Chidi Samuel
The Parents of three-year-old Valerie Oruade, accompanied by some sympathisers, on Monday staged a protest over an alleged defilement of their three years old daughter at the gates of University of Benin consultancy Nursery and Primary School Ekenwan campus in Benin City, the capital of Edo State.
The aggrieved parents and the protesters called on the management to produce the staff who allegedly defiled their daughter in school on November 8. Narrating her daughters ordeal, Mrs Oruade said: “My child could not talk because she was so tensed”.
She stated that after reporting the sad incident to the school authorities, “they told me to protect my child’s image and shouldn’t allow anybody to know”, instead of fishing out the man responsible for the crime.
One of the protesters, Jennifer Ero, a child rights protection activist,blamed the school authorities for what she termed sheer negligence. According to her: “We are saying that we send our children to school not to be defiled. If the schools can no longer protect our children it means our children are not safe”.
While reacting to to allegation,Mr Michael Osasuyi, the spokesperson for the University of Benin, said the institution was aware of the incident and that the matter was being investigated by the police and that Justice will prevail.
“When things like this happen, constituted authorities saddled with the responsibilities of taking charge of all of this, swing into action and that is exactly what the police is doing,” he explained.