Calabar-based Man And Wife Arrested Over Child Trafficking

A man, identified as Godwin Eze, and his wife have been apprehended by the police for child trafficking in Calabar, the Cross River State capital.

According to Punch, the State Commissioner for Health, Inyang Asibong, handed over the couple to the police at the General Hospital in Calabar after receiving a tip-off that the couple were allegedly stealing babies.

The commissioner affirmed in Southern City News that the hospital management began investigations on the case shortly after the tip-off before handing the couple, who were operating from a shop within the premises of the hospital along Mary Slessor Avenue, over to the police.

She said, “The suspects have been trafficking persons for about five years. The husband had lived in the General Hospital, Calabar, doing this with his wife. There had been suspicion before now, but nobody was really sure.

“He has a shop here. Normally, the authorities think they go home at night, but they do not. What happens is that he deceitfully locks his door from outside when he is inside and when you see the padlock, you think there is nobody there.”

She further said, “He has been having these pregnant girls come around for a long time and presently he has five of them at the same time. The woman brings them to the labour ward, and when they want to deliver, she claims they are her husband’s sisters. But at some point when it became obvious she was lying, she started delivering the girls by herself in an un-conducive environment in the hospital unknown to anyone. The man admitted to the act. We found out that the man has been doing this for five years now. They sell a male child for N200,000 and the female for N150,000.”

Although the state Police Public Relations Officer, Irene Ugbo, said she was not aware of the matter, Punch gathered that they were currently in detention and were being investigated by officials in the Criminal Investigation Department of the State Police Command in Calabar.

Photo credit: Punch