By Izunna Okafor, Awka
Mr. Uzochukwu Okoli and Mr. Chinedu Nweke have been arrested for matters bordering child abuse and other related offences in Anambra State.
The arrests were made following the intervention of the state government, through the Ministry of Women Affairs and Social Welfare, on a case of underage children whose father, Mr. Okoli, gave out their hands in marriage to some old men who also maltreat and turned them to punching bags, even to the extent of urinating into the mouth of one of them after beating her up.
The victim of the incident, Chioma Okoli (currently aged 16 years), was forcefully given out in marriage to Mr. Chinedu Nweke (aged 34) by her father, shortly after the death of their mother, which made their father to relocate them down to Anambra from Edo State where they were residing and attending school.
This forceful marriage reportedly happened after the father had earlier forced her (while at the age of 14 years) to go and live with a 70-year-old man, who was subjecting her to various kinds of ill treatments that made her to run back to her father’s house, only to be forced into an early marriage with a 34-year-old man, Mr. Nweke.
Confirming this to newsmen on Thursday, the Public Relations Officer of the Anambra State Ministry of Women Affairs and Social Welfare, Chidinma Ikeanyionwu said the girl, who came to the Ministry together with her elder sister and their children, explained that life with Nweke had been a hell because he beats her, and sometimes after beating her, urinates into her mouth and all over her body, which made her run away with her 9-month-old baby.
It was gathered that their father had also warned them not to come back home from the marriage.
In a video also shared by the P.R.O., the father of the girl, Mr. Okoli, who was handcuffed together with Nweke, was also heard boldly threatening that, if he returns from the prison alive, he would deal with the children and make life more miserable for them for reporting her to the Commissioner.
“You should better pray that I die there in the prison, because if I come back alive, I will deal with all of you, and in fact, you won’t be my children again,” he threatened (I’m Igbo language), while the children also responded that they had already disowned him as a father long ago.
In her reaction, the Commissioner for Women Affairs, Hon. Ify Obinabo publicly confuted the suspects, expressing shock on their actions and inhumane treatments to the young girls.
While reiterating her warning against underage marriage, the Commissioner, who said Governor Chukwuma Soludo’s government has zero tolerance for such crimes, further instructed that the case be charged to court immediately to secure justice for the children while the suspects are paid black in their own coins, to serve as deterrent to others.
Watch the video below:
