Sikiru M. Jimoh
8 October 2008
Ther rising cases of molestation of women means that the country's development will be delayed much longer, because in most societies women play very pivotal role in balanced development. In urban centres, young girls are vulnerable to all forms of abuses and a case of two yongesters illustrated here shows that more effort needed to tackle one of the most serious menance of our time.
Child molestation is very rampant in Nigeria today with teenage girls flooding urban centres and the Federal Capital Territory vending womanhood for cordials. This trade is responsible for broken homes, late marriage and gross irresponsibility characterizing many husbands in their respective homes. Begging another tool of exploitation is equally an umbrella of rape as in the case of a grey-haired man engaging an abandoned suckling in the Federal Capital Territory.
Any country that gives her women education will develop fast and wipe away ignorance, but it has to begin from individual homes. Illiteracy of a woman spread fast and end an entire family in a state of irrecoverable despair. This observation is drawn from the contributions of observers who read the story of Comfort Dada Isaiah in Daily Trust publication of Friday, August 8, 2008.
Abuja Environmental Protection Board (AEPB) - the agency vested with the responsibility of tidying and creating a decent environment for residents of the FCT_ on Wednesday, July 30 found the relatives of thirty-one year old and mentally-retarded Comfort Dada Isaiah who left home at the age of twenty-three after completing her secondary education and wandered from 1999 to 2008. As this was still fresh in the minds of the readers, on Tuesday, September 9, a sixty-nine old man confessed to an allegation of raping a girl of eight years in Garki, Abuja and was handed over to the Commissioner of Police, FCT Command.
Mr Titus Ndawa of investigation department, AEPB told Daily Trust that the man was arrested in Area 10 Garki after committing the crime, and he confessed that he did it.
The unscrupulous element ,one Bello Lamu who is not identified with any deformity claimed to be a beggar and had moved into the Federal Capital Territory holding the victim, an eight years old Lember Akpenpuun in hand.
Mr Leramoh O. Abdul-razaq, Head of Administration, AEPB explained to the commissioner that when the Task Force Team on beggars and hawkers arrested the old man and the eight year old victim in Area 10, the act had already been committed, and it was through close observation after the arrest that Lember was discovered to be a victim of rape. Preliminary investigation revealed that the girl was abandoned by her relations before she fell into the hand of the unscrupulous element. Investigation had it that she is from Nasarawa State. The matter is with the Commissioner of Police for further investigation and appropriate legal action.
These two shocking cases of child molestation and other related abuses are usually discovered by AEPB in their daily arrest of beggars and hawkers in the FCT.
In 1999, Comfort left home after completing her secondary education. The family thought she needed a job and a friend of the family got her a job as house help to a pastor. Owing to the way of life in the churchyard, Comfort later disappeared from the church leaving her belongings "Men of different age grades and young girls were kept in a single room where they lived day and night. What they are doing in that church is not clear to me" she said.
At an age when Comfort was supposed to be under the full care of her parents whose responsibility would have been to tighten their grip on her, the parents loosened their grip and allowed their daughter to fall victim to ritual and indiscriminate sexual activities in an environment hidden under the umbrella of worship. Many teenagers in Comfort's shoes would give in to some immoral activities to survive as we see under-aged children loiter in nooks and corners in the FCT awaiting men to pick them for a night.
Early 2002, a married woman in Maiduguri heeded the advice of her mother and fled her matrimonial home leaving husband and children without divorce. On many occasions she had complained to her mother of inadequate care she received from her husband. The aged mother advised her to leave the man for a while and explore Kano for immeasurable care. After her first visit, she returned to park some of her things to join a man in whose arms she could comfortably lay her entire soul. She saw care and money, but when sickness followed, no amount of money could buy health. Circumstances beyond the control of money forced her out of the city to join her husband and children in Maiduguri.
The cases of teenagers are exceptional. A female child is an asset. Many evil activities such as armed-robbery, murder, theft, hired-killing, house-breaking, jail-breaking, drunkenness rape, war crimes, looting of nations' treasury and other violence-related activities are traced to men who are presumed heads of homes. Without a male child in a family, divorce is staring in the face of a wife. But which is tragic: Having no male child or having a male child who will end in jail?
In Africa and the world abound there is no single woman well-armed with education who has failed to provide education for her children, but there are such men existing in all societies who have taken to philandering and drunkenness as hobbies neglecting matrimonial responsibilities.
Every nation needs to take adequate care of its women to progress and should put their well-being into consideration when making laws. An uneducated wife in a family is an additional burden to the responsible husband who is already engaged with thoughts of the children's education and excellent life-style from means honestly got.
When Comfort was returned home, the younger sister she left at a more tender age was already a university graduate in gainful employment waiting to choose among responsible men. Obviously, while her younger sister Janet was busy in the classroom receiving training that would scare irresponsible men away from her sight, Comfort was left wandering and falling prey to wanton sexual activities with vermin.
Although Comfort knew where her parents were residing, she decided to avoid seeing her mother in particular because, she stated in the letter she wrote while in AEPB custody in Abuja, that her mother was fond of dumping her in the house of one Alfa Siaka Dlaa and finally one brother Stephen M. J. Abere dumped her in the midst of some rascals accommodated in a churchyard in Lagos.
Towards the end of April, 2008, a team of environmental officers of AEPB on patrol found Comfort Dada Isaiah under the over-head bridge at Berger where she had made a home to sleep in the Federal Capital Territory (FCT).
Mr Titus Ndawa, Special Assistant to Director on Security Matters, Investigation and Monitoring, AEPB told Daily Trust that when Comfort was discovered at Berger, she was wearing a black overall garment and it was when she responded to their questions that they knew she was not in perfect state of mind and could tell nothing about herself. She remained in the custody of AEPB for a period of three months during which a staff of the board Mrs Beatrice Shomorin a widow confirmed that she was not pregnant but could not menstruate. The widow equally investigated her root and why she left home and finally came with the report that Comfort's mother, father, sisters, brothers live in Ibilo in Edo State.
On Friday, August 1, the Obejiras arrived AEPB office in Area 3, Garki, Abuja where Comfort identified Mrs Akibayi Isaiah as her mother and greeted her with a smile. Other family members present were Janet her younger sister a university graduate who burst into uncontrolled tears on seeing her sister; the elder brother Stephen M. J. Abere who left her in the custody of the pastor in Lagos was also in attendance, but her father Mr Isaiah was not in attendance because he lost his sight years after the disappearance of Comfort from home.
You could never know that Comfort was mentally retarded as she expressed herself excellently in English and genuflected respectfully hiding her face in the black overall garment often stealing looks at visitors and passers-by, but the heavy stink she wore around her portrayed abnormality.
Before Comfort could make any reasonable statement prayers were observed for her at Family Worship Church at Finance Quarters in Wuye and she disclosed her identity as an Ebira from Okene in Kogi Stat and wrote the address of her parents which the widow used in tracing the parents on Wednesday, July 30.
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