12th January, 2017
Mr Emeka Ugwuonye, a legal practitioner, took to Facebook to reveal how a little boy, Chinaecherem Ukomadu was brutally beaten by his mentally challenged father in Imo state after the boy returned home at night from playing with his friends.
According to Emeka, he said he got wind of the information through a mail sent to him by a woman who was concerned about the case.
Read the woman’s mail below:
“I am presently in my husband’s village, in Imo State. This morning I woke up to some noise at the gate, I went out, my husband and mother-in-law were outside. My mother-in-law was holding a little boy called Chinaecherem Ukomadu of between 5 to 7 years of age.
“She called me to come closer and look at what the boy’s father did to him. According to people in the village, the boy’s father is mentally unstable and the sister chased his wife away and collected the boy from her when the boy was just 4 months old.
“She later came and dumped the boy some time ago claiming the boy was too stubborn. According to the people, the boy has been subjected to maltreatment of various forms, from going without food to sleeping outside to severe beating and what have you.
“Last night when the boy had finished playing with the other kids, he went home but the father refused him entrance. He kept knocking then decided to go to one of the families around, he was ignored so he went back, the father then allowed him in, gave him the beating of his life and hit him with a rod on the mouth.
“He was screaming and crying and bleeding. Of course, again he slept in the cold outside, as at when I saw him, he had blood dried up all over his body. I could barely look at him without shivering.
“My husband, mother-in-law and everyone was in shock. Long story cut short: my husband took the boy in the car and together with his cousin who knew the whereabouts of the boy’s father’s sister we went to pick up the sister in I think the next village from where we proceeded to take the boy to FMC Owerri.
“While driving there we could barely contain ourselves. My husband had to caution me severally because the sister to the boy’s father was saying annoying things. While the people in the boy’s father’s village were saying that she chased the boy’s mother away and collected the boy at four months, she was busy saying the mother abandoned the boy and she raised the boy that we don’t know the boy, the boy is a devil, the boy is wicked, nobody can live with the boy, the boy is this, the boy is that. People this is a boy of less than 7 years.
“Despite telling her that the boy is just been a child and also reacting to the harshness from those around him, she still kept insisting that the little boy is a devil. Anyway, we have taken him to the hospital. They have cleaned him up but the team to carry out the surgery is yet to arrive.
“The boy is traumatised, he has lost lots of blood, he’s in shock and I still insist he’s just a child who’s been brutalised and denied love all his life. As of now, my husband’s major concern is not the bills but where does the boy go to after the treatment.
“My husband’s cousin is saying that the father’s sister will take him but my concern is that is whether it is this woman who says this child is a devil that should take him. It’s her that raised him in a wicked manner in the first place.
“The boy cannot go back to his insane father. We may say what of the mother but that I don’t know much about her. Also, is there no law against such a thing. Can the law not force the father’s sister to take the father to a psychiatric hospital because that had been suggested but she refused and instead put a child under his care.
“Also are there organisations that can take care of this child? I believe she tried to turn that child into a slave.
“Thank you, Sir.”