under the age of 18 years. The case of JENO Hospital revealed how medical personnel, through abuse of their responsibilities, engage in child trafficking.

There are many reasons that Nigerians now engage in selling and buying of children. One of these is the poor economy. Many parents are so poor that, to make ends meet they sell their own children. Consequently, the children end up as child labourers in cities like London, Birmingham and Manchester, according to The Telegraph of London. In January 2005, David Harrison, an undercover reporter with The Telegraph, came to Nigeria and was offered several children for sale by their Nigerian parents. That is, two boys, aged three and five, for £5,000 or £2,500 for one; and a 10-month-old baby for £2,000. Teenage girls, including pregnant ones were, according to the newspaper, willing to sell their babies for less than £1,000. “One international trafficker, tracked down in Lagos,” as Telegraphy reported, “claimed to be buying up to 500 children a year.”

Apart from using the children for domestic work up to 18 hours a day, cleaning, cooking and looking after other young children, the foreign newspaper reported further that they are subjected to physical and sexual abuse. That month, as Telegraphy reported, campaigners urged the government to take urgent action to end this 21st century slavery. “These children are being abused under our noses in our own country,” Chris Beddoe, the director of End Child Prostitution and Trafficking, a British-based coalition of international charities, told the newspaper. “It is totally unacceptable. We need urgent action to identify these children as they enter the UK, find those who are being abused and offer proper protection to those who escape or are freed from their abusers.”  Vernon Coaker, the Home Office Minister responsible for the prevention of trafficking, described child traffickers as “evil” and said anybody who could buy and sell babies was “sick”. The Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre, a British non- governmental organisation, revealed that 330 children, including 14 aged under 12, many of them from Africa, had been trafficked to Britain over the past 12 months.

The Telegraph revealed the modus operandi. That is, the traffickers use a network of corrupt officials and co-traffickers to obtain passports and visas, often giving the children new names. Many of the young victims are flown directly from Lagos in Nigeria to London airports. Others are taken, via other West African states such as Ghana and Benin, to “transit” cities, including Paris. A growing number of the African slave children arrive in Britain unaccompanied, as asylum seekers, or with “private foster parents”. The newspaper quoted Debbie Ariyo, the executive director of the London-based charity, Africans United Against Child Abuse: “This trade is a disgrace. These children are not going to loving homes. They are being cynically used by adults as slave labour and to defraud the state and then when they get older and have served their purpose and no longer attract benefits, they are thrown out on to the streets with no papers even to prove who they are. These are damaged, traumatise children and we have to end this misery.” Campaigners said that many of the slave children – psychologically and often physically damaged at 18 – were thrown out of the houses of their “owners”.

According to the United Nations Human Development survey, 70 per cent of Nigerians live below the International Poverty Line of one US dollar per day and it is the child that is the most affected by this economic downturn. Infant mortality is pegged at 77 deaths out of every 1000 live births, while maternal mortality is 704 deaths out of every 100,000 live births. Only about 10 per cent of the population have access to essential drugs, while more than five million adults are estimated to be living with HIV/AIDS.  Another motivation for Nigerians who buy babies is to have access to British welfare facilities. The most recent of such cases was in April this year when Nigerian-born Peace Sandberg, 40, paid £150 for a three-month-old boy in this country. With a forged birth certificate with which she obtained a visa for the baby from the British High Commission, she flew into London.

Hours after arriving at the Heathrow airport, Sandberg claimed she returned to Nigeria in December 2006 to give birth and wanted to own her own flat. But Sandberg, a support worker for Kensington Housing Trust, was recognised by Lizette Reddy, a housing officer at Ealing council’s homeless persons unit. Sandberg’s plan, therefore, fell flat. Also, Mrs Ijeoma Okoronkwo of South-East zone of NAPTIP told this magazine that about 20 offenders have been successfully prosecuted across the country and are currently serving various jail terms. She said that NAPTIP is doing well, stressing that the awareness on child trafficking is being taken to all nooks and crannies of the country and people are becoming very conscious of the crime. Out of the 20 convictions in the land, two were from the South-East zone; one person each from Anambra and Ebonyi states. There are seven cases in court, she revealed, lamenting that criminally minded people are taking advantage of childless couples to engage in the nefarious trade. Mrs Okoronkwo argued that people are reluctant to go to motherless babies homes for child adoption probably because of cultural or legal implications, and pointed out the need for re-orientation of the populace on formal adoption. According to her, Nigeria is a source state, transit and destination place for child and human trafficking.

Child Rights Act, 2003, section 30 states: “No person shall buy, sell, hire, dispose of or otherwise deal in a child. A child shall not be used for the purpose of begging for alms, guiding beggars, prostitution, pornography, domestic or sexual labour or for any unlawful or immoral purpose, or as a slave, or practices similar to slavery such as trafficking of the child, debt bondage, serfdom, forced or compulsory labour, hawking or for any purpose that deprives the child of the opportunity to be in school. A person who contravenes this section shall be liable to 10 years imprisonment.” Observes believe, however, that the federal government could take a cue from the Delta State government which, in April, presented the Child Rights Bill to the state legislature. In the words of Governor Uduaghan, the bill was to “protect our children from any harmful and unacceptable practices that will compromise their future…” Will the Umar Yar’Adua administration do something about this? Nigerians are expecting.

–Reported by Emma Una, George Okpara and Jude Orji.

only igbo people.from cannibals to drug dealers to bakassi boys, from blood rituals to osu caste to biafragroups,from selling babies to sex trade from rapists to kidnappings.i have diffrent news mix with all crime.only kidnapping you came off with in rivers state.

orija kalu,sam egwu,Nzeribe,all eastern politicians and average money hungry igbos.

•He should tell us his source of income –AC
From Chuks Okocha in Abuja, 03.07.2009

Saturday, March 7, 2009

The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) yesterday rose in defence of its National Chairman, Prince Vincent Ogbulafor over allegations that he acquired a property worth over N400 million in the high brow Asokoro District in Abuja and that he solicited for bribes from some elected government officials.


But the opposition Action Congress party has challenged the PDP chieftain to tell Nigerians his source of income in the last five years that enabled him purchase the property.

Reports in the media have been agog over the corrupt tendencies of the PDP chairman in the last one year.

In a statement issued and signed by the National Publicity Secretary of the party, Prof. Ahmed Alkali, the party in a tacit admittance that Ogbulafor was in fact the owner of the mansion located at 45 Mohammed Nasir Road in Asokoro, Abuja said, “To question the ability of the chairman to own property anywhere, given his family background and successes in private business is callous and uncharitable.”

On allegations that Ogbulafor had solicited for bribes from elected politicians, the party said, “the allegations against the National Chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party, Prince Vincent Eze Ogbulafor are petty, frivolous and in bad taste.

“To also allege that he solicits for personal favours from elected party members is out of the question.

“Prince Ogbulafor is an avowed believer and firm practitioner of President Yar’Adua’s dogged war on corruption and will never engage in acts that will undermine or retard this noble endeavour.”

The statement said that the allegations are targeted at Ogbulafor and are “aimed at tarnishing his hard won years of building a decent and reputable career both in and outside politics.”

PDP blamed the attack on those “whose stock in trade is intimidation, harassment and blackmail with a view to attracting unmerited attention and perhaps material benefits.”

The party said in the statement that it “is constrained to come out openly and forcefully to condemn this breed of rumours and indecent politics of opportunism”, stating further, “silence here, we believe, is no longer golden and indeed could be interpreted as acquiescence to the callous sundry allegations being peddled around by merchants of anarchy.”

The party stated that it is well aware that since last year, following the inauguration of the National Executive Committee and following the “pledge and commitment of the National Chairman, Prince Vincent Eze Ogbulafor to reform, re-organize and reposition the party and return it to the people in line with the vision of the founding fathers of the party, there have been conscious and deliberate efforts to weaken this resolve.”

