Activism and demand for justice for the late 13-year-old girl, Elizabeth Ochanya, a victim of serial rape, heightened in the country recently. The minor died late last month from Vesico-Vaginal Fistula disease she allegedly suffered from sexual assaults from father and son in Makurdi, Benue State. This is an unspeakable evil, a debauchery for which the government should waste no time in bringing the suspects to book.
Since then, from Makurdi to Abuja; Plateau to Delta and Benin to Lagos, civil society organisations such as the International Federation of Female Lawyers, Nigeria Association of Women Journalists, Nigerian Medical Association and National Association of Nigeria Students have been roaring in rage. NANS, in a protest march that ended at the Government House, Makurdi, Benue State, told Governor Samuel Ortom that Andrew Ogbuja and his son, Victor, must be prosecuted. “There are other Ochanyas out there; government should protect them,” one of the placards read.
Ortom, in an instant emotional paroxysm, reminded himself of his daughters: “What if it were any of them? Indeed, this matter will not be swept under the carpet. The law must take its course.” Yes, and it should be expeditiously done too.
The abuse started when Ochanya was just eight years old, in 2013, by Victor, son of Ogbuja – the chief suspect, who is a senior lecturer in the Benue State Polytechnic, in the Department of Catering and Hotel Management. Victor’s sexual escapade was exposed by his sister, who once told their father after she caught him in the act. But it was not long before Ogbuja joined his son in the unholy assault that eventually reduced the minor to their sex slave. Ogbuja, who has since been arraigned before a Makurdi Upper Area Court, is being remanded at the Makurdi Federal Prisons, while his son, said to be a final year undergraduate, is on the run.
Ochanya became a member of Ogbuja’s household on account of her aunt being his wife. The aunt had gone to the girl’s parents to plead with them for her to live with her family so that she could have a better education. There was no school in her village. Her aunt’s logic made sense to the deceased parents and they wasted no time in releasing her. Truly, she got enrolled as a student at the Federal Government’s Girls College, Gboko, but not without becoming a home help.
Her medical complications had manifested since June, resulting in her being taken from one healthcare provider to the other. At one of them, she excruciatingly narrated her ordeal thus: “When I was eight years old, the son started sleeping with me and when his sister caught him, she reported him to their father and the father scolded him. From there, the father also started sleeping with me and I told my mother; that is why we brought this case here. I want my health back.” Regrettably, she never got it.
While the state government has vowed to ensure justice, the CSOs and other women groups that have demonstrated considerable interest in this heart-rending episode should see the case through so that their lamentation and crusade against this peculiar female gender-based violence is not in vain. Rape, no matter the victim’s age, dehumanises and is emblematic of degradation of societal values. It is a bestiality which the society and government should pull no punches in dealing with any Rasputin involved.
The fate that befell Ochanya was one of the reasons the Child Rights Act was enacted. Thousands of girls from less privileged families serve as housemaids or slave labourers in middle class families in the urban areas, where they are sexually subjugated. When they are not abused in the homes of their loco parentis, they succumb to the wayward libidinal impulses of male neighbours and outsiders. Sometimes, they end up fatally as well. It is unfortunate that only 24 out of the 36 states of the federation have domesticated the CRA to ensure that every girl-child is protected.
Consequently, the depravity of the Ogbujas is a wake-up call to governors whose states are still toying with the Act to domesticate it; and to parents who freely let out their girl-children as housemaids to be more circumspect. Rape in Nigeria has reached an epidemic level, evident in the daily newspaper reports. The most extreme cases involve fathers with their biological daughters – underage and adults. The Lagos State Police Command said that 678 rape cases occurred in one year – 2012 March to 2013 March. The state must protect its young ones. In Akwa Ibom State, seven rapists have been jailed since 2017, according to the Commissioner for Women Affairs, Glory Edet, while 30 cases are still in court.
The evil phenomenon was so disturbing that the Senate passed a law in 2015, which made the offence punishable with a life jail sentence. This is the least punishment Ogbuja and his son deserve if found guilty. The country’s criminal justice system should be fully activated against such aberrant behaviour. As it is in the West, storing the names of sex offenders in databases by law is imperative. This is instructive. The culprits may be denied employment in institutions where they may be considered as serious risk to others. In the United States, sex offender registries are kept by 50 states and the District of Columbia. There are 859,500 sex offenders convicts in these registries as of 2016, says the US National Centre for Missing and Exploited Children.
If the Senate law of 2015 has been observed in the breach, the circumstances surrounding Ochanya’s death are enough to compel the society, especially women groups, to reverse the inertia.
