Family tortures girl with hot knife, pepper in vagina for alleged theft

A 13-year-old girl is in hospital in Ibadan, with bodily injuries, including on her private part, after horrific torture reportedly by a family, PREMIUM TIMES has learnt.

Community activists and local security sources, Amotekun and State Security Service operatives, revealed the matter to PREMIUM TIMES, with photographs and details of the statements volunteered by the parties involved.

Afees and Suliat Taofik of Bello Street, Boroboro area in Oyo town, had on Monday kept the teen, Aliah Oluokun, to look after their shop, when they alleged a sum of money was missing. The teen’s mum operates a shop beside Taofiks’.

Aliah’s account

Aliah admitted to the theft and took the Taofiks to a set of bricks nearby, where she had kept the money, her family told PREMIUM TIMES. The sum of N170, 000 was found but the couple said N130, 000 was still missing.

The teen insisted what was found was all she took and she did not even count the money before “keeping it”.

She was taken to a local Amotekun office where, according to her, she was first tortured.

The family wanted Amotekun, a community vigilante outfit, to help force her to admit to having removed N130, 000 from what she had taken.

“They too beat me,” she told PREMIUM TIMES by telephone, from her University College Hospital, Ibadan, bed.

But the Amotekun returned her to the Taofiks citing her age. “We said she could not be kept with us and that they should bring her the following day,” a commander, Adebowale Fakayode, told PREMIUM TIMES.

However, the Taofiks continued to hold and torture the girl, this time reportedly joined by their sons, Malik and Abdullahi, she said.

Her uncle, Afees Alaba, said he then intervened and asked that Aliah be freed on the promise that he was going to pay the claimed N130, 000 the following day, Tuesday.

“By that evening, following the torture, the girl was already dying,” Mr Alaba said. “I then begged them to release her; that I was going to pay the remaining money by 4 p,m. the following day even though Aliah said all that was found was all that she took. I even said to reassure them they should keep my land documents until I return with the money the following day.”

Mr Alaba then left for Ibadan, roughly 30 minutes’ journey from Oyo. “Hardly had I got to Ibadan, when her mother, who is my younger sister, called to inform me that they had continued to torture her.”

Torture Galore: “Hot knife, coal stove, fresh pepper”

Apart from trading in the same area, the Taofiks and the Oluokuns also reside in the same neighbourhood where their shops are.

Despite the assurances given by Aliah’s uncle, Mr Alaba, the teen was not released to her mother, who told PREMIUM TIMES she was powerless and her husband, Afees Oluokun, had travelled.

The Taofiks decided to hold Aliah all night during which she was reportedly subjected to severe torture right in the presence of her crying mother.

Aliah was said to have been tortured with a heated knife, plier and fresh pepper.

The knife was used to inflict injuries on her thighs and hands, pepper was applied to her private part, and the plier was used to cause her wounds on her toes, photographs received by PREMIUM TIMES show, complimenting disclosures by Aliah’s family and security operatives.

“The mother kept calling me in the night but I was already in Ibadan and she could not stop them,” Mr Alaba said.

Around 6 a.m. on Tuesday, the family said, “Aliah escaped from the Taofiks’ home”.

“We then found her and took her to a private hospital, called Opabode, which said they could not treat her despite her pains except we obtained a police report,” Mr Alaba said. “That was why we reported to the police before they (the Taofiks) were arrested.”

Aliah has since Thursday been transferred to UCH in Ibadan for better care.

“We were responsible for all the bills in Oyo,” Mr Alaba said.

A former senator, Monsurat Sunmonu, is footing her bills at the UCH. Ms Sunmonu said she has spoken with police authorities, vowing to help the girl and her family get justice.

Police spokesperson for Oyo State, Gbenga Fadeyi, could not be reached via phone calls for comment for this report.

The Taofiks are now in custody at police headquarters in Ibadan and we could not speak with any of them.