In this regard, PDP said that it is determined and resolutely committed to going ahead with all its programmes and plans of action for the special convention and shall not be deterred nor shall it succumb to the selfish ambitions of a few who are bent on subverting the unity and cohesion of the party.

“The PDP and its governments at all levels shall not be distracted by the mischievous antics of a lawless and arrogant few”, it said.

The party promised to get to the root of those behind the misleading allegations against Ogbulafor.

In reaction, the National Publicity Secretary of the opposition Action Congress (AC) Alhaji Lai Mohammed, has asked Ogbulafor to tell Nigerians his source of income in the last five which enabled him to purchase the mansion.

Mohammed queried: “What has he been doing
http://nigeriaworld.com/cgi-bin/axs/ax.pl?http://odili.net/news/source/2009/mar/7/204.html

EFCC investigates Chime's in-law over N14m fraud

By Adelani Adepegba

[b]The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission is presently investigating Ngozi Mgbeke, the sister-in-law to Enugu State Governor, Sullivan Chime, over alleged forgery, impersonation and receiving N10m under false pretences.



Ngozi is the elder sister to Chime's new wife, Clara, who got married to the governor in October 2008 at Amuda Isuochi, Abia State.

Her investigation was prompted by a petition to the commission by the family of late Anayo Mgbeke (Ngozi's husband), who had a thriving haulage business in Enugu before he died in a motor accident in April 2007.

In the petition signed by the solicitor to the family, Okey Obikeze, the complainant (Mgbeke family) said since Anayo died, there had been a dispute between Ngozi and other members of the family concerning the money and other property generated from the said business

It was alleged that while efforts were being made to resolve the dispute, Ngozi, acting against a subsisting court order, conspired with some lawyers and falsely used the name of her mother-in-law, Chinyere Mgbeke, to fraudulently obtain a letter of administration from the court with which they withdrew N10m from a family account with a commercial bank in Enugu.

She was said to have also used the name of her mother-in-law without her consent to obtain over N4m owed the family by a construction company under the false pretence that she was the sole beneficiary and owner of the said money. The Public Relations Officer of the EFCC in Enugu, Blessing Ekeleme, said she did not know the level of investigation into the case, noting that her office did not handle petitions, but only gets brief of arrest after detectives might have concluded their work. [/b]

An investigator with the agency however confirmed that the matter was being investigated and that arrests would soon be made.

The Mgbeke Family in a separate letter to the Nigerian Bar Association and the Attorney-General of the Federation, complained about the "professional misconduct and conduct unbecoming of legal practitioners."

"We are greatly alarmed by the time; the way and manner the said letters of administration were obtained. It is our view that it is highly unprofessional for (lawyer's name withheld) to write and state that Chinyere Mgbeke (one of our clients being the mother of late Christian Anayo Mgbeke) consulted him/her when he/she was not actually consulted by Chinyere Mgbeke," part of their petition said.

http://nigeriaworld.com/cgi-bin/axs/ax.pl?http://odili.net/news/source/2009/mar/8/415.html

NDLEA nabs 14 suspected drug traffickers
… Confiscates 77.307 kg of narcotics
By CHRIS ANUCHA
Thursday, February 26, 2009 
•Ogbuji Emmanuel
Photo: Sun News Publishing
More Stories on This Section

[b]The National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) has arrested 14 persons suspected to be drug traffickers.
The suspects were nabbed at the Murtala Muhammed International Airport, NMIA), Ikeja, Lagos.

Cannabis weighing 59.547kg, were recovered from two of them, while 1.827 kg of heroin was recovered from one of them.
Others had cocaine weighing, 15.933, in their possession. The estimated street value of the drug impounded from the suspects is put at N60 million.

The NDLEA Airport Commander, Mr. Victor Cole-Showers, gave the names of the suspects as, Emmanuel Ogbuji, 45, Mezue Obinna, 30, Eluma Ifeanyi, 30, and Okoro Onwuka, 35.
Others are: Onum Michael, 36, Anaeto Ugochukwu, 39, Obiora Celestine, 46, and David Monteiro, 35.

Eight of them were alleged to have ingested the hard drugs and were on their way to various destinations in Europe. Michael’s case is said to be critical and may be the next drug suspect to be operated on this year, to evacuate cocaine from his stomach. The suspect, a native of Ohafia Local Government Area of Abia State, had already confessed to have ingested 78 wraps of hard drugs, which was meant to be delivered in Hamburg for a fee of 3,000 euros.

The dream was not only dashed, his life is also in danger. As at the time of filing this report, he had excreted 77 wraps, while one is still stuck in his stomach. In his confessional statement, Michael said: “I suffered a big loss in business and somebody wanted to help me start all over again. That was how I found myself in this problem”.

A few weeks ago, another suspected drug trafficker, Anthony Hyginus, 39, was saved from premature death when doctors removed a ‘stubborn’ wrap of cocaine that got stuck in his stomach through surgical operation.

Chidi, a factory worker in Spain, was arrested during the screening of KLM passengers to Amsterdam. He allegedly ingested 71 wraps, weighing 1.434 kg, for a fee of 2,000 euros. The suspect said: “They said I would have been paid 3,000 euros if I had swallowed 100 wraps but I could not, because it is not easy”. The native of Orlu, Imo State, had been living in Spain for the past 10 years.
Obinna, an automobile parts dealer, living in Togo, was arrested while on his way to Hamburg. He allegedly ingested 70 wraps of substance, suspected to be cocaine, weighing 1.452 kg, for a fee of 3, 500 euros. Listen to his excuse: ‘‘I wanted to help my younger ones and my mother.’’ The suspect is from Dunukaofia Local government Area of Anambra State.

Ifeanyi is said to be living in Spain but has a shop, where he sells musical instruments at Ikotun area of Lagos. He was nabbed on his way to Madrid, Spain. Eluma allegedly ingested 73 wraps of substance suspected to be cocaine, weighing 1.515 kg. The suspect, from Oru West Local Government Area of Imo State, claimed it was circumstances that pushed him into drug trafficking. He said: “I was not going to be paid any money. The drug is mine, I bought it to sell in Europe.” The NDLEA spokesman, Mr. Mitchell Ofoyeju, told Daily Sun that the suspects would appear in court soon.[/b]Meanwhile, the Chairman/Chief Executive of the NDLEA, Ahmadu Giade, has again expressed deep concern about the rate of hard drug ingestion by traffickers, describing it as suicidal. “Cocaine induced surgical operations rather than sicknesses, are sad and regrettable. Ingestion of narcotic drugs is suicidal. I strongly believe that premature death, economic sabotage and image smearing, caused by illicit drug trafficking, are critical areas of justification, for our call for stiffer penalty for drug culprits, as enshrined in the Agency’s Act,” Giade declared.

http://www.sunnewsonline.com/webpages/features/crimewatch/2009/feb/26/crimewatch-26-02-2009-002.htm

Imo community razed over leadership tussle
Written by Chidi Nkwopara
Wednesday, 25 February 2009

Owerri—Properties worth millions of Naira have been razed in Akabor community, Oguta local government area of Imo State, following the bitter struggle for the traditional stool of the community.
As at the last count, no fewer than 17 residential houses have been set ablaze, while scores of people have taken refuge in the neighbouring communities, or in Owerri, the state capital.

[b]Feelers from the community revealed that the current bloody skirmish was triggered off by what a source claimed was “the mysterious murder of one Mr. Joseph Amakonze, a youth, whose loyalty to one of the factions, was not in doubt”.

It was further gathered that the dead youth’s colleagues claimed that his murder was the handiwork of their opponents and immediately started a reprisal attack.

