Recent news reports highlighting various cases of child abuse in the country call for a concerted effort to stem the tide of an evil and uncivilised trend. While an outright elimination may seem impossible, a reduction in the number of child abuse cases is achievable. But it will require the strict enforcement of the extant laws and the enactment of new ones, where necessary, to force habitual abusers of children to mend their criminal ways.
One of the child abusers who should be made to face the full weight of the law is a certain Joy Amodu. The 27-year-old security guard reportedly visited a most violent form of cruelty on her 10-year-old niece recently, for alleged bedwetting. After administering a severe beating to the child, reportedly kept in her custody by the father, she went ahead to rub some ointment with a severe burning sensation (known locally as Aboniki) into the little girl’s private parts and eyes, leading to her lapsing into a coma.
So bad was the situation that when she rushed her victim to the hospital, the girl was rejected at the first two ports of call. It reportedly took the intervention of a non-governmental organisation to eventually get her admitted to a military hospital. Her state of health now is still unclear.
But Joy is not alone in this growing trend of denying innocent children the joy of living in their world of innocence. In a similar case in Mabushi, Abuja, Janet Moses, 43, was convicted and ordered remanded in prison custody, pending sentencing on April 28. A News Agency of Nigeria report has it that a neighbour who saw the woman battering a two-year-old child kept in her custody on March 22, lodged a report with the police, leading to her arrest.
Also, in another display of unrestrained cruelty, a 28-year-old woman, Angela Uzoma, described as a “pastor’s wife,” was arraigned in November last year for pouring hot water on her sister. The “crime” of the 14-year-old girl, who was engaged in street hawking to augment the family income, was that she came back home without selling all the pawpaw that she went out to hawk. In a bid to hide the crime, Uzoma reportedly refused to take the girl to the hospital, hiring a nurse, instead, to give her private treatment. There are also cases of sexual abuse, especially involving the rape of minors.
Child abuse, which generally refers to acts of neglect and cruelty against children under the age of 18 years, does not lend itself to a straightforward definition. But the World Health Organisation describes it as “…any act or failure to act that violates the rights of the child that endangers his or her optimum health.” This transcends cases of physical abuse and embraces emotional abuses, which are not visible. But, regardless of the type of abuse involved, it causes very serious emotional harm and trauma. Quite often, the consequences are long-term, physical, psychological, behavioural and societal.
It is also pertinent to note that child abuse cases occur in every family situation across the world, whether in poor or in rich homes. Most importantly, it is usually perpetrated by close relations, as in the case of a British woman who left her three-year-old son locked up alone in the house and went to work, only to return to meet the dead child 20 hours later. Megan McKeon, 24, then told detectives she had left him at home alone 20 times before.
While child abuse is admittedly a global phenomenon, it is the sincerity put into tackling it in different societies that makes the difference. This is why laws are put in place to ensure that the rights of children are protected. The best known of such laws is the 1989 United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, to which Nigeria is a signatory. The law requires the state to act in the best interest of the child. That convention, which has 140 signatories, forms the basis of the Child Rights Act in Nigeria. Unfortunately, many states have refused to domesticate this law, and those who have, only apply the law in the breach.
In Nigeria, many cases of child abuse have either gone unnoticed or are, at best, treated as family affairs. This, undoubtedly, is accountable for the widespread nature of abuse. In the few cases when abusers have been made to face prosecution, in the face of alarmingly glaring evidence, they have been allowed to get away with light sentences. A typical example is the case of Grace Jacobs, who was sentenced to a six-month imprisonment without an option of fine, for inflicting bodily harm on her 10-year-old, born-out-of-wedlock son. The telltale marks of blade cuts inflicted by Jacobs were self-evident.
Since most of the abuse cases take place in private, often caused by close relations of the victims, there is the need for the society to be vigilant and willing to expose the offenders. In many cases, the abusers actually believe they are inculcating discipline in the child. Quite significantly, the cases of Moses and Uzoma would not have seen the light of day if some neighbours had not made it their business to report them.
Besides, when cases of child abuse come into the open, the society owes it a duty to ensure that the perpetrators are not allowed to go scot-free. This is why the sentencing of Jacobs in 2012 by an Ikeja Magistrates’ Court was quite significant. Although many considered the verdict too lenient, it nevertheless served the dual purpose of drawing attention to the often-ignored practice, while also serving as a deterrent to parents who just cannot do without abusing their children.
The government must be actively involved in the fight against child abuse. Some parents go ahead to have children when they are not psychologically and physically ready for parenting. Whenever it is discovered that a child has been abused, either by the caregiver or the parents, the government should be ready to act, and could even take such a child into custody, if need be. The ultimate goal is to give the child, who is the future of the country, the best that he or she can get.
Punch
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