BY NGOZI OKORIE
THE controversy triggered by the alarm raised by a mother, Deborah Archibong, over the alleged molestation and maltreatment of her 11-year-old son, a JSS1 student of Deeper Life High School, Idoro Uyo, Akwa Ibom State, took another dimension on Wednesday, as the Police detained a septuagenarian doctor and four others over the matter.
The 74-year-old doctor, identified as Dr. Effiong Udimidue, is said to be running his private clinic after retiring from the state government. Sources who disclosed his detention could not however confirm the exact connection.
He was said to have been detained by the Akwa Ibom Police Command, alongside four other staff of the Deeper Life School, after a meeting with all the parties involved in the allegation.
The meeting held on Tuesday at the Police Headquarters, in Uyo.
The four staff of the school who were also detained included the Vice Principal of the School, two boarding masters of both the Junior and Senior Students hostel, and an administrative staff.
They will be arraigned soon, according to the Police.
Before the last meeting, the Police had, last Thursday, invited the senior students accused of molestating and bullying the JSS 1 student, Don-Davies Archibong, along with all the parties involved, to make statements.
The victim’s mother, Deborah Archibong, had petitioned the Police, alleging that her son was inhumanly treated and subjected to starvation in the school.
She alleged that when the school authority changed her son from his dormitory to a senior students’ dormitory in the Deeper Life School, some senior students sexually abused him.
“They will remove his boxer and push their legs and hands into his anus…Look at a child I sent to school; he came back with a broken anus,” she said in a video that went viral.
The Commissioner of Police, Andrew Amiengheme, in a statement on Tuesday signed by the Police Public Relations Officer, Odiko MacDon, promised that no stone would be left unturned in unraveling the truth.
Amiengheme also assured that the outcome of the investigation would be made public, but urged all parties involved in the matter to exercise restraint pending the outcome of police investigation.