A source who pleaded anonymity for fear of being attacked, said that “the rampaging youths, who wanted to avenge the death of their colleague, were armed with all manner of dangerous weapons and started burning, damaging and looting the properties of some people opposed to their choice royal father”.

He appealed that something urgent be done to avert further loss of lives and properties in the community.

It would be recalled that the tussle for the traditional stool started about two years ago, after the death of the royal father of the community, Eze Emetuma.

When Police Public Relations Officer (PPRO), Mr. Linus Nwaiwu, was contacted on the incident, he confirmed the story, but added that a detachment of policemen have been drafted to the area to maintain peace.

http://www.vanguardngr.com/content/view/29584/45/
[/b]

Abia Gov Named in Illegal N5bn Transfer
From Funso Muraina in Abuja, 02.25.2009


[b]Abia State Governor Theodore Orji was yesterday in Abuja named as the principal facilitator in the N5 billion of the state fund allegedly transferred into the account of Sloks Nigeria Limited belonging to his predecessor, Dr. Orji Uzor Kalu, who said the transfer was done without his knowledge.
Kalu, a two-time governor of the state, said the alleged money transfer was done without his knowledge because he had directed that his name be de-listed as a director of the company since 1999 when he became governor.
Orji who was then the Chief of Staff to Kalu was alleged to have ordered the Director of Finance in the Umuahia Government House, Mr. Udeh Jones Udeogu, to effect the fund transfer to the private firm.
Making the revelations at a Federal High Court in Abuja to justify the trial of Kalu for money laundering, the Economic and Financial Crimes commission (EFCC) alleged that the N5 billion was transferred in 36 installments from the United Bank for Africa (UBA) Government House bank account at Umuahia to Sloks Inland Bank account at Apapa, Lagos.
Abia Government House Cashier, M. A Udo, allegedly acted as a clearing agent in converting the UBA cheques to drafts and paying them into Inland Bank account of Sloks.[/b]Lead counsel to EFCC Rotimi Jacobs presented to Justice Adamu Bello the graphic details of how the fund was allegedly transferred directly from the state account to the private firm of the former governor.
The statement of the Fund Transfer Officer (FTO) of UBA in Umuahia, Ohiri Christy, explaining the details of the transfer was also presented in the proof of evidence supplied to the court in a bid to establish a prima facie case against the former governor.
Kalu along with two others, Udeh Jones Udeogu and Sloks Ltd, standing trial for alleged money laundering involving N5 billion had approached the judge to dismiss the criminal charge against them because the EFCC allegedly failed to establish a prima facie case against them.
In a preliminary objection against his trial, the former Abia governor claimed that the alleged fund transfer was done without his knowledge and that the charge against him was illegal having been done in breach of an order of Umuahia High Court that no court action should be instituted against him on the issue.
The motion argued by his lead counsel, Chief Awa Kalu (SAN), claimed that the charge was brought in bad faith by EFCC and should be dismissed for lacking in merit.
He submitted that the Federal High Court in Abuja lacks jurisdiction to entertain the suit because the alleged fund belongs to the state and any dispute arising from it could only be looked into by Abia courts.
The counsel argued that the the state House of Assembly, the only body that has power to investigate the state finances, had at no time indicted the former governor while he was also not accused of any wrongdoing in the financial regulations of the state.
Besides, the counsel said the Money Laundering Act 2004 under which the former governor was charged to court had been repealed by Money Laundering Act 2007 and as such was a non existing law.
He, therefore, asked the court to nullify the charge and strike out the trial of his client.
Opposing the application however, EFCC asked the judge to turn down the request on the ground that Kalu had full knowledge of the fund transfer and gave directive to its spending by the company.
Jacobs informed Justice Bello that there was no abuse of judicial process as both the Umuahia High Court and Federal High Court have concurrent jurisdiction while their orders could not stop each other from functioning.
EFCC submitted that contrary to Kalu’s claims, he was a director of Sloks Nigeria Ltd till 2004 when the fund was transferred and as such could be held accountable.
The commission admitted that the Money Laundering Act 2004 had been repealed by the 2007 Act but insisted that the offence committed while the 2004 Act was in place could be tried under the repealed Act.
He described Kalu’s motion as frivolous, baseless and lacking merit and urged the court to hold that the former governor has a criminal case to answer.
Justice Bello will, however, give ruling on April 7 on whether or not to sustain the criminal charge against the former governor.

http://www.thisdayonline.com/nview.php?id=136624

Kidnappers abduct Dep CBN Gov’s mother in Imo
Written by Tony Edike
Monday, 23 February 2009


ENUGU—THE aged mother of the Deputy Governor of Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Mr. Ernest Ebi was kidnapped Saturday night by unknown persons from heraged mother of the Deputy Governor of Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Mr. Ernest Ebiof Imo State.
Madam Ebi said to be over 70 years, was kidnapped by a six-man gang, who stormed her home at about 7 pm Saturday in two unmarked private cars, a Toyota Cressida and a Mazda.

Sources close to the family said the woman was being driven into her compound when the assailants who were trailing the vehicle from a distance forced their way into the premises and forced her into their vehicle, leaving her driver behind.

According to a source, although the kidnappers were armed with sophisticated weapons, they did not release any shot as they met no resistance.

“They dragged the woman into one of their cars and drove away unchallenged. Before taking her away, they made sure that she was with her GSM handset apparently to ensure easy communication with members of her family,” the source said.

It was learnt that when some members of her family and sympathisers called the phone few minutes later, the kidnappers answered and requested that the call be repeated later as they were too busy to take the call at the time.

[b]The source said that when the kidnappers were reached on the same line yesterday, they demanded a huge sum of money as ransom, but the amount could not be immediately confirmed, even though it was learnt that the family was willing to negotiate the release of the woman without much delay.

“We are really worried by this ugly development because one can’t understand why these hoodlums should continue to terrorize innocent people in this area without any intervention by the law enforcement agencies. The woman is aged and you can imagine the trauma she would pass through as a result of this evil act. We just hope that they will not harm her,” the source added.[/b]http://www.vanguardngr.com/content/view/29422/45/

How police, soldiers burnt Abala community witness (1)

It was more like a commando operation, a repeat of the Odi massacre when soldiers stormed and set the place on fire. But this time around, it happened in Abala autonomous community, Obingwa Local Government Area of Abia State. However, police and the community are trading words over who takes responsibility for this crime against humanity. Whereas the community is blaming the police and soldiers, the police, on the other hand, insist they had nothing to do with carnage. In this interview with Correspondent, Ben Duru, an eyewitness who doesn't want his picture printed, Nnenna Udo, traced the root of the crisis to the time the police and soldiers stormed the community. Excerpts:



Could you tell us what happened in your community recently?


[b]Last Wednesday about 4 O'clock in the evening, we were in the village, Abala autonomous community, Obingwa Local Government Area of Abia State, I travelled home. Actually, I travelled home on Tuesday evening and in the morning I saw the villagers running to every direction in confusion. I asked them what was happening, but no one stopped to answer me, they kept running in different direction. I now discovered that policemen and soldiers were gathered everywhere, burning houses. So, everyone in the village fled to different directions.



What actually did you see?


I saw the policemen and soldiers setting houses on fire. Before that day the policemen and soldiers were trailing a gang of armed robbers, passing through the area to a nearby community. If you know Abala community very well, it is like a roundabout with one road leading to Akwa Ibom State and the other leading to Ukwa Local Government, that is, Azumiri, Akirika and the one leading to Abala. So, they were trailing these armed robbers. Before the police came we saw many vehicles passing through the village and within a short time we also saw police vehicle following the vehicles used by the armed robbery suspects. About four in the evening we started hearing gunshots everywhere and people started running in confusion. People thought there was an invasion of the village nearby, because it was so serious that even where we were staying people were already fleeing. The following day police and soldiers came and started burning houses. [/b]
About how many houses were burnt on that day?


