• Traffickers lay siege, lure parents to trade kids for money in Akwa Ibom
From Isaac Job, Uyo
Blessing Walter, a 20-year-old teenage girl from Oti – Oro in Akwa Ibom State was pregnant for her boyfriend, who refused to accept the responsibility. During the pregnancy, she didn’t attend any ante natal clinic, no good food to eat as she lived from hand to mouth.
She was mocked by her peers for being pregnant without any man accepting her. Her mother, Grace Walter, 55, couldn’t bear the shame of struggling to take care of unwanted pregnancy from her daughter alone and sought for help from her friend who lives in Port Harcourt, Rivers State.
According to a source in the village, Mrs Walter’s friend introduced her to a member of child trafficking gang in Port Harcourt that took care of the pregnant girl till the day she put to birth.
Another source in Oti- oron, who spoke to Daily Sun on condition of anonymity, said food, provisions and basic necessities needed by pregnant women were provided lavishly and the young expectant mother was comfortable at least for once. It was gathered that the benefactor agreed and negotiated that the unborn baby will be taken away from the mother for a fee of N800,000 to assist in her upkeep.
The source disclosed: “They monitored the expected delivery date (EDD) till last week when the teenager gave birth to a bouncing baby boy in an undisclosed traditional birth attendant’s house within the village.
“The following day, a car arrived with two women and a driver, took the baby away. It was not clear whether the money was paid in full.”
However, the journey to Port Harcourt was truncated when the operatives from Akwa Ibom State Police Command intercepted the syndicate along Nsit Atai- Oron road and arrested all the occupants in the car.
A statement signed by the police public relations officer in the state, Timfon John, a deputy superintendent of police, and made available to journalists in Uyo, disclosed that the police patrol team intercepted a Mazda vehicle and driver identified as Bethel Anyanwu along Nsit Atai-Oron road alongside two female occupants one of them carrying a two day old baby neatly wrapped.
John said the driver and his two passengers could not provide satisfactory explanation on the infant found in their midst before they were arrested.
The statement reads in part:
“Operatives of the command while on patrol along the Nsit Atai/Oron Road, intercepted a Mazda vehicle with registration number YAB 454 AA. The vehicle was driven by one Bethel Anyanwu, a male, and had two female occupants along with a two-day-old baby.
“Upon interrogation, the occupants could not provide a satisfactory explanation regarding the infant. Further investigation led to the arrest of one Alison Eduno, who facilitated the connection between the buyer and the seller.
“The grandmother and the mother of the baby later known as Grace Walter, a 55-year-old female, and Blessing Walter, a 20-year-old female, both residing in Oti Oron, were also apprehended.
“They confessed to selling the baby for the sum of eight hundred thousand Naira (₦800,000).”
She said after series of interrogations the female occupants in the car later identified themselves as Nasikpo Sonia Labere and Inemesit Okin and confessed that they were sent by one Waazor Godwin and Lilian Duru to bring the baby from Miss Grace Inyang in Oron local government area of the state. John explained that further investigation led to the arrest of Alison Eduno who allegedly facilitated the transaction.
“Following a series of interrogations, one Nasikpo Sonia Labere, a female, and Inemesit Okin Akpan, a female, confessed to being sent from Port Harcourt, Rivers State, by one Waazor Godwin, a female, and one Lilian Duru, a female, to collect the baby from one Miss Grace Inyang in Oron.”
John said all the suspects are now in police custody at the state police command, Ikot Akpan Abia, Uyo while the baby has been taken to the state ministry of women affairs and social welfare for care.
“All the aforementioned suspects are currently in police custody,” the statement disclosed.
However, further investigation revealed that human traffickers have capitalize on the prevailing economic hardship in the country to trick vulnerable people, especially teenage mothers to sell their children.
The illicit deal is now holding sway in southern Nigeria, particularly with Akwa Ibom State recording incidents of child trafficking, abuses and all forms of in human treatment against innocent children.
Some have been branded witches, thrown to the streets and allowed to languish in pains with unfavourable conditions against United Nations Conventions on Child Rights in the Sustainable Development Goals ( SDG) which have been domesticated in Nigeria and domiciled by states.
Two months ago, police in Akwa Ibom apprehended two ladies in Nsit Ubium local government area of the state, who sold a nine-year old child before they were intercepted at a check point between Akwa Ibom and Abia states. The suspects were paraded at the police headquarters, Ikot Akpan Abia while the teenager was shielded and reunited with family.
Many have attributed it to poverty resulting in high number of school drop outs among teenage girls both in rural and urban communities. In a telephone interview, Akwa Ibom State Commissioner of Police, Baba Mohamed Azare, stated that child trafficking is a serious crime not to be linked with poverty.
Azare said the criminality involved in selling a new born child transcends poverty line in the society. According to him, anybody who commits such crime will face the wrath of the law.
He said: “Even a mad woman who gives birth to a child always protect and care for the child jealously. How can we trivialise a serious crime like selling a child to strangers in the name of poverty?”