A London woman who sent her teenage son to their native Nigeria because she disapproved of his lifestyle has been jailed for eight months.

Edirin Onogeta-Idogun, 17, from Newham, flew from the UK to Nigeria last July.

His parents Lydia Erhire and John Idogun were issued with a court order to return the boy, who is believed to be with his father in Lagos.

When they failed to do so, Mrs Erhire was convicted at the Old Bailey of being in contempt of court.

Edirin was born in Nigeria but moved to London with his mother seven years ago.

He had been studying for his GCSEs and had been due to transfer to a college in Hackney to study business and media.
'Significant risk'

Last year he feared he may be taken to Nigeria and forced to marry against his will, his solicitors said, and a Forced Marriage Protection Order was issued on 8 July.

He attended school for the final time on 12 July and it is thought he flew to the African country about four days later.

The High Court ruled Edirin was a resident of England and was entitled to continue to live there.

His removal from England was contrary to the protection order and he was at "significant risk" while in Nigeria, it decided.



me i don't know about forced marriage o. he should have been taken there when he was younger and brought back at the end of his teenage years, then at least the impressionable gang culture years would have been bypassed.

Wat is it, wt al dis teenagers of nowadays, exp d 1nce in uk, c d problem he has caused d parents.

D mum in question is a friend 2my cousin, i didn't no they av bin convicted, 80% of kids born/raised here ar 4 d govt.

Hahahahaha.I no wan laff.
So basically,the child reported and accused his own parents 
My people dey talk say "okro a naghi akari onye kuru ya"

7508:

A London woman who sent her teenage son to their native Nigeria because she disapproved of his lifestyle has been jailed for eight months.

Edirin Onogeta-Idogun, 17, from Newham, flew from the UK to Nigeria last July.

His parents Lydia Erhire and John Idogun were issued with a court order to return the boy, who is believed to be with his father in Lagos.

When they failed to do so, Mrs Erhire was convicted at the Old Bailey of being in contempt of court.

Edirin was born in Nigeria but moved to London with his mother seven years ago.

He had been studying for his GCSEs and had been due to transfer to a college in Hackney to study business and media.
'Significant risk'

Last year he feared he may be taken to Nigeria and forced to marry against his will, his solicitors said, and a Forced Marriage Protection Order was issued on 8 July.

He attended school for the final time on 12 July and it is thought he flew to the African country about four days later.

The High Court ruled Edirin was a resident of England and was entitled to continue to live there.

His removal from England was contrary to the protection order and he was at "significant risk" while in Nigeria, it decided.



me i don't know about forced marriage o. he should have been taken there when he was younger and brought back at the end of his teenage years, then at least the impressionable gang culture years would have been bypassed.

What an utterly silly and ignorant judgement.

There is nothing like forced marriages in that section of Nigeria.

Secondly, governments should have NO RIGHTS to dictate to parents the country of residence of a ward they are legally responsible for.

.

chaircover:

It is a very sad story sha and I hope the family can get over the blame/accusations/resentment and put all this behind them.

I think the child is already lost. He is passing porkies on to ensure he returns to UK, while the parents want to retain him in Nigeria to reform him.

In my opinion, it looks too late. They should have done it like 5 years earlier.

As much as I know it is dificult raising a child, I will go with my gut here. They were not monitoring their child and ensured he was given, and followed, a proper African upbringing. He ended up being a typical Black Brit, they are now firefighting. 

A lesson to everyone. Study your environment, take interest in the mentality being developed by your kid and if you want your child to have certain African qualities, then teach that to them at an early age.

As much as what the child did was wrong, I fully understand his gesture.
A) sending him back to Africa is not the solution to the problem.
B)3e they not the ones who brought him there at the first place?
C)there is something called THE LAW, and everyone should abide by it or face the consequences.
D) as a 17yr old, this "kid" had a right to his own opinion. . . . . that his bush parents liked it or not. may jail teach her a good lesson of life.

