A nine-year-old boy,
identified only as Kingsley, was on Thursday abandoned at a filling station at
Adetola bus stop on Ijaiye Road, Agbado, Lagos State, by his mother.
It was learnt that the
mother, Blessing, allegedly tortured him for greeting a neighbour.
She was said to have
brought the boy from Ojuelegba, where they live and dumped him at the station
around 7am.
Punch gathered that
Blessing left the area after telling the child that she wanted to buy some
items at a nearby shop.
Some Good Samaritans,
however, later bought food for the kid before he was taken to the Ijaiye Police
Station around 11am.
Kinglsey’s body was
full of scars for which he held his mother responsible.
“Mummy beat me because
I greeted our neighbour. She and the neighbour are quarrelling and she warned
me not to greet her. She beat me with a stick when she saw me with the woman,”
Kingsley said.
The primary two pupil
said he had been a victim of malnutrition and abuse since her parents divorced
each other.
“My mother and I moved
to Lagos from Calabar (Cross River State) after she divorced my daddy.
“I live in Ojuelegba
with her and my stepfather, Jonathan. She beats me every day.
“She will give me
lashes for not waking up early to do domestic chores. At times, she won’t give
me food to punish me.”
A Good Samaritan, who
did not want his name in print, said he saw the boy sitting helplessly in a
corner in the filling station.
He added that the boy
was so hungry that he gulped the food and drink that were bought for him.
He said, “I was coming
back from the office and popped over to buy petrol.
“I saw the boy sitting
in a corner. There was blood in his head and hands. We decided to buy him rice
and a drink. He was taken to the Ijaiye Police Station and they promised to
take him to hospital to treat his injuries.”
The Supervisor of the
filling station, Adeola Olufunwa, said she was nearly detained at the station
on the matter.
She said, “I was the
one who noticed the boy’s presence around us and I alerted my colleagues.
“But funny enough, the
police wanted to detain me for a case I knew nothing about.”
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