A Port Harcourt-based businessman, Olatunbosun Olawoyin, says he has been barred from seeing his twin children for nearly a year by his estranged wife, a senior officer of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), who he accused of violating a court-ordered interim custody and visitation schedule.
Documents reviewed by PREMIUM TIMES between Saturday and Monday show that on 29 March 2021, the Rivers State High Court in Port Harcourt granted Mr Olawoyin custody of the children pending the final determination of the couple’s divorce petition.
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The court allowed the children to visit their mother, Oluwakemi Olawoyin, during school holidays and select weekends, provided she communicated the children’s location to the father.
The court emphasised that the children’s schooling and welfare must not be disrupted and required both parents to file undertakings not to breach these conditions without written consent. The judge who gave the order, S.O Benson, retired and died in 2023, prompting the transfer of the case to a new judge.
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Mr Olawoyin told PREMIUM TIMES on Sunday that his estranged wife has refused to return the 11-year-old children (their names withheld) to him after he released them to her for the 2025 Easter holiday, in obedience to the court order. He said she subsequently relocated the children from Port Harcourt to Kaduna without notice.
He added the situation got worse when she blocked him from communicating with the children by phone for the past one month, since January. He said he had no knowledge of their location in Kaduna where she presumably relocated the children.
“Since 13 April 2025, I have not seen my children,” he said. “They have been kidnapped in all practical terms, and I have no idea where they are or which school they attend.”
According to him, the situation has put a six-year scholarship won by one of the children in Port Harcourt at risk.
Mr Olawoyin said he has reported the matter to multiple authorities, including the EFCC, Kaduna and Rivers State Police Command, the National Human Rights Commission, the Code of Conduct Bureau, and the Ministry of Social Welfare.
Father narrates ordeal
In petitions to the Kaduna State Police Command, Rivers State Ministry of Social Welfare, and the EFCC, Mr Olawoyin described himself as a distressed father whose rights—and those of his children—have been persistently violated.
He requested urgent intervention while the divorce and custody proceedings remain pending.
Mr Olawoyin and his wife married on 21 September 2013 and welcomed their twins on 26 October 2014.
Following a breakdown in the marriage, Mrs Olawoyin filed for divorce in August 2020. Mr Olawoyin too filed a counterclaim.
He claims that during the Easter holiday, on 12 April 2025, his wife took the children but willfully refused to return them on 23 April, as agreed, in direct violation of the court order.
The twins were in JSS 1 at a private school in Port Harcourt at the time of their relocation. Mr Olawoyin raised concerns about their education, noting that one of the children is a beneficiary of a six-year secondary school scholarship, which is at risk due to his prolonged absence from Port Harcourt.
On 10 May 2025, the law firm Owubokiri & Co., acting on behalf of Mr Olawoyin, wrote to the Kaduna State Commissioner of Police formally reporting the “abduction” of their children, attaching the certified copy of the court ruling.
PREMIUM TIMES also reviewed documents showing that one of the twins earned scholarship at their school in Port Harcourt (name of the school withheld), in March 2024.
However, a letter from the school dated 6 October 2025, stated that the child had not resumed school since 5 May 2025, risking the scholarship.
Mr Olawoyin said his wife’s withholding of the children in Kaduna directly caused the academic disruption.
The father described the situation as parental alienation, emotional abuse, and a violation of the children’s rights to stable family life and education.
Mr Olawoyin provided WhatsApp screenshots and call logs which appear to show repeated attempts to speak with the children via their mother’s phone from 1 to 25 January. Messages asking about their residence and school went unanswered, and calls were allegedly blocked, according to the screenshots shared by the man.
Mrs Olawoyin responded out of the blue in an instance: “We are in court, I can never kidnap my children.”
Human rights group intervenes
On 25 November 2025, the Human Rights Volunteer Corps (HRVC) petitioned the EFCC to investigate Mrs Olawoyin for allegedly using her position to “abduct” her children and deny Mr Olawoyin his court-sanctioned rights.
