Vanguard is reporting a sad look on the faces of
sympathisers and newsmen who had gathered in the female surgical ward of the
Abubakar Tafawa Balewa Teaching Hospital told it all.
Some of them could not control their
emotions as they rained curses on the three heartless men who raped and removed
the eyes of a young woman in Lukshi Village of Dass Local Government Area
of Bauchi State. They could not help but wondered what could have prompted
anyone to sexually abuse the woman and also deprive her of sight.
Languishing in pain on her hospital
bed, the victim, Zainab Mohammed struggled to come to terms with this pathetic
reality as she kept asking God why life has treated her so unfairly, especially
as she may never see again.
Narrating her ordeal to newsmen, the
32- year-old mother of four said on that fateful day, she was returning home
after attending a turban ceremony when she was attacked by three men inside a bush.
According to her: “After attending a
turbaning ceremony in Lukshi, a village in Dass Local Government, I started to
head home to meet my family as there was nobody to cook for them. When I
reached a particular area close to a bush, I saw three men looking at me as I
approached them.
“One of them approached me and said
that he wanted to have sexual intercourse with me and that he was willing to
pay for it, but I objected because I am a married woman. When they saw that I
was not willing to cooperate with them, they pushed me to the ground and
dragged me inside the bush and raped me, one after the other.
“After raping me, one of them
brought out a knife, stabbed and plucked out my right eye with it, while the
other two held me tightly to the ground. He also tried to removed the
left eye,but he could not. But the eye ended up being damaged. After doing
this, they left me in my pool of blood and fled”.
Zainab called on the state
government and well-meaning Nigerians to assist her financially as her husband is
not capable of taking care of all the medical expenses.
The victim’s husband, Mohammed
Usman, who is still traumatized over the predicament of his wife told Vanguard
Metro, VM, the situation has distabilized his family.
Giving account of how he received
the bad news, he said: “I waited for my wife to return from the ceremony
she attended in a nearby village,but she did not show up . When it was getting
dark, I began to get worried and wanted to go and look for her.
Suddenly, some of my neighbours ran
to my house to inform me that my wife was attacked while returning from the
ceremony. What broke my heart was that the attackers did not only rape her, but
also blinded her”.
He called on the state government to
assist him , saying that he was a poor man and cannot shoulder the financial
responsibilities of his wife’s medical treatment.
The state Police Public Relation
Officer, DSP Haruna Mohammed confirmed the arrest of the three suspects
in connection with the incident. DSP Mohammed gave the names of the suspects as
Sabo Rabo of Durr Katanga Village, Bitrus Yakubu of Dado Village and
Mohammed Bamigboye of Durr Katanga Village. According to him: “The three
suspects that were responsible for raping and removing the eyes of a young lady
while she was returning from a ceremony were arrested following some useful
information given to the police by some residents in the area”.
While saying that the suspects
confessed to the crime and will be charged to court, he urged residents in the
state to be conscious of their environment and report any suspicious character
to the police when the need arises.
In his own confession, one of the
suspects ,Bitrus Yakubu, a 45- year-old man, informed that they were instructed
by one native doctor called Galambi to pluck out the eyes of a woman for a
reward of N1million after the operation.
He said: “One native doctor,
Galambi, told me and my colleagues to get him the eyes of a woman. I don’t know
what he intends to do with the eyes, but he promised to give us N1 million
after the operation. We could not resist the offer because of poverty and the
desire to become rich people like our friends”.
Bitrus also revealed that it was
Sabo Rabo and Mohammed Bamigboye who raped the woman and removed her
eyes,adding that it was actually his first time of committing a crime like
that.
In his confession,the native doctor,
Galambi denied sending the suspects to remove the eyes of the woman,but
admitted receiving the eyes from them. “The men approached me to prepare some
charms for them because they wanted protection; so I told them to get the eyes
of a woman, which they agreed to bring.
Another purpose of the charm is to
help them to disappear whenever they want to. I don’t know whose eyes they
removed or how they got it,my own work is to prepare the charms for them,” he
said.
He said he never promised to give
them the sum of N1 million as alleged by the three suspects, adding that as a
native doctor what he demanded from his clients was not strange.
The Head of Ophthalmology Department
of ATBU, Dr .Mohammed Mahdi Abdull who operated on Zainab told VM
that: “When she was taken to the theatre for surgical operation, we
discovered lacerations on the lid of the right eye which was swollen and
the eyeball was already ruptured, but on the left eye, there was no eyeball
because it was completely damaged”.
The doctor expressed optimism that
Zainab may be able to see with her right eye after operating and repairing the
globe.
Follow Me On Twitter &
Instagram: @effiongeton
No comments:
Post a Comment