[b]The houses the police and soldiers burnt were more than 50, especially in my own area. In my compound, we had three buildings burnt; my father owns two and my uncle one. These buildings, including the kitchen the police and soldiers burnt all. The thing is too much to understand. You see people who stored oil in drums in their houses; everything went up in flames. The house of an Assistant Commissioner of Police from the area was also burnt; another storey building belonging to a popular businessman based in Aba was completely razed to the ground. This man deals in building materials and had some of his materials in the house; everything was totally burnt. Houses that belong to important men in the village were also completely burnt, and the worse thing was that most of these people were not around when this thing happened. Nobody knew what the police and soldiers were going to do, we suddenly saw them and immediately they entered the village they started to setting the buildings ablaze. Properties worth billions of naira were lost because majority of the people, especially the important people in our community were not around when the burning started. [/b]
Did anybody in the village get to know why the police and soldiers embarked on this action?


[b]We don't know, and the police and soldiers did not tell us anything. In fact, immediately they entered the village they started shooting in different directions to scare everybody away. As the people were running for dear life, the police and soldiers began to set the buildings on fire, nobody had the courage to stop and ask why they were doing what they were doing, because we believed that with the way they entered the village anybody who tried to question them would be killed instantly. They destroyed everything, from household property to cash crops, goats, fowls everything around especially those belonging to those who rear their goats and chickens inside their compounds. But all we know is that the police were trailing criminals the previous day, but both the criminals and the police did not stop in our village. If you want to see the police, I can lead you there, so you can understand what I am talking about. Where the police and the armed robbery suspects engaged in shooting is very far from our village. We knew there was a shoot-out because we saw the vehicles of the armed robbery suspects when they were passing, but we did not then except when we immediately saw the police vehicles also trailing them, with up to five patrol vans and it was after sometime that we started hearing gunshots and the whole village began to flee in confusion. The following day we heard that police vehicles were burnt and the criminals made away with some money.



To be continued tomorrow


http://nigeriaworld.com/cgi-bin/axs/ax.pl?http://odili.net/news/source/2009/feb/23/702.html
[/b] 

How can we still enjoy romance and sex in the Niger Delta when we are no longer at ease?

The worst victims of the Niger Delta crisis are not the men, but the girls and women, because since Whitey no safe for PH again, Ogbongidi don dey starve oh!
The expatriates have fled in fear of kidnappings.

To worsen the situation, many girls and women have be attacked, robbed and raped by both the militants and military officers on rampage in the Niger Delta.

Many of the babes are flinging their arms and legs apart without caution in their desperation to survive and balance their accounts. I saw some young Nigerian babes at the Novotel and Protea Hotels and they must still be in their teens. Young, pretty and sexy (YPS),

The randy oil workers are having their pick of babes and they are not even afraid of HIV/AIDS.
[b]The babes are becoming commercial sex workers and even a JSS Two school boy was caught in the arms of Ogbongidi babes in Monkey village.[/b]One of them saw me one rainy day and took shelter under my umbrella. As we were walking along, she confessed to me that she was from Warri where she lived a normal life and had a three bedroom flat, but came to look for Whitey at the Nigeria LNG on Bonny Island.
Every Friday, there is Happy Hour at the West Bar when the Ogbongidi come as guests of the randy white expatriates and some Nigerian workers.
Many campus girls have also joined them to sow their wild oats and some have sworn that they must marry Nigeria LNG workers by hook or by crook. And the housegirls are not left out.
In fact, one housegirl we saw as one of the dirtiest got pregnant for one Nigeria LNG worker.
Many of the workers here go after anything with boobs and buttocks.
https://www.nairaland.com/nigeria/topic-152339.0.html#msg2524383

*comfort:

Kidnappers abduct Dep CBN Gov’s mother in Imo
Written by Tony Edike
Monday, 23 February 2009


ENUGU—THE aged mother of the Deputy Governor of Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Mr. Ernest Ebi was kidnapped Saturday night by unknown persons from heraged mother of the Deputy Governor of Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Mr. Ernest Ebiof Imo State.
Madam Ebi said to be over 70 years, was kidnapped by a six-man gang, who stormed her home at about 7 pm Saturday in two unmarked private cars, a Toyota Cressida and a Mazda.

Sources close to the family said the woman was being driven into her compound when the assailants who were trailing the vehicle from a distance forced their way into the premises and forced her into their vehicle, leaving her driver behind.

According to a source, although the kidnappers were armed with sophisticated weapons, they did not release any shot as they met no resistance.

“They dragged the woman into one of their cars and drove away unchallenged. Before taking her away, they made sure that she was with her GSM handset apparently to ensure easy communication with members of her family,” the source said.

It was learnt that when some members of her family and sympathisers called the phone few minutes later, the kidnappers answered and requested that the call be repeated later as they were too busy to take the call at the time.

The source said that when the kidnappers were reached on the same line yesterday, they demanded a huge sum of money as ransom, but the amount could not be immediately confirmed, even though it was learnt that the family was willing to negotiate the release of the woman without much delay.

“We are really worried by this ugly development because one can’t understand why these hoodlums should continue to terrorize innocent people in this area without any intervention by the law enforcement agencies. The woman is aged and you can imagine the trauma she would pass through as a result of this evil act. We just hope that they will not harm her,” the source added.[/b]http://www.vanguardngr.com/content/view/29422/45/

[b]Niger Delta Region

Whilst I have never given voice to the happenings in the Niger Delta region in Nigeria, the most recent developments would give anyone a great deal of concern.

It has transpired that a group of lawless brigands with no semblance of humanity or a conscience have grabbed a 3-year old mixed race girl from the comfort of being driven to school in Port Harcourt and threatened to kill her. This is pure evil.
I cannot understand what these people are trying to achieve, it is a given that British citizens have been advised to leave the Delta area because of seriously deteriorating security situation which has had the federal government without clue, initiative or inspiration, they have been caught flat-footed every time as Niger Delta criminals pretending to be activists have created a state within a state fomenting unrest.

These events are hardly local, they raise hackles internationally as global oil markets wobble and Nigeria makes the news again for all reasons but commendable ones.

Mike Hill, her father, is essentially a local who is both an oil worker and he runs a bar frequented by expatriates in Port Harcourt, her mother Oluchi is literally inconsolable, the kidnappers have asked the father to take her place.

Big man wades in

As usual, we are told that resources are being mobilised to search for the girl and rescue her from her captors, but is shows an utter embarrassment of duties and responsibilities if the Inspector General of Police has to fly out to Port Harcourt to coordinate the search.

Now, rescuing this child of utmost importance and the best resources we can get which should be devolved around the country must be applied to this task.

If I am now hearing that there is no District Superintendent, State Police Commissioner, Regional Commissioner or Assistant Inspector General of Police (IG) to coordinate this but the big cheese himself, we do have a sorry state of law enforcement in Nigeria - though an opportunity for the IG to ingratiate himself with foreigners and have the media spotlight.

Beyond this, one is worried about the fact that the girl might be taken into some nightmarish enclave in an unfamiliar setting whilst these rotten criminals exact their demands for a ransom or some other ameliorating deal - it is important that they do not bungle this rescue operation.

Get the girl then finish the men

The most important task is to get the girl back to her family safe and sound, after that, those men should be hunted down and exterminated like vermin - there is no cause in this world that can warrant the kidnapping on a child to gain some bargaining advantage.

These men do not deserve to walk the face of this earth one extra second, it is utterly contemptible and evil that anyone and even a Nigerian can think up such a scheme.

Maybe, it is necessary to have the Oga police in there coordinating things, but the job would only have been done with the speedy rescue of the girl and the apprehending of all the culprits to see justice and have the full wrath of the law visited upon them.