^^^ I believe if the law hold the parents responsible to care and raise him at the age of 17, then the law has no business dictating where he is raised. That should be the parent's complete discretion.

^^^ you are way of topic. Where to raise him was not the reason a court order was issued. The fear of being forced into a marriage is thje reason why this kid got a solicitor to begin with. When the parents broke the law by taking him to Africa AND not returning him when it was ask of them, that's when the law was broken.

^^^ That is why I said the law was silly and ignorant.

That part of Nigeria has no record or has ever had any record of forced marriages. They should have checked that. The boy obviously made it up, he even claimed to be gay to generate a motive for his parents acting that way.

Now instigating a ruling demanding and forcing a parent to produce the child in UK when they have taken him to Nigeria to get him far from his [I guess, most likely] Ghetto Gangster Grimey life, where he would not allow another kid from another postcode to enter his postcodial territory without being stabbed, is misguided in my opinion.

If the parents produced him because of the court order, no doubt the boy is not going back, he would refuse. They are basically extinguishing the parental rights.

To summarise, the parents might have been wrong with breaking the court order, but the court order was faulty in the first place because of immense ignorance of the judicial officers.

When he is 18 and they are not allowing him to travel, then that is kidnap and they can be charged. At the moment, he is their ward and there is no empirical evidence suggesting his claim of danger is realistic, he is just being cunning like most western-raised kids who are very aware of the western laws that they can manipulate and make themselves untouchable and uncontrolable. The first time, I saw the story, I went straight to check his name to see if he was a Northerner, when I saw his name, I muttered "Bullshit". That is not done in those regions in the South, not even to a female child.

isnt the boy a dual citizen if he was born in nigeria?

@sagamite
shouldnt we give the kid the benefit of the doubt?! or is he simply guilty just because he comes from a non muslim family? what if he IS whatever he say he is (whatever that may be)?

i have no doubts that the parents believed that they were helping the kid by taking him as far away as possible from his hood BUT they should have done that BEFORE he went to see the solicitor. as soon as the law was involved (and an order was put in place) then the parent HAD TO abide by the law. however you may look at it, the parents ARE/WERE wrong.

how can the order be WRONG? its the law. . . . . . if she believed that the law was WRONG then she should have gotten a solicitor and fight her claim in court but doing what she/they did is not solving the problem thus her stint in jail.

i completely understand your point but this is not 9ja where people do what they please and pay off whoever is in their way just because THEY believe they are right.

^^^ You are completely right that the parents where wrong all along. They broke the law. The boy played the system, he got a Forced Marriage Protection Order and they broke it.

I guess they are the ignorant type, my guess is backed up by the fact they are the type to believe in some mooronic exorcism for a badly behaved child , that is why they thought they could ignore the Protection Order. If they were not ignorant, they would have gone to court and challenged it by making it completely clear that forced marriages is not a practice of Southern Nigeria, it is unheard of, and the boy is playing the system.

My only pity for them is that my guts tell me that even if they had taken that approach they will still fail and be overruled because some mooooronic British Liberal-minded social worker/judge would say even though there is no threat of forced marriage, the boy does not want to go to Nigeria (or go to Nigeria to live, if the parents are willing to reveal their alternative plans), hence they should be prevented from taking him out of the country. This is even clear in the report where it said "The High Court ruled Edirin was a resident of England and was entitled to continue to live there". By the time that rides out, the boy will know the ploy and refuse to get on the plane. So maybe they had no choice.

I will not give the boy benefit of the doubt. As I said earlier, that part of Nigeria has no record or has ever had any record of forced marriages.

Africans/Nigerians on the other hand, have an extensive, long and verifiable record of taking wayward kids back to Africa to be influenced by a different and more disciplined culture. Evident by the boy already being registered in a school within the short period he is already in Nigeria. I bet he has no wife yet.

It is clear to me, there was no forced marriage, there was an attempt to instil discipline and values.