The HRVC emphasised the emotional trauma suffered by the children, including putting Araoluwa’s scholarship opportunity at risk, and called for enforcement of court orders to restore their rights.
The HRVC coordinator, Larry Oguego, told PREMIUM TIMES via phone call on Saturday that rulings remain valid until formally overturned.
“Even if we assume, without conceding, that the judge’s passing invalidated the order, it does not justify holding children hostage,” he said.
Mother speaks
In an interview via phone call on Saturday, Mrs Olawoyin said no active court order prevents her from relocating the children.
She argued that the interim order lapsed after the judge’s retirement and death and emphasised that she has not relocated the children unlawfully.
“That order he is referring to was a temporary order. The judge who gave it has retired and died. The case stopped. This is a new case that I filed in Port Harcourt. All those issues were presented before the court. The judge said there was no order before her and that she did not give any such order,” she said.
Her claim that she refiled her case runs counter to her husband’s account, which explained that the suit in court is being sustained by his own countersuit. He insisted that she withdrew her suit. PREMIUM TIMES requested her new filing, but she has yet to share it with our reporter as of the time of filing this report on Monday.
But she explained that her posting to Kaduna made relocation of the children necessary and that she continues to comply with court proceedings, framing her actions as focused on providing for the children and ensuring their welfare.
She denied ignoring or blocking her estranged husband’s calls.
“I only receive calls on WhatsApp. There is no record of his calls on my phone. I do not block him. If he calls me, I will answer,” she told PREMIUM TIMES.
She emphasised that the final divorce and custody judgement is scheduled for 20 February, and urged patience as the courts determine the outcome.
When contacted over the phone on Sunday, EFCC spokesperson Dele Oyewale told our reporter that the issue “is purely a domestic matter and has nothing to do with the EFCC.”
The court orders
But PREMIUM TIMES saw a copy of the ruling delivered by the earlier judge on 29 March 2021.
In the ruling, which the court ordered must subsist till the final determination of the suit, acknowledged Mrs Olawoyin’s presence “in the life of the two children” as “a stabilising factor”.
While granting custody to the father pending the determination of the suit, the court held in the ruling that access to the children of the marriage “will be granted to the applicant (Mrs Olawoyin) by this court on conditions hereunder set in doing so.”
“I have taken note of the fact that the applicant is a working mother and very busy at that. Without touching on the issues for determination in the substantive suit, it is hereby issued by this courts,” the judge said, indicating among other conditions, granting Mrs Olawoyin access to the two children “during Easter, Charismas, 1st and 2nd terms and long vacation.”
The court also held that the couple must share the vacation or holidays “equally and in such a way as to suit the two children of the marriage and without interfering with their school calendar.”
When the children are not on holiday, the court directed that Mrs Olawoyin must give her husband at least 24 hours by SMS in advance “before visiting the two children” at their residence in Port Harcourt. The address was given in the ruling, but PREMIUM TIMES decided to withhold it.
“Should there be any change of residential address, Respondent (Mr Olawoyin) must file a notice of such change at the registry of this court and serve applicant’s counsel accordingly.”
The ruling also gave Mrs Olawoyin permission to take the children to “any decent playground or mall shop within the city of Port Harcourt and return them back to the aforesaid residence.”
It directed the couple to sign, and file an undertaking not to breach the orders, “except with the written consent of this court.”
The court also signalled that the orders could be varied, “if need be, and at the request of the parties or any of them.”
Mr Olawoyin told our reporter on Sunday that no variation of the orders was issued by the court as no party requested it and that no written consent of the court was issued to validate any breach of the orders.
The judge directed in the ruling that the orders will “automatically expire” only “at the final determination of this petition as they are only active, pending the final determination of this petition.”
In an interview with PREMIUM TIMES on Saturday, Lagos-based lawyer Vincent Okafor explained that any valid court order remains enforceable until it is formally set aside, even if the judge who issued it has retired or passed away.
“Any order of court that is not challenged, or that has not been set aside, remains valid… The judgment does not belong to the judge; it belongs to the court,” Mr Okafor said, citing the Supreme Court authority in Ojukwu v. Governor of Lagos State.
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