For now, despite all the real and palpable suffering in the Niger Delta regions, their cause is completely lost if any group of criminals can do this in their name, they must repudiate this activity and turn up these criminals with the utmost alacrity.

:ohttp://akin.blog-city.com/childinnigerdelta.htm

this old lady is back.



Re: Re-visiting The Clifford Orji Story , A Decade Later.
« #192 on: March 14, 2009, 02:24 AM »

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
SEVERAL more human corpses and body parts were recovered from the horror shrines in Okija, Anambra State weekend by the special police homicide squad, which said that the shrines were part of an elaborate fraud racket.

A police assault team on mop-up operation, raided a total of 11 shrines in the Okija area in Ihiala local government last Friday, and recovered corpses, body parts and artefacts. Police chief, Mr. Felix Ogbaudu however, declined to disclose the actual number of bodies recovered in the follow-up raids.

Friday’s raids were under taken by men of the Special Anti-Robbery Squads (SARS) of the Anambra State police command, reinforced by crack detectives pesonally dispatched to the crime scene by police Inspector General, Mr. Tafa Balogun. The detectives are to take over police investigation into the shrines in which 50 fresh corpses and 20 human skulls were recovered on Wednesday.

Also recovered in Friday’s raids were a live monkey, two vehicles, Volvo Salon car and a lorry – while two brothers, Okonjo and Bartholomew Ndukwu, earlier identified as robbery suspects, narrowly escaped arrest.

According to state Police Commissioner, Mr. Felix Ogbaudu, the suspects so far arrested are fraudsters.

Apparently, police are working on the theory that the shrines are at the centre of an elaborate fraud and protection racket.

He told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN); "They (suspects) are petty fraudsters who put fear into peoples’ minds".

Mr. Ogbaudu called for calm urging the people not to entertain any fear of super-natural reprisal insisting that those who fled should return to their homes.

He reported that feedback from residents of the area indicated general relief at the exposure of the shrines which were identified with bondage.

Police are also on the trail of the Ndukwu brothers and several other suspects linked to the shrines, believed to number 14 in the Okija area.Human Rights body, Civil Liberties Organisation (CLO) had earlier alleged that the shrines were used for fraud and sponsored by political figures.

"From reports received so far, some of the villagers in Okija are happy with the operations, because it has relieved them from an age-long bondage" said Mr. Ogbaudu.

A victim of one of the shrines, Chief Christopher Ekwenibe has commended the command for doing a good job.

Ekwenibe, who visited Ogbaudu at the command’s headquarters Awka, said he was summoned to appear before one of the shrines about four years ago.

"I refused to honour the invitation, because I did not believe in it. I am happy this has ended, because activities of the shrine had become ridiculous to our people," he said.

A former chairman of Nnewi-South local government council in Anambra State, Mr. Romanus Okoli also enthused over the raids.

Okoli said the police should be commended for making the discovery, because activities at the forest (shrines) had been thriving for a long time and threatening the people.

"That forest needs to be delivered, because the people have been in bondage and coerced to go and worship the deities, Okoli, a pastor added.

Meanwhile, the Delta State police command said it arrested a 38-year-old man, Chukwuemeka Okonkwo, for a alleged human trafficking and forced labour.

The state commissioner of police, Mr. Charles Akaya, said in a statement that Okonkwo and his accomplice, Christopher Okwuesoeze, was the driver of a Mercedes Benz mini bus with registration number XC 654 UWN, which conveyed the children.

According to the statement, Okonkwo also claimed that the children were on holiday.

The police in on Wednesday uncovered 20 human skulls and 50 decomposing corpses, in two shrines in Okija.

Mr. Felix Ogbaudu, Anambra State Commissioner of Police acting on a tip off, had dispatched some 80 members of the special anti-robbery squad headed by Mr. Gabriel Haruna, to the shrine located in Ogwugwu Okija in Ihiala council area of the state. The development culminated in the discovery of the human skulls and corpses, allegedly sacrificed to appease the numerous deities in Okija as claimed by the son of the chief priest, Mr. Osita Ndukwu of Umuhu Okija.
By weekend, there were indications that many more suspects involved in the dastardly act would be apprehended.

But Mr. Chukwumezie Obed Igwe, who reported the fetish activities by the shrine operatives the discovery is a plus for the people of the area and advent believed liberty for his people; who had been subjected to the devilish pastime over the years.

"I am happy because I have been able to expose this barbaric practice and set our people and children unborn free," he declared triumphantly.
Source: Daily Champion.

M. News (Lagos)
ANOL
February 5, 1999
Posted to the web February 5, 1999

By Gabriel Orok, Nkiru Nwokediuko, John Odiboh
Lagos

Crowds still gathered this morning at Toyota bus stop, Oshodi Isolo expressway, the former kitchen of the Lagos cannibal, Clifford Orji. The cannibal was arrested Wednesday by the police after the cries of Awawu, a gaunt and shackled woman from Agege gave him away.

Clifford and his accomplice, Tahiru have been singing to the police in Lagos on why they had been killing fellow human beings for dinner. People always suspected that Clifford Orji was queerly different.

He used to sell razor blades at the bustling Oshodi market several years ago. Then he shifted his abode to a self-created grotto under the highway bridge in Isolo, where he advertised himself as a "native doctor Chinneyelu".

Occasionally, he violently pursued stray-walkers to his "sanctuary" during day time. In the dead of the night he usually blanketed the air around him with the meat-like odour from his special barbecue.

People merely suspected that this barbecue- loving recluse was not normal; that he was possibly mad. But no one was prepared for the horrendous discovery of last Wednesday: that Orji was also a cannibal - a man eater! The discovery sent shock waves throughout the sprawling metropolis of seven million people, drawing hundreds of people to the under-the-bridge abode of Orji, where he also kept a well-kitted kitchen to prepare cooked and roasted human flesh! How long the afro-haired man from Enugu State has been feeding on human flesh in Lagos is unknown.

How many people he has slaughtered for dinner is also unknown, as Orji has not revealed much during police interrogations and even the parade before klieglights and journalists in Lagos Thursday. A shrill cry of a famished and emaciated lady, waiting to be slaughtered, was what gave up Orji Wednesday.

The noise attracted passersby who not only discovered the woman but also stumbled on a phalanx of human parts in Orji's make-shift home. Human bones, skulls, legs, hands, freshly cooked soup with human meat, were discovered.

The uproar triggered by this shock discovery was said to have attracted men of the Operation Sweep. Surrounded, Orji attempted to escape.

But the police quickly arrested him and took him to the Makinde Police Station in Oshodi, nearby. The lady being dressed for slaughtering, and who Orji had turned into a sex-slave for several days, was freed and taken to the hospital in Ikeja.

The arrest of another person, said to be Orji's accomplice in the human-flesh eating business introduced a new dimension to the tragedy. Police have since found that Orji and his friend were not just human eaters, they were also human spare-parts sellers, as money, cheques were said to have been recovered at the make-shift home at the popular Toyota Bus Stop on the Oshodi-Isolo Expressway.

Were Orji and his accomplice mad? Some people interviewed at the scene of the tragedy believed they are sane. Some did not.

"What evidence do you have to claim that he's mad," said Chuks Igbokwe who spoke with the National Concord. "As far as I am concerned, he might be one of these Otokoto ritual murderers who trade in human parts. If he is mad, why should he kill and eat his victims?" People who frequently passed by Orji's make-shift home of horror recounted incidents when they were chased by the iron-rod wielding Orji; incidents when his potential victims escaped by the whiskers; incidents when the smell of his human barbecue pervaded the environment.

"Any time wey I pass here, I go see the man eating meat . . . I no know say na person im de chop," Okechukwu, a motor spare parts dealer told The Guardian Wednesday.

The controversy about Orji's mental state will linger for some time. Up till this morning, Lagosians continued to troop to Orji's former home as news of Orji's cannibalism spread.

