When I read this news this morning I felt that you dear readers need to also read it, which is why I have decided to report it exactly the way Sun news have reported it so that you will have a comprehensive account of how this happened.
Uneasy calm reigned at Olorunsogo area of Ibadan, Oyo State capital at the weekend, as a family alleged that a soldier raped their 16 year-old boy (names withheld). The incident happened at the premises of the burnt Power Holding Company of Nigeria (PHCN) in the area.
Soldiers were deployed in the Olorunsogo District office of PHCN after it was burnt down by rampaging youths during the fuel subsidy protest in January due to epileptic power supply to the area. Father of the victim, Mr. Adejare Taiwo (not real names) told Daily Sun at the weekend that his son, a SSS1 student at one of the popular secondary schools in the city, was allegedly raped on Thursday around 8p.m by one of the soldiers posted to secure the PHCN office.
According to Taiwo, his wife was a petty trader at Olorunsogo bus-stop along the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway and like most traders in the area; she used to keep her wares within the premises of the PHCN office. He explained that on the fateful day, his son was sent to pack her mother’s wares after she had retired home to prepare food for the family.
But one of the soldiers was said to have lured him into the canteen within the premises, which has been converted to a room by the soldier and had sex with him through the anus.“On getting home that night, I met them picking beans to be cooked for the night. I inquired who would help her pack her wares and she said she had instructed one of the traders to help her.“I was not comfortable with the arrangement, so I asked my son to go and pack the wares and furniture being used by his mother.
For many hours after he didn’t return home. I was wondering what could have happened to my son. When we waited till about 10p.m and he did not return, his mum went to search for him. She met him on the way and related what happened to him. “I was even waiting at home, fuming with anger and threatening to beat the hell out of my son when they came in and my wife said we should go inside so that he could relate what happened to him,” the 37-year-old man said.
Relating his nasty experience in the hands of the randy soldier, the hapless young boy said the soldier had approached him while packing his mother’s ware and asked whether he had a sister or any girl around he could call for him (soldier).“I told him I didn’t know any girl in the neighbourhood and I didn’t have a sister. He then grabbed me at the wrist and asked me to follow him. He dragged me into a room inside the canteen. He locked the door at the back and threatened to kill me if I shout. He ordered me to off my trouser and I started begging him but he would not listen as he forced my trouser down and removed my pant.
“He later grabbed my organ and shoved me forward, making me to fall. After I had fallen down, he took out his organ and put it in my anus and started making sex with me. I was begging him to release me but he would not listen.“But about five minutes later, the other soldiers called him and he rose up, buttoned up and went out leaving me in the room. I realized he locked the door from outside.
“I seized the opportunity to put on my trouser and used the nail behind the door to also lock the door from the back. I then escaped through the window. As I was running away, the other soldiers saw and shouted at me but I heard him telling them to let me go,” the distraught boy stated. He said although he did not know the soldier’s name but he could identify him.“He is their commandant in that place and he was the only one using the premises of Ile Gate Food Canteen within the premises while others are sleeping in the next building. When they called him out, I heard others calling him ‘Oga, Oga (leader).”His father said he reported the incident to his own father the following morning and they both called their lawyer, Mr. Adebayo Shittu, who is the former attorney-general and commissioner for justice in the state, who urged them to lodge a complaint at the police station.“We went to Ogbere Onilanta Police Station on Friday to report the incident but the two policemen that attended to us said they could not handle the matter as it involved the Army. They asked us to go to the headquarters of the 2 Division, Nigerian Army, Ojo to lodge our complaint with the Military Police.
“But we didn’t know anybody that can assist us and we don’t know what will be the reaction of the soldiers there. We are poor people. We want good-spirited Nigerians to come to our aid so that we won’t suffer in silence,” said the grandfather of the hapless boy, who pleaded not to be mentioned. When Daily Sun contacted the Police Public Relations Officer (PPRO), Oyo State Command, Mrs. Bisi Clet Ilobanafor, she said the family had been advised to go back to the station and re-lodge their complaint, saying it was not true that the police could not handle the incident.
Barr Shittu also confirmed the allegation when contacted, saying his chambers has decided to take up the matter and get to the root of it.
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