Favour was discovered by her mother to have been defiled after she was brought back from school in the school bus. According to the toddler’s mother, Mrs. Okoye, her kid attends a nursery school in Shibiri, where she pays as high as N17,800 per term. She said she always took her to the school while the school bus dropped her at home after school hours. That, according to her, has been the routine, but on that fateful Tuesday, July 16, she discovered to her amazement blood stains in the girls private part, after the school bus had dropped her and left.
Recounting what happened in tears, she said “On Tuesday July 16, I took my baby to school as usual. Their closing time is 2:30 or 3pm but normally they take others home before bringing my daughter back, so it is usually around 4pm that they bring her home. That particular day, the school driver dropped her around 4pm. When the driver came, the baby was seated beside him at the front seat with another baby boy while others were at the back. When I picked her from across the road where she was dropped and walked into my shop, I discovered she was feeling dizzy and sleepy, a condition, which was unusual because each time she came back from school, she would always play before she slept but on this occasion, she came home feeling sleepy. She was saying, ‘mummy see’ but I couldn’t make any meaning out of it. I simply dismissed her as a talkative. The driver even smiled. As I put her on my shoulder, she slept off. When I was laying her to sleep, she opened her legs and I saw blood in her private part and I rushed out but it was late as the driver had zoomed off.”
With the blood stains all over the kid’s private part and her sudden relapse to sleep that afternoon, it became clear to her mother that an adult male had defiled her. She shouted and rushed out to get the driver who brought her home to explain what happened but the driver had gone. Her voice attracted neighbours who came and saw what happened to the kid.
What she did
In her bid to get somebody to explain to her what could have happened to Favour, she said: “I rushed to a neighbour whose son also attends the same school to get the headmaster’s telephone number. Before then, I had called her teacher, whose phone was switched off. I was advised to go to hospital for a medical test. I went to a nearby private hospital, Vineyard Hospital, at the back of Shibiri bus-stop. When the doctor saw it, he said that without a police report, he would not do anything. We went back to the school but we didn’t see anybody. I met only two gatemen and also saw the bus where it had been parked. The gatemen called the headmaster and they spoke in Yoruba. He later told me he was somewhere but I told him that I would only give him 10 minutes to get to the school, after which I would report the matter to any police station for his arrest. At that point, he flared up, and even questioned if that was the way I talked to people.”
So, with the unsatisfactory response from the headmaster, she said: “I reported the case at the Shibiri Police Station. I was given a written note but when I went back to the hospital, the doctor said that the written note was not enough for him to lay his hands on my baby. He advised me to go to Ajangbadi Police Station to get a proper police report. When I reported at Ajangbadi, I was told to write my statement, after which the Investigating Police Officer (IPO) told me that they would go to the school the next day, Wednesday July 17, to arrest the headmaster, the teacher, the driver and the cleaner. They gave me a note to the General Hospital, Igando, but I couldn’t go there that day because it was late then.”
Back to Igando General Hospital
Narrating her difficulty at getting the baby examined and the medical report given to her for further investigation, she said: “After the doctor had examined my baby, he shouted in utter amazement at such wickedness but said only the baby’s early morning urine would help to unravel what actually happened since I had bathed the baby. I went there the following day, Friday July 19, with her early morning urine but the doctor said I was late. He insisted I must be there by 8am latest. So, he asked me to come back again on Saturday July 20.”
Mrs Okoye revealed that she dressed her baby in pants on the fateful day but lamented that the pants was not on her when she noticed the blood in her private part. She also revealed that as at Thursday, July 18, only the driver was being held by the police at Ajangbadi. The other three- headmaster, teacher and the cleaner had all been released on bail.
Asked what the statement of the school authority was, she said she had no idea but added that they wrote their own statements.
The medical report
Eventually, a medical diagnosis was carried out on the baby’s early morning urine at the General Hodpital, Igando and from the report it is obvious that the baby’s hymen had been broken. The report among other technical terminologies stated, “No active bleeding. Hymen is breached.” In other words, there was a forcible entry into the baby’s private part either by a male organ or an adult finger or whatever, which has been the basis for suspicion. So, the question that remains unanswered now is Who defiled Favour? What actually happened to her? And where were the school authorities under whose care the baby was entrusted when she was brutally assaulted and defiled? These and many more nagging questions are what the crack team of the Nigeria Police officers at the State Headquarters, Ikeja, where the case had been transferred to are working tirelessly to provide adequate answers to.
Headmaster reacts
When the headmaster of the school, Mr Owoyemi Taiwo was contacted on phone, he declined comment. He said that the matter was already at the Lagos State Police Headquarters, Ikeja where it was being investigated and that it would not be proper for him to say anything until after the police investigation had been concluded. He also promised to narrate all he knew about the incident to Sunday Sun as soon as the police investigation was concluded.
Police angle
Speaking on the matter, the Investigating Police Officer, simply identified as Bose confirmed that the case was at their desk at the Escort Section of the Commissioner of Police, X Squad, Unit D, State Police Command, Ikeja. She asked the Sunday Sun to visit their office to see her boss but when the reporter insisted that he only wanted to know the position of the case, she said it was still under investigation.
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