On Thursday, Orji and his accomplice were paraded to newsmen by the Lagos State Police Commissioner, Sunday Aghedo. The journalists who crowded the premises of the Special Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS of the Lagos State Police Command, Ikeja, covered their noses with handkerchief while interviewing Orji who claimed to be a native of Enugu State.

Besides Orji was a middle-aged man, unidentified by the police, and who was bleeding on his nose and mouth. Mr. Sunday Aghedo, the state commissioner of police, described the two men as human eaters.

On display beside them were roasted parts of human beings - heads, leg, hand and the abdomen. One severed head wore a permed hair of a lady identified as "Eno", a trader from Akwa Ibom.

Aghedo continued: "These are the men who were arrested yesterday by members of the Operation Sweep. They were arrested with human parts in their enclave at the local airport area and taken to Makinde Police Station. They are now answering questions on homicide at the State Crime Intelligence Department (SCID)". When it was his turn to speak, Orji confessed to the media men: "We are human meat eaters. We have killed over three people, especially young girls who hawk wares. We always lured them to our enclave under the pretext that we wanted to purchase their wares. Once they are in our net, we pounced on them and killed them for eatable meat. My colleagues is the human hunter while I am the butcher. We usually go for girls with permed hair."

"Why, have you taken to human eating; is it because you cannot afford animal meat?, "a journalist asked Orji. Orji replied: "We have been eating human meat for the past seven years before coming to Lagos. It is our culture to eat human meat".

"If you are a free man today will you still be eating human meat?" Orji was asked again.

"Yes, to me there is no difference between human and goat meat," Orji replied. The lack of remorse by the cannibals is making the police doubt the mental state of the men.

"They may be victims of psychic and spiritual problems. Before prosecution, we have to send them to psychiatric home for medical examination. Who knows, they maybe mentally sick".

M[b][/b]r. Aghedo said. Cannibalism is a taboo in Lagos, but in some parts of Nigeria, especially, in the south east states of Cross River and Calabar, human meat eating is not strange.

There were reports of food vendors selling human meat as animal meat to unsuspecting hungry travellers.

Inside the Cannibal's Kitchen

1. Rusty frying pans

2. Bucket

3. Bowl containing human bones

4. Grill on another metal bowl

5. Firewood

6. Human parts: roasted limbs, palms, wrists, ankles, feet, thigh, skulls.

7. Rice, yam, gari, pepper, and oil

8. Soup pot with human meat.

9. A gaunt lady waiting to be slaughtered

10. Cutlasses, knives.

11. Cellular phone

12. Money estimated to be N500,000

. Some Igbo women need to stop being glorified prostitutes.Those of us who have northern Nigerian links (Emeka is also a Nigerlite) know what goes on between some Igbo women and oga Alhaji or rich Nigerian men. Some Igbo women are so cheap these days that my former illiterate northern driver once told me that he could sleep with any Igbo woman for ten naira (1 cent). .http://nigeriaworld.com/articles/2007/jul/021.html

The Bakassi Boys are a group of youth known for their anti-crime vigilantism, and are usually armed with machetes, guns, and charms. They operate in the Igbo area of Nigeria, and are sometimes accused of illegal activities and human rights abuses, yet enjoy popular support in the areas where they operate.


By Dan Isaacs
BBC correspondent in Onitsha, south-eastern Nigeria 



Human rights campaigners have called on the Nigerian Government to disband state-sponsored vigilantes operating in eastern Nigeria.

In a report published on Monday, the US-based Human Rights Watch says that the vigilantes, known as the Bakassi Boys, have carried out scores of extra-judicial killings as well as hundreds of cases of torture and arbitrary detention.



It is good because they catch the criminals, then kill them and burn them

Local trader 
The report also warns that these groups are being used as a tool for politically-motivated violence in the run up to national elections.

Although the Bakassi Boys operate in three states across south-eastern Nigeria, it is their activities in Anambra State that has caused most concern.

There, they have been adopted by the state government as a crime fighting force - funded and officially sanctioned under a law passed by the state parliament two years ago.

They work independently from the police force in the state, and do not as a rule hand suspects over to them, a fact confirmed by the Abdul Bello, the Anambra state police commissioner.

"To the extent that they do not submit themselves to the control of Nigerian police force, they are not working with us," said Mr Bello.

And as for what they do with those they apprehend, Mr Bello said: "You had better ask them, because I don't know what they do. And that is where we part ways."

But there is no doubt that the activities of the Bakassi Boys, despite their methods, are popular among many of the traders in the sprawling town of Onitsha, home to one of the largest markets in West Africa, with an appalling reputation for armed crime.

 

In a world where the police had effectively abandoned law enforcement, the arrival of the vigilantes was very welcome.

"All that the police do is take bribes," one market woman tells me.

"When you tell them a crime has happened, they just run away."

These traders are people living day to day with theft and violent crime.

"Before the Bakassi Boys came, there were many problems with thieves and armed robbers. Now it is much better," says one shopkeeper.

But few have any doubts about the vigilante's tactics, and another man tells me: "It is good because they catch the criminals, then kill them and burn them".

Climate of fear

At the entrance to the headquarters of Bakassi Boys in Onitsha, two cars bear the vigilante logo on their bonnets: a skull and cross bones crudely painted in red.

By the door a young man in dark glasses sits on a bench studying his reflection in a highly polished machete.


The Bakassi Boys have a fearful reputation


Gun cartridge cases litter the ground.

Up a narrow staircase and into a darkened office, the local Bakassi commander, simply known as Okpompi tells me how his men work closely with the local police, how they hand over all criminals they catch, and how they possess no weapons.

Once these formalities have been dealt with, we discuss the guns I can see hidden behind the sofa, the man I saw tied up and being beaten when I had arrived unannounced the previous day and, most revealingly, the methods they use to extract confessions from the suspects they catch.



'Supernatural powers'

The Bakassi Boys have a reputation for possessing powerful magic powers.

The objects I see around the room all bear witness to the use of fetishes and juju in their daily work.


Bakassi Boys say they work within the law


There are also crucifixes on the walls.

"Our powers come from God", Okpompi tells me.

"We are all Christians working with the power of the Almighty."

Hanging from the door is a carving of a shrunken human head, on the desk are a range of small wooden coffins containing devices to determine the guilt or innocence of suspects - but they are sacred and must not be opened in my presence.

"We don't kill anybody. If anybody tells you the Bakassi Boys kills anybody, it's not true," says Okpompi, "but we do make people confess to their crimes."

The most infamous of their techniques involves a machete, imbued with powerful magic charms.

It is held against the bare chest of a suspect.

If it turns red, the person is guilty.

But only the Bakassi Boys can see the change of colour, and it is for them alone to decide guilt or innocence.

Claims of torture

Their claims that those found guilty are then handed over to the police are not only denied by the police themselves, but also challenged by those who have witnessed the Bakassi Boys activities first hand.



People are afraid to talk, they fear for reprisals

Chief Chike Udenze, businessman 
Human Rights Watch researchers have documented testimonies to scores of killings as well as hundreds of accounts of torture and detention.

"They usually use their knives to kill people", businessman, Chief Chike Udenze tells me.

"They then use tyres over their necks, fill them with fuel and shoot into the tyres to set them alight. That is their usual method".

Chief Udenze is not a neutral observer to the activities of the vigilantes.

He is a prominent local politician who accuses the ruling establishment in Anambra state of using the Bakassi Boys to silence opponents such as himself.

"People are afraid to talk, they fear for reprisals," he says.

"But the use of the Bakassi Boys against political opponents could seriously jeopardise the conduct of the upcoming elections."

Crackdown on crime

Not surprisingly this is a view strongly rejected by the government of Anambra state, particularly as the Bakassi Boys are authorised and financed by them.