@ op
bullshit story  only in england! 

the mums family should go traditional for the boy jare!!!

by the time they use some good old afose,ofo, on him and everybody involved  , he wont even remember  what the uk looks like

too bad the mother has landed herself in prison 

More evidence about the boy:

"Indeed, the parents’ core concerns were that Edirin’s grades in school in the UK were failing because he had gotten entangled in drugs and gangs and was presenting the parents with serious control problems. He refused to go to school and on the occasions he attended, he would be very late, getting involved in all sorts of scrapes. The mother had to attend several meetings with the school authorities at Canon Palmer Catholic School, Ilford, Essex to discuss his behaviour and poor grades. He was constantly returning home after 3:00 or 4:00 in the morning and would refuse to say what he’d been up to, threatening harm if further challenged. He’d return home sometime with blood on his clothes, his lips cut or swollen, his eyes partly shut, bumps on his head, scars all over and so on. The mother would ask if he’d been attacked or being in a fight, he’d grunt a response and clam up. And while out, he’d switch off his phone just to ensure no one can reach him."

http://www.saharareporters.com/press-release/edirin-onojeta-idogun-case-judicial-terrorism-uk

I can spot bullshit a mile away. The boy was playing the system.

A judge with a brain, would have checked the history of the area/region and the background of the boy if the lawyers of the mother had argued this (which I hope they were intelligent enough to do) and overturn the whole Protection Order Rubbish.

The Judge that initially imposed the Order in the first place is a mooooron! This liberal foooools think this is some action movie where they are do-gooders and fighting the bad, misguided people.

^^what if he was bullied at school and the problem was that he was staying away from the goons who would often beat him up?

by the way, couldnt the failing grades and the staying away be about the refusal to abide by some pressurized marriage?

lets have an open mind here.

^^^ Come on. Lets have a logical mind.

I would think a bulllied child is far more likely going to be known by the school if he is constantly in a fight, and not identified as a child with bad behaviour because the bullying would have come up repeatedly after every fight.

I would think a bulllied child is far more likely not going to be part of the kids being into drinks and drugs and will shy away from most people.

I would think a bulllied child is far more likely not going to be the type to go out and socialise all night till 4am, more likely he would be a self-isolating person.

All the above from a simple analysis of the scrap of report I put up there far more suggests a child that is truant, ill-disciplined and getting out of hand, than a bullied child. It is more likely a bullied child will be anti-social than be one that is part of a crowd of misbehavers.

There are many black boys just like that (badly behaved and truant) in the UK and they have similar failing grades, so I can reasonable assume where the cause of the failing grade is from. Definitely not from a fictional forced marriage from a region and culture that does not practice it.

The parents should take all the blame.
They had too much money and ended up spoiling the brat.
Sent him abroad 7 years ago to solve a problem.
Sent him back to Naija to reverse the goof.
Tough luck to the entire family.

Sagamite:

^^^ Come on. Lets have a logical mind.

I would think a bulllied child is far more likely going to be known by the school if he is constantly in a fight, and not identified as a child with bad behaviour because the bullying would have come up repeatedly after every fight.

I would think a bulllied child is far more likely not going to be part of the kids being into drinks and drugs and will shy away from most people.

I would think a bulllied child is far more likely not going to be the type to go out and socialise all night till 4am, more likely he would be a self-isolating person.

All the above from a simple analysis of the scrap of report I put up there far more suggests a child that is truant, ill-disciplined and getting out of hand, than a bullied child. It is more likely a bullied child will be anti-social than be one that is part of a crowd of misbehavers.

There are many black boys just like that (badly behaved and truant) in the UK and they have similar failing grades, so I can reasonable assume where the cause of the failing grade is from. Definitely not from a fictional forced marriage from a region and culture that does not practice it.

