No fewer than 47 children have been evacuated from a facility in Ile-Ife, Osun State, where women were apparently impregnated and their babies sold off by operators.
An undergraduate was also among the numbers of women rescued at the facility, which is said to be operating under the guise of an orphanage in Osun state.
Olubukola Olaboopo, who is the Women, Children and Social Affairs Commissioner for the state, and other officials of the ministry and police sealed off the facility identified as Oroyemi Elizabeth Covenant Home and Care Centre.
Olaboopo told The Nation on the phone on Saturday that government received reports on the goings-on in the building over a period of three to four years suggesting that there were some illegal activities there.
She said despite warnings by the government, the owner persisted, thus breaching the Child Right Laws, and resulting in the closure of the building.
“We have gotten several reports over a period of 3-4 years, reporting how the children in Oroyemi Elizabeth Covenant Home and Care Centre are malnourished and the environment have been very dirty and how some illegal activities have been going on more or less like a baby factory and many more allegations,” she said.
“We rescued 47 children; 10-15 adults girls are there. Those with physical disabilities,among whom is an undergraduate of Osun State Polytechnic, Iree, were among those that were rescued. Most of them were crying, they refused to follow us but we were able to take three of them.
“As at this (yesterday) morning, the matron who is taking care of those adults just told me that it seems two of them are breastfeeding. When we interrogated them, they said they have never given birth to a child. So it means that we want to know who got them pregnant when they are not married.
(C) Control TV 2020.