The authorities turn a blind eye to the Bakassi Boys' excesses


The staunchest supporter of their activities is the governor himself, Chinwoke Mbadinuju who tells me that crime in the state had reached such an appalling level that something had to be done.

"These vigilante boys are there to ensure that the armed robbers that menaced us for all these years were stopped. This had been achieved".

As for the reports of extra-judicial punishments carried out by the Bakassi Boys, the governors answer is measured.

"Definitely it's an exaggeration. There are occupational hazards but these things are an exception to the rule."
[b][/b]

https://www.nairaland.com/nigeria/topic-232075.0.html

I. THE BRIDE-PRICE LAW

The Bride-price Law of Eastern Nigeria 1956 also set the Marriageable Age at 16 years of age. It also fixed the amount of money to be paid as bride-price.   The people did not like this Law and ignored it because they like to bargain for the bride-price as if for a commodity or chattel.



II. PROHIBITION OF CHILDHOOD MARRIAGE LAW



Prohibition of Childhood Marriage Law prohibits Childhood Marriage in Nigeria. Because this Law is totally ignored by both the parents and the men who want to betroth young girls, Childhood Marriage is still condoned, not only in Igbo land but in the whole of Nigeria, in this day and age. But to make a very bad case worse, Nigerian Family Law regards any girl who is said to be “married”, no matter her age, as an adult. This is regardless of the fact that the age for adult suffrage or the right to vote in Nigeria is 18 years. See 136. The Legal Status of Women In Nigeria by Bisi Olateru-Olagbegi and Biola Akiyode-Afolabi (Bisi Olateru-Olagbegi, WILDAF Nigeria National Co-ordinator, & Biola

Akiyode Afolabi, Executive Director WARDC.



Most of the young girls betrothed this way become pregnant at the very onset of their puberty, and are left to carry the pregnancies. Above all, they are left to bear the babies without proper medical attention and without Caesarean Section.

On account of child marriage, many of such girls and their babies die from fistulas and other complications. This is a measure of the callousness with which the men who are said to have married them and the society treat these young girls. That the Igbo allow the practice of Childhood Marriage to go on when the girls are not physically and biologically developed for procreation is a crime committed against Igbo women and against humanity. Here The Aka Ikenga Ndi Igbo and the Oha Na Eze Ndi Igbo should show their relevance in Igbo land, Igbo culture and Igbo civilization by seeing to it that these Laws are obeyed.





III. LAW PROHIBITING OSU AND ORU CASTE SYSTEM AND THEIR STIGMA

The Osu and Oru caste system is found mostly in the Southeastern and South-central Nigeria called Igboland or Igbo society. This affects women very much in that it is a descent-based discrimination which seriously affects the choice of partners for marriage. It is similar to that faced by the Dalit of India, Nepal and Sri Lanka, the Burakumin of Japan, minorities in the US, Apartheid in South Africa (before 1994) and the color-caste system in Guyana. There are many versions of oral history (and little information) on the origins of the Osu and Oru caste system in Igboland. The paucity of information in this area is, in part, due to the fact that some people erroneously believe that one cannot change the attitude of the society toward the Osu and Oru system, and on another part, because the issue is not politically palatable. In other words, nobody wants to be associated with it for fear of being ostracized by their community (Isaiah Ilo 1992; Obi 1994; Dike 2003).



The Osu is a person sacrificed or dedicated to the gods in the Igbo community to appease the gods. Thus, an Osu and Oru is a sacrificial lamb (except that they are not slaughtered; they are kept for service to the deity). (Anoka 1991; Dike 1999, August 8-12, 2002, & 2002), a child, slave or property of a god or a deity (Obi 1994). However, in Chinua Achebe’s popular Things Fall Apart, the plights of an Osu and Oru (an outcast) in Igboland are vividly and pitifully portrayed. He notes that an Osu and Oru is: a person dedicated to a god, a thing set apart - a taboo forever, and his children after him. He could neither marry nor be married by the freeborn. He was in fact an outcast, living in a special area of the village, close to the Great Shrine(1959, p.156).



The Osu and Oru Caste System affects the man as well as the woman equally in the society. This is the major reason why Ndi Igbo make extensive inquiries about the young man or young woman and their families, initially, before ever any negotiations for marriage is undertaken. If any links to the Osu and Oru Caste is found, even remotely, the idea of marriage is called off completely. But if the man and woman concerned would decide to go ahead with it, they would be doing so completely at their own risk. The risks in such cases is ostracism by the non-Osu and non-Oru families and kindred. Even though a free-born, he and she and their descendants, would become Osu and Oru wholly and entirely by that marriage. Some of such people either do not marry, or they marry people of the same caste.

Some young men are known to have committed suicide on account of the stigma, which status can be acquired by Birth, Marriage and Inheritance. The act of discrimination violates people’s human rights by dehumanizing them through the practices of discrimination and segregation. Certain parts of Igbo land, such as those of the Mid-West, do not have the Osu and Oru caste system. 



The Law passed in 1956 by the Eastern Nigeria Government has been neglected and disregarded. The Law Enforcement Agencies operators are themselves afraid of becoming tinted with the caste system and therefore, steer clear of it. It becomes a question of: Who will bell the cat? This means that the people affected and the society in general are not being protected by the rule of law. The challenge of finding ways and means for eradicating the Osu and Oru caste system and their stigma is another one that is starring the Aka Ikenga Ndi Igbo and the Oha Na Eze Ndi Igbo starkly in the face.





IV. LAW PROHIBITING FEMALE GENITAL CIRCUMCISION



This Law which was passed by the Federal Government in 2002 prohibits Female Genital Circumcision. There is no earthly reason why the girl-child should be circumcised in Igbo land or anywhere. The practice is carried on only for the reason of the self-aggrandizement of men; for the sadistic reasons of curbing the sexual appetites of women; and from keeping them from imagined promiscuousness. I wonder how the excessive sexual appetites of men, Igbo men inclusive, and their promiscuousness are curbed? Do women become promiscuous or prostitute by themselves or with themselves? Is it not obvious, as Ndi Igbo say, that wherever a Masquerade is talking that there is a human being (a man) there?

 
This only goes to say that wherever there is a promiscuous or prostitute woman, that there are men there also! Igbo men should, therefore, stop piling all their faults on the girl-child and women and oppressing them for those reasons. Female Genital Circumcision or Female Genital Cutting or Mutilation, as it is described sometimes, comes in about four different forms. To say the least, female circumcision in whichever form is wicked; sadistic; unsympathetic; non-empathetic; non-compassionate;  oppressive, suppressive and a crime against womanhood and humanity, which should be stopped with immediate effect. This should be done, if for no other reasons, for the fact that it is deadly in the child-bearing life of such women; and also in obedience to the Federal Law prohibiting and abrogating the practice in Nigeria. Period!   



V. PUNITIVE WIDOWHOOD PRACTICES



This is another wide-spread practice in Igbo land, which should be stopped with immediate alacrity, to borrow a leaf from Zebrudaya, Okoroigwe Nwogbo, alias 4:30. Why should a woman be made to suffer so much and some die as a result of such punishments, because she lost her husband by death? This is a time when she deserves much sympathy and empathy and co-operation. But men are not made to suffer like that when their wives die. Why should it be assumed that the woman killed her husband, while the same assumption is not extended to men when their wives die? Why should it be assumed that a woman would want to kill the man she married, and with whom she has children and is building a family and home, and the same suspicion is never extended to men when their wives die?



