- She’s always maltreating, starving her – Neighbours
- Allegations not true – Suspect
A middle-aged unmarried woman, Zainab Atinuke, has allegedly stabbed a minor living with her with a broken bottle.
Atinuke, a trader, who lives at 64, Olorunkemi Street, Bariga, Shomolu, Lagos, has also been accused of always “severely maltreating” the minor living with her before the incident.
The 12-year-old minor, simply identified as Mary, who was said to have been introduced to her by her boyfriend, was alleged to have been “domestically abused continuously” by Atinuke.
Our correspondent also gathered that Atinuke was in the habit of starving the minor, compelling her to resort to stealing food items. But for the quick intervention of some neighbours, the minor would have suffered serious beating from those she had stolen from.
A child rights protection activist and Coordinator, Child Protection Network in the Shomolu-Bariga area, Comrade Toyin Okanlawon, alleged, in a report made available to our correspondent, that Tinu “frequently brutalised the teenager,” noting that on many occasions she had been cautioned by neighbours, but all efforts to contain her “excessive inhumane treatment” proved abortive.
Okanlawon further said in his report, “The girl is getting used to starvation. She was starved recently for three days; so she went to steal fried flour (puff-puff) because she was hungry. She was about to be lynched, when she opened up that her madam refused to feed her and that was why she stole the snack.”
According to the child rights activist, the suspect betrayed no emotions about her actions.
Findings by our correspondent revealed that Atinuke had on a particular occasion stabbed the victim with a broken bottle on her wrist.
Many of the neighbours, however, have been of the opinion that the minor be taken away from the suspect in order to forestall a situation where she would suffer further harm from Atinuke.
One of Atinuke’s neighbours, who simply identified himself as Kunle, said, “That woman (Tinu) is wicked and mean; she does not have feelings. She is fond of maltreating the girl. People around her have intervened many times to rescue the girl from her, but she always prevented them. And despite all advice given to her to change from such behaviour, she has remained adamant. She would rather begin to curse anyone who offered her such advice. She does not feed the girl well.
“At a point, when she discovered that some neighbours were giving food to the girl, she got angry with them.”
Corroborating the allegations against Atinuke, another neighbour, who spoke to our correspondent on the condition of anonymity, said, “There were occasions when the girl’s hands and body would become swollen from the severe beatings she had received from Atinuke. The girl’s back is full of scars from her beatings. I have had to feed the girl several times. When she (Atinuke) got to know that we had been feeding the girl, she was very annoyed with us and she severely punished the girl for that. We had to stop it before she took it out on us.”
One of the leaders of the community said, “I have been warning Atinuke about the way she was treating the girl. I told her categorically that one day, she would be held responsible, if anything bad eventually happened to the girl, but she did not change.
When contacted, Atinuke said, “No! There is nothing like that. I didn’t beat her at all, I didn’t hit her with a bottle, neither did I bite her. All the allegations are not true.”
Our correspondent gathered that officials of the state’s Ministry of Youth and Social Development had taken custody of the minor victim and appropriate punishment given to the suspect.