Very well said.

ikamefa:

@ op
bullshit story  only in england! 

the mums family should go traditional for the boy jare!!!

by the time they use some good old [b]afose,ofo, [/b]on him and everybody involved  , he wont even remember  what the uk looks like

too bad the mother has landed herself in prison 

Add correct Abeokuta sun and pepper dried-kpankere too.
The boy understood the system.He had the guts to cook-up a story of forced marriage to cover his tracks and gain grounds. 

they should have sent him back to nigeria when he was younger.

how can a child be getting home at 3 am in the morning.


if you want to try something like that in nigeria [assuming you somehow escape your parent's wrath], the mere sight or fear of seeing oro, armed robbers, or juju adherents doing all kinds of ebo, will keep you home.

Typical British brainwashed boy.

There are too many of these kind of things happening in the UK now. We also found that it is mostly in families where they have only one child and the child starts getting indoctrinated in school. Counselors and child care workers are trained to deliberately instigate children in the name of investigations.

Children, especially the ones they think are different, get asked about their families and how their parents act towards them at home. They then start being told that they have rights to refuse instructions etc. You will be lucky the day you touch the child and if you dont, the child will turn to a spoilt brat. It's a choice between the devil and the deep blue sea; you are either going to send your child away to Nigeria early enough with the attendant worries about where he may be or you lose control over him.

I've seen it happen several times. I think the parents should appeal the decision and they will win with a proper solicitor. However, if that boy gets returned to the UK without his head being cleared properly by some Nigerian teaching, he will never be their lovely son again. It's difficult enough as it is now.

I wish the family all the best. To think that any boy will be advised to lie against his parents in such a manner is scary and tells you how monstrous the British system is.

JustGood:

Typical British brainwashed boy.

There are too many of these kind of things happening in the UK now. We also found that it is mostly in families where they have only one child and the child starts getting indoctrinated in school. Counselors and child care workers are trained to deliberately instigate children in the name of investigations.

Children, especially the ones they think are different, get asked about their families and how their parents act towards them at home. They then start being told that they have rights to refuse instructions etc. You will be lucky the day you touch the child and if you dont, the child will turn to a spoilt brat. It's a choice between the devil and the deep blue sea; you are either going to send your child away to Nigeria early enough with the attendant worries about where he may be or you lose control over him.

GBAM!!!

The oppressive liberal mofos with their approach that has turned the country of gentlemen to the country of lager louts.

No gaddam way am I raising a child in this country.

@Sagamite

I believe that this child is really gay. Why else would he have gone straight to an organisation that supports gay teens and overlooked the other ones such as Childline or the NSPCC? At age 14 a child in the UK has the legal right to divorce their parents and so at 17 all Edirin would have to do was to gain support from the numerous child help organisations in the UK and gotten any type of order to prevent his parents taking him against his will to Nigeria.

It doesn't make any sense.

Given that fact the 'forced marriage' belief by Edirin is probably genuine as are the claims of excorcisms and beatings.

The Law of the Land is not stupid. Don't you think that they are aware of the fact that thousands of Nigerians and other non UK citizens based in the UK relocate their kids to their home countries each year? My own parents did this and I am sure you probably know of some cases too. You need to ask yourself why this case in particular has attracted a jail sentence.

Edirin was probably being bullied at school for being gay too.

From what I gather, this has everything to do with Edirin being gay and the fact that Edirin himself approached the gay organisation to help and they are now the ones in court fighting for his human rights. Its that straight forward.

Gemma11:

@Sagamite

I believe that this child is really gay. Why else would he have gone straight to an organisation that supports gay teens and overlooked the other ones such as Childline or the NSPCC? At age 14 a child in the UK has the legal right to divorce their parents and so at 17 all Edirin would have to do was to gain support from the numerous child help organisations in the UK and gotten any type of order to prevent his parents taking him against his will to Nigeria.

It doesn't make any sense.

Given that fact the 'forced marriage' belief by Edirin is probably genuine as are the claims of excorcisms and beatings.

The Law of the Land is not silly. Don't you think that they are aware of the fact that thousands of Nigerians and other non UK citizens based in the UK relocate their kids to their home countries each year? My own parents did this and I am sure you probably know of some cases too. You need to ask yourself why this case in particular has attracted a jail sentence.

Edirin was probably being bullied at school for being gay too.

