A women who wanted to sell her five year old daughter for N300,000 has been detained by operatives of the Imo State Police Command.
It was gathered that the woman who simply identified herself as Princess, an indigene of Ogoni in River State, who later claimed to have come from somewhere else, on Saturday Novermber 14 had approached some persons who she told that she wanted to sell her five year old daughter.
It was gathered that “Those she approached lured her to the premises of Assumpta Cathedral Church Owerri, where Ozisa FM Radio station is located. It happened to be when the Imo State Chairman of the National Association of Women Journalists (NAWOJ), Barri Vivian Otti, and Aku Obidinma, a staff of Ozisa FM came out from the studio after rounding off a radio programme.
“The attention of the Catholic diocese was later drawn to the matter. In a bid to arrest the situation they retrieved the child from the woman whose mental stability was in doubt, and told her to come back on Monday.
“But she claimed that she didn’t have money to feed, let alone paying her transport fare back to the church. At that point, Aku Obidinma opted to give her N10,000 to enable her feed and pay her fare back to the church on Monday while the NAWOJ boss, Barr Vivian Otti was pleaded with to take custody of the child.
The church on the other hand promised to report the matter to the police which they did not do”.
It was also gathered that the lady shortly after, came to insist on taking her child but the church unsure of her mental state refused to oblige her.
“However, while the church was still planning to report the matter to the police, Barr Otti returned the child to the church.”
“In a curious twist of events, the woman who claimed she was a sex-hawker and had no other means of income turned around and lodged a complaint at D 13 of Imo state police command that some persons took away her child and gave her N10,000. This prompted the police to effect some arrests and also detained the mother of the child, having realized that her story was incoherent.
Though the police frowned at the refusal of the church to report such a sensitive matter to the police, many viewed the actions of the Church and that of Obidinma and Ottih as purely humanitarian, adding that their actions were aimed at protecting her from a woman whose mental stability is questionable.
