A married woman Ifeoma Ozougwu in Enugu has been arrested by the State Police Command for battering her 10-year-old female housemaid with hot iron before drilling nails into her head.
A video of brutalised Chinonye Nnadi went viral on social media on Friday as made available by the Chairperson of the WomenAids Collective WACOL, Prof. Joy Ngozi Ezeilo. Ngozi noted that her office was alerted on Friday about Chinonye’s case as and reached out to her poor widowed mom. She then promise that WACOL will follow through with the case and ensure justice is gotten.
“This is gory and torture of a young innocent girl whose only crime is being born to a poor widow who had to give her up to live with someone in the hope that she will get an education and survive. We pray that she recovers. We demand full wrath of the law on this woman that inflicted such a level of physical injury on this girl.”
“I spoke to the distraught mother of the victim. She is a poor widow living in a rural village in Aku, near Nsukka, Enugu state. It is time to eradicate child labour, ban and punish heavily anyone using children as domestic help. The Child Rights Act and the NAPTIP Act must be effectively enforced. WACOL will follow through to ensure that justice is done in this matter“, Ngozi said.
According to reports, Ifeoma had on Wednesday back drilled nails in 2 places into Chinonye’s head and also used hot iron all over her body simply because Ifeoma’s baby fell off her hands while she slept off at about 12am, though the baby survived no physical or internal injury
In a statement released by the Spokesperson of the state police command, Daniel Ndukwe Ikea, 24 year-old Ifeoma Ozougwu and her husband, Jude Ozougwu, 40, were arrested after credible was made available to the Police. He noted that the operatives of the Command swiftly moved to the area where they rescued Chinonye and arrested the couple. Read also:Â 51-year-old Engineer Arrested For Raping And Impregnating 15-year-old Housemaid
“Preliminary investigation showed that the suspect, who the victim’s relative and a mother of three (3), maltreats her to the extent of using different objects, including hot pressing iron, iron rod, and nails to inflict several grievous bodily harm as well as inserting pepper into her private part”, part of the statement reads.