From what I gather, this has everything to do with Edirin being gay and the fact that Edirin himself approached the gay organisation to help and they are now the ones in court fighting for his human rights. Its that straight forward.

For one, I really don't believe the boy is gay. I think he is playing the system.

But that is irrelevant, I am happy to have a open mind about that possibility, Gay or not, the reason for the protection order was given was for forced marriage. That is something practically non-existent in Urhobo culture or Southern Nigeria amongst the illiterates, talkless of semi-literates.

He has been in Nigeria for months now and all that has happened is that he is registered in school, a very similar response to badly behaved western-raised Nigerian kids.

His claim to forced marriages sounds like bollocks and he is playing the system based on the information widely spread in schools. Common sense will tell me that although Forced Marriage Protection Orders are really aimed at the Asian community, the delivery of awareness information would be broad and not targeted only at this community to avoid any claim of discrimination. It appears this boy is aware of the law and played it to his advantage to avoid being taken back to a Third World where he can be smacked without police or some social worker locking parents up.

The fact he approached a organisation that supports gay teens speaks volumes.

I am Urhobo and I know the culture well. That being said I wouldn't put it past an Urhobo family to marry of their gay son asap in the hope to 'cure' him. Therefore the forced marrage claim by the boy is believable.

He has been in Nigeria for months but I read a press release that stated that Edirin has said he is being beaten and made to undergo exorcisms.  - I am concerned about these and feel that the boy should be brought so he can testify as to what is really going on.

You keep saying that he 'played' the system. Well if he was clever enough to 'play' the system then how comes he willingly got on the plane to Nigeria? A lot of things don't make sense but the fact remains he bypassed all other other child help organisations and went to gay one and said that he feared he would be sent to Nigeria and forced to marry possibly because he is gay.

Where is the link to the part he approached a gay organisation for help

Sagamite:

^^^ Come on. Lets have a logical mind.

I would think a bulllied child is far more likely going to be known by the school if he is constantly in a fight, and not identified as a child with bad behaviour because the bullying would have come up repeatedly after every fight.

I would think a bulllied child is far more likely not going to be part of the kids being into drinks and drugs and will shy away from most people.

I would think a bulllied child is far more likely not going to be the type to go out and socialise all night till 4am, more likely he would be a self-isolating person.

All the above from a simple analysis of the scrap of report I put up there far more suggests a child that is truant, ill-disciplined and getting out of hand, than a bullied child. It is more likely a bullied child will be anti-social than be one that is part of a crowd of misbehavers.

There are many black boys just like that (badly behaved and truant) in the UK and they have similar failing grades, so I can reasonable assume where the cause of the failing grade is from. Definitely not from a fictional forced marriage from a region and culture that does not practice it.

Gbam. And this presentation rules out the gay argument in one fell swoop, because if he was gay he would not be staying out late exposing himself to the undesirable bigotted elements out there.

Busy_body:


Where is the link to the part he approached a gay organisation for help

It is in the sahara reporter link I posted above.

Gemma11:

The fact he approached a organisation that supports gay teens speaks volumes.

I am Urhobo and I know the culture well. That being said I wouldn't put it past an Urhobo family to marry of their gay son asap in the hope to 'cure' him. Therefore the forced marrage claim by the boy is believable.

He has been in Nigeria for months but I read a press release that stated that Edirin has said he is being beaten and made to undergo exorcisms.  - I am concerned about these and feel that the boy should be brought so he can testify as to what is really going on.

You keep saying that he 'played' the system. Well if he was clever enough to 'play' the system then how comes he willingly got on the plane to Nigeria? A lot of things don't make sense but the fact remains he bypassed all other other child help organisations and went to gay one and said that he feared he would be sent to Nigeria and forced to marry possibly because he is gay.

It would be an impossible task to ask you for evidence of the bolded above, so I am going to be fair and ask you for your word only: Have you ever seen such Forced Marriage in Urhobo land?