Some of such acts of punishments and atrocities committed on widows include:

making the woman drink some of the water used in bathing the body of her dead husband;

sit on the bare floor or, at best, on a straw-mat or mattress;

sit in a position where she would be looking at the body of her husband laid in state, overnight, until it is taken away for burial;

not to sleep on a bed throughout the mourning period of six months to one year;

shave off her hair, wear rags, eat, drink and bathe in secrecy;

eat and drink and bather only from old and broken vessels;

not to eat from food items provided for her husband’s funeral ceremonies;   

to accept a substitute husband, if still of child-bearing age, and not to become pregnant otherwise, during the period of mourning;

not to look out to see what is going on for the funeral ceremonies of her husband;

not to talk aloud or travel beyond a certain distance during the mourning period;

to know that her own monies and properties belong to her husband;

to hands-off all monies, moveable and immovable properties of hers and her husband’s;  The woman, if she unfortunately does not have a child, is sent away as soon as her husband breathes last. Some of such women are not even allowed to participate in the funeral of their husbands.   

If the woman has only girl-children and does not have a male child, she could be allowed to stay in the worst type of shelter, and at the pain of losing all the family possessions;

she would also be starving with her daughters; there is also the danger of

having her daughters married away very young, with or without her or their consent.

 
SILENCE BY MEN: A CONSPIRACY AND CONNIVANCE



These discriminatory practices are not applied to men at all. In fact men have it very easy. They have a field-day. Some men have actually confessed of spotting their subsequent wives from among the girls who came to sympathize with them on their bereavement of their wives. The men also have a choice as to what to do to mourn their wives, if any. They are even comforted for losing their wives and are pampered by the same Umuokpu ma obu Umuada who punish the widows. I know that the retort to this statement would be that it is the Umuokpu ma obu Umuada who perpetrate those atrocities on their fellow women. But that is not altogether true, because men are behind the Umuokpu ma obu Umuada who carry on the practices, even if by remote control. After all, the Umuokpu ma obu  Umuada are the kindred-sisters of the men – dead and living. Therefore, the kindred brothers use their kindred sisters as willing tools to carry out their nefarious acts of violence on their wives and widows.



Besides, the silence of men in these circumstances means connivance. After all, it is men who are being mourned. If the living men do not like what was happening to the wives of their dead relations and friends, they should have protested and spoken out, loud and clear. Ndi Igwe, Ndi Igwe-na-Ndi Ichie, and the Town Unions should abrogate these practices and call the Umuokpu ma obu Umuada to order at attention. These local and cultural legislative bodies should do this. They can do it. To say that they cannot is, again, a ruse, a deception and the passing of the buck! Ndi Igbo have a saying that: Nwam akalia-m bu aghugho, that is to say that: the expression that my child is beyond my control is a trick or a connivance! I am not looking forward only to the State Governments of Igbo land to enact the laws prohibiting Punitive Widowhood Practices, but I lay the onus for the practices on the men, and the responsibility to persuade Ndi Igbo to obey the existing laws and to have new and progressive ones enacted, on Aka Ikenga Ndi Igbo na Oha Na Eze Ndi Igbo to abrogate these and other such obnoxious practices in Igbo land, and really make it happen and work. Some States, like Enugu State, have already enacted the progressive law, and they are, hereby, congratulated. Let the other States of Igbo land follow suit and place themselves squarely on the path of the emancipation of women.             





VI. DISINHERITANCE OF WIVES AND DAUGHTERS IN IGBO CULTURE



The Disinheritance of the Girl-child And Women In Igbo Culture is, in effect, the disinheritance of Daughters and Wives, who are the very people that should be considered first. The case against the Omenana of disinheriting daughters and wives, more so widows in Igbo Culture, cannot be more succinctly put than by Justice Niki Tobi, in his lead judgment in the Anambra State Appellate Court, on 10th April 1997. This was when he showed a change of heart and leadership, by taking the bull by the horns. He came up with a pioneer and landmark decision, in the Mojekwu vs Mojekwu Case, in the Nnewi Oli-Ekpe Appeal Case, appealed from the lower Court. In the judgment, which was clearly in favor of the girl-child and women, he wrote:



“All human beings – male and female - are born freely, without any inhibition on grounds of sex; and that is constitutional.  Any form of societal discrimination on ground of sex, apart from being unconstitutional, is antithetic to a civil society built on the tenets of democracy, which we have freely chosen as a people. We need not travel all the way to Beijing to know that some of our customs, including the Nnewi “Oli-Ekpe” custom,  relied upon by the appellant,  are not consistent with our civilized world in which we all live today, including the appellant.  In my humble view, it is the monopoly of God to determine the sex of a baby and not the parents.  Although the scientific world disagrees with the divine truth, I believe that God, the Creator of human beings, is also the final authority of who should be male or female.  Accordingly, for a customary law to discriminate against a particular sex is to say the least an affront to the Almighty God Himself.  Let nobody do such a thing.  On my part, I have no difficulty in holding that “Oli-Ekpe” custom of Nnewi is repugnant to natural justice, equity and good conscience”.

The judgment has been acclaimed everywhere as a landmark decision. Some other such judgments followed. See Law And Practice Relating to Women’s Inheritance Rights In Nigeria: An Overview by Joy Ezeilo, University of Nigeria Nsukka, Enugu Campus.



APPLICATION OF THE REPUGNANCY TEST CLAUSE



The British colonials saw the oppressive ways of the Customary and Traditional Practices, and instituted the Repugnancy Test Clause, as part of the Nigerian Legal System in 1900. It provides for the overriding of any Customary and Traditional Law and Practice in the Courts if it is in conflict with natural justice and equity. Also Customary and Traditional Law should be overridden if they were in conflict with the written and official law, and the rights of women and children. Unfortunately, the Test Clause was left by the Law Courts and Law Enforcement Agencies to lie dormant for one whole century until Justice Niki Tobi’s landmark Decision in 1997, and just before it was re-introduced in the 1999 Constitution. The Repugnancy Test Clause, of course, applies only to cases appealed from the lower Courts to the higher Courts.



COURT DECISIONS: THE ONLY ANSWER



Women should learn to take the matters that concern them to the Courts, and refuse any kind of pressure to withdraw the matter from the Court for adjudication at home. This is because any kind of adjudication out of Court would be according to Omenana, by the Elders and the Umuokpu ma obu Umuada. Women should seek for bloodless and discrimination-free revolution in decisions in matters concerning them. The spirit of the new bloodless revolutionary initiatives for women emancipation always should be for women to take matters concerning them to the Courts of Justice everywhere in Igbo land and in Nigeria. Many more of such favourable decisions by Justice Niki Tobi have followed and, in all of the cases, the judges denounced such disinheritance practices as repugnant to natural justice, equity and good conscience.



[/b]

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forcing a woman who's husband is dead 2 marry d younger bro or get thrown out of d house irrespective of who contributed in building d house or buying d cars,mother n sister inlaw bullying,child abuse (children hawking on d streets for their parents at d expense of their education),then dis stupid occultic practice where some evil possessed men walk bout in d middle of d night making some incartation n barning women from seeing them (i've 4goten d name but its very common in ogun state,people from ijebu,ilisan,remo,shagam will know what i'm talkin bout).infact we nid 2 get rid of so many barbaric lifestyle dat is drawing us back instead of moving 4ward in nigeria,if people from d early 80's (my age group)say they should abolish it osupa (fuji musician),traditional rulers n some old folks will say we should not let civilization take away our culturemshewwwwww.destructive,barbaric n demonic culture is wot nigerians call heritage n culture

After reading this thread I gotta ask - how is it possible that Deep Zone/Hotfunmi is Aloy-emeka?!!!

Wth?

tangent: lynching petty criminals(jungle justice) should be abolished.

HELL NO TO THIS. THIS CRIMINAL DESERVE JUNGLR JUSTICE BECAUSE THIS SAME POLICE MEN WLD RELEASE WITH A BRIBE FROM THIER FRIENDS.

no need to repeat the thread.

It takes a man of culture...
http://deolaonline.com/it-takes-a-man-of-culture-to-reject-some-cultures/