This is a very sad story...We hope the right organization will read and investigate this so that justice will be done.
At an age when most of her mates are in primary school, a 12-year-old girl, Monsurat ( surname withheld) has been put in the family way by a 43-year-old muslim cleric in Lagos. But the man at the centre of the scandal has denied the young girl’s allegation, pleading a frame-up by some of his unfriendly co-tenants at their No. 411, Bomu Sabo residence.
Young Monsurat, an orphan, was allegedly impregnated by an Alfa (names withheld) who she said, often lured her into his shop for
sexual escapades that started about one year ago. The girl who became an orphan at a tender age told Sunday Sun that although she lost her virginity when she was seven years old by another man, she was sure that the Alfa is the father of her unborn baby.
She said that the illicit sexual affair with the man who enticed her with money and shelter when she had no place to sleep, started when she was 10 years old. “He lives inside our compound. One day, he just said I should come to his shop and I went there. He told me since that I didn’t have, shelter, I should be sleeping inside his shop pending when I would be able to secure a place.
“Whenever I was sleeping in the night on the pavement, he would come around 2 am and wake me up to follow him to his shop and have sex with him. Many people in this place are aware of it. The first time he forced his private part into me, he said I shouldn’t scream. He told me, I shouldn’t tell anybody but people have been seeing us.
“When people tried to advise me, he said I should not listen to them. He started having sex with me since I was 10-years old. He told me that if I start having sex with him he would give me money and he lured me into the corner and started touching my breasts. I wasn`t happy about it and I told him to use condom, but he refused and he warned me not to tell anybody.
“ He warned that if I tell anybody, he would use juju on me because they said he is from Ijebu. He was giving me money, but he stopped since I got pregnant for him.” The girl told Sunday Sun that she was in Primary Five when she realized that she was about two months pregnant adding that this was later confirmed by other tenants due to her incessant “morning sickness”. She said that the last time she had it with the Alfa who runs an ice block business was in April this year.
“When he slept with me last was during Easter this year, and since then, I haven’t seen my menstrual period. I told some neighbors that I have seen my period and later, I started having morning sickness. They used something to test my blood and it was confirmed that I am pregnant. They asked me who slept with me and I told them it is Alfa, but he denied that he slept with me. “He had been sleeping with me before I started seeing my period as a girl. When I became pregnant, I told him that I have not seen my period but he said he was not responsible for the pregnancy; everybody is aware that he did it,” she said.
On how she lost her virginity, the girl told Sunday Sun that she was raped by a co-tenant in their family house at that tender age. “I was in our family house in Egbeda when the man sent me to buy food for him. When I came back with the food, he started touching me and warned that if I screamed or talked I would die. Later, he pulled my underwear and put his thing on my private part and I screamed.
“After that, blood came out from my private part and some tenants brought me out from his room and I was rushed to the hospital for treatment. The man was arrested by the police but he later disappeared from our street and I have never set my eyes on him since then. It is Alfa who continued having sex with me and got me pregnant.”
But when Sunday Sun took the matter up with the Alfa (names withheld) at his shop located near the compound, he denied having carnal knowledge of the girl. Instead, he regretted that his assistance to the orphan has made him a topic for street gossip and undeserved accusation.
“She is more or less like a landlord in this house. I started assisting her like my daughter because other tenants wanted to drive her away from the compound due to her bad attitude of stealing people’s things. But I intervened as a father by offering her little help because her parents are dead. I sent her back to where she was learning hairdressing because the people had thrown her out for not keeping to the terms of her apprenticeship.
“Also, I made sure I took care of her feeding. I did all these to give her a secure future but in the process, she just disappeared one day. After some weeks, she surfaced and when I questioned her, she didn’t give any convincing reason for leaving the place. It was at that point, that I heard that she is pregnant”, he said.
The father of three said he had no hand in the girl’s pregnancy. “I am not responsible for this pregnancy. I am a married man with three kids, about the same age with her. I never had any carnal knowledge of her. There is nothing like that; I am innocent. Her immediate sister who happens to live outside the compound came and said we are going to have a blood test and I have agreed. I can see that the assistance I rendered to her has landed me in trouble.
“For me, I don’t see it as a problem. I see it as a challenge because I am happy that a lot of people are coming out to say that she is their daughter and caring for her”, he said. The man accused, “ neighbors in the compound who don’t want my progress”, of persuading the girl to say that he got her pregnant.
A reliable source who pleaded anonymity told Sunday Sun that the police have done nothing about the abominable act partly because the girl’s relatives have not taken the matter seriously. Besides, there is the fear that the randy cleric has voodoo powers and could harm anyone that dares to challenge him.
“The problem is that her parents are dead and sometimes she sleeps with some tenants because she doesn’t have a home. The man now exploited the opportunity to sleep with her. The relatives are not serious about the case. Everybody in that place is afraid of him because he is a voodoo man. He boasted that nobody can do anything about that because he is an Alfa”, the source said. When contacted, a senior Police officer at the Sabo, Yaba Police station told Sunday Sun that they were not aware of the case.
-Sunday Sun
....this is case of child abuse and it is very sad. Share your thoughts, thanks!
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