Nigeria: Police Rescue Stolen Babies in Asaba

25 May 2010

Lagos — The Delta Police Command has uncovered an illegal orphanage where it claimed that babies are sold at Usonia Street in Asaba, the state capital.

Mr. Charles Muka, the Command's spokesman, said the orphanage, known as Mary's Perpetual Help Orphanage, is owned by one Johnmary Ihueze.

Muka told the News agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Asaba on Monday that Ihueze, who was nabbed by the police after a tip off, "also keeps pregnant girls who are coerced into signing off their babies upon delivery in an affidavit."

"Upon his arrest, six pregnant girls, among them a 14-year-old, was also discovered. Through interrogation, a one-month old baby girl was recovered at Motherless Babies Home, Obosi, in Anambra.

"The pregnant girls have been evacuated to a Shelter for Victims of Domestic Violence and Abuse in Asaba for rehabilitation," he said.

In another development, Muka said the police also exhumed two unidentified corpses in an uncompleted building on Benin-Asaba Expressway after a tip off by the contractor handling the building.

He said that efforts were being made to trace the perpetrators of the act, while the bodies had been deposited at the Federal Medical Centre, Asaba, for autopsy.

Similarly, the police also rescued six girls from human traffickers at Ekpan in Uwvie Local Government Area (LGA), of Delta.

"The police, on receiving the report, swung into action and arrested a native doctor and seven other suspects," Muka said.

According to Muka, the native doctor gives the girls "some spirit bath" preparatory for "their journey abroad."

He said the suspects, who are assisting the police in their investigation, would soon appear in court.

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