In regards to approaching a gay organisation, any street-wise kid in London would be aware of the weight a gay argument will carry under the courts and might exploit it. His approaching one is not some solid evidence.

@ Post

When I read this, i knew rightaway that a 17 year old child that had to be sent home at that age was already a walking-dead whose Parents wanted to save his life, he just doesn't know it yet. And now we read further that  he is already coming home at 4am with bloodstained clothings meaning that although he has probably been getting involved in stabbing other children like him, recording the victim pleading for their lives on their phones, posting it on youtube, etc, and it is only a matter of time before he kills, that is if he hasn't already God help us

And it is the children that relocate from Africa at that age that turn out to be the worst because they have to overdo things and act tough and rough,  to impress the other kids who were born and bred here otherwise they get mocked and bullied for their bush African accents, etc.

The only reason the Mum was jailed was because the boy took out the Forced Marriage Protection Order, which the Mum violated by removing him from the "safe house" he was placed in, and carted him off to Africa. She was done for childnapping/kidnapping, not for sending the boy home, phew All is well that ends well

Sagamite:

It is in the sahara reporter link I posted above.

Thanks ma babydaddy You could have provided the link and infact copy it here for me your wifey na

Dude's not gay and he is not being forced into nada jare like you correctly deduced, he is just a smartypant who got lucky, and for all we know, the Mum might have been acting out under the instruction of her Hubby in Nigeria and has no say in this, yet she is the one in gaol Now he has to live with this stigma hanging on his head for the rest of his live  

And the way Police Stations are being shut, Police numbers are being slashed, Prisons are being shut, Dangerous Prisoners are being released early and throwing in the inflation gripping the Country, things are getting tighter now. It would not be preposterous to think that if someone steps on you now sef, you berra apologise before they pull a knife on you, chei

Busy_body:



Gbam. And this presentation rules out the gay argument in one fell swoop, because if he was gay he would not be staying out late exposing himself to the undesirable bigotted elements out there.

So you don't think it is a bit wierd that this guy bypassed orgs like Childline or the NSPCC which could have easily assisted him in filing for a another type of civic order to protect his rights and specifically chose an organisation that specialises in supporting the rights of gay teens instead? How do you explain that.

Further more the statement on Sahara reporters is just a press release and shouldn't be taken as the Gospel.

Sagamite:

It is in the sahara reporter link I posted above.

It would be an impossible task to ask you for evidence of the bolded above, so I am going to be fair and ask you for your word only: Have you ever seen such Forced Marriage in Urhobo land?

I have a cousin who was gay and the first solution the Elders in the village thought would cure the problem was marriage.

In regards to approaching a gay organisation, any street-wise kid in London would be aware of the weight a gay argument will carry under the courts and might exploit it. His approaching one is not some solid evidence.

But Edirin could have gone to another non -gay organisation and got a similar type of civic order to protect his rights and had nothing to do with marriage. That is my point.

Gemma11:

I have a cousin who was gay and the first solution the Elders in the village thought would cure the problem was marriage.

There is a difference between thinking about marriage and being forced into marraige. Was (s)he forced into marriage?

Gemma11:

But Edirin could have gone to another non -gay organisation and got a similar type of civic order to protect his rights and had nothing to do with marriage. That is my point.

What I told you was a gay argument carries more weight, and most UK youths will know that.

In this case it doesn't matter if the 'thought' would really be carried out. The fact is that it is possible. The other day I heard a man say that if he found out his son was gay the first thing he would do would be to lock him up with three prostitutes in a hopes to 'cure' him. There are also plenty accounts of gay men in Africa who say their families are pressurising them to get married. I don't understand why you are conveniently excluding the gay equation and the fact that Edirin sought the help of the gay organisation; They didn't seek him.

All Edirin had to do to apply for the order and state why he felt it necessary and whether you like it or not claiming to be gay and being scared of being sent back to Africa for marriage is realistic.

The judge is not going to hand out a forced marriage order just for the sake of it as there are other order orders that could have had the same legal hold as the forced marriage one.