Angry women in Sapele, Delta State, last Friday, beat up a 54-year-old former councillor, John Onose, alleged to have raped a minor.
Onose, a father of six, had allegedly raped a 7-year-old girl, inflicting serious injuries on her private part.
The suspect was said to have lured the little girl to a bush near his house, where he sexually assaulted her, resulting in her admission for treatment at the Central Hospital, Sapele.
An eye witness, Mrs. Jane Oghenefovie, said that the angry women attacked the former councillor when the police brought him to the same hospital for a medical test.
On seeing the degree of injury inflicted by the suspect on the little girl’s private part, Oghenefovie said that the women pounced on Onose inside the hospital premises, shortly after he was tested for HIV and other Sexually Transmitted Diseases.
She said that the angry women rained blows and slaps on the suspect, condemning him for the heinous crime he had allegedly committed against a child young enough to be his grand-daughter.
According to Oghenefovie, the policemen, who had brought the suspect to the hospital, sensed danger and immediately whisked him away from the scene.
She said, “The man is an animal.The police should have allowed us to teach him a lesson. How can he rape that poor little girl, a 7-year-old? That is the height of wickedness. A man with six children. If anyone does that to his daughter, will he be happy?
“The women would have torn his manhood. Go and see what he did to that little girl’s private part. The man is evil and should not be allowed to walk the street free, because many other children’s lives could be endangered if such a man is set free.
“We thank God that he is now in police custody; that man should be investigated. They way I saw the body of that baby, this man could be a ritualist. If not, what did he want to do with the child’s womb that he had forced to come out?”
Narrating her ordeal beside her daughter’s hospital bed, Mrs. Onome Ojakovo, said that the little girl had complained of pains on her buttocks.
But unaware of what the suspect had allegedly earlier done to her daughter, she said she didn’t take her complaints seriously, at first.
According to her, “when my daughter came out from the corner of Mr. Onose’s house, she complained of pains on her buttocks but I didn’t pay serious attention to it. I just thought she might have hit her buttocks on the ground while playing. So, I asked her to go and wash herself.“But when she came back from school the next day and was still complaining of the pains, I decided to check her pubic region properly and what I saw shocked me. My daughter was bleeding from her private part, with her womb coming out!
“Out of shock, I raised the alarm, which attracted our neighbours. It was then that it dawned on me that my child had been sexually violated. I started crying that I couldn’t imagine who could have done this wicked act to my little child.”
She added that she later learnt that the suspect allegedly lured her daughter to a nearby bush, where he covered her mouth while he inserted his fingers into her private part and did some other heinous things with her.
Ojakovo said Onose also threatened the little girl never to tell anyone what he had done to her in the bush.
The sad mother, therefore, appealed to the public and security agencies to come to her aid as the suspect’s family members had continued to threaten her life.
She also said that the little girl’s response to treatment at the hospital had been very slow, adding that her condition had only shown little sign of improvement.
A source close to the Sapele Police Station confirmed that the suspect had since remained in custody while investigation had continued on the incident.
All attempts to get the reaction of the Delta State Police Public Relations Officer, Celestina Kalu, failed. Kalu, a superintendent of police, did not pick calls made to her mobile phone lines.
She also did not reply the text message sent to her on the matter.
