The suspect, who resides at Chris Igwilo Street Akapka GRA, 3-3 Onitsha of Anambra State, allegedly used various objects like a broken bottle, knife, and electric iron to harm her house help, identified as Happiness Nwafor, in response to an incident involving her son.
She was also said to have taken the victim to the parents’ house and dumped her there before fleeing to an unknown destination.
She was thereafter declared wanted by both the federal and state ministries of women’s affairs, where the Minister of Women Affairs, Uju Kennedy-Ohanenye, had placed N2m bounty on anyone with useful information on her whereabouts.
Okafor, however, surrendered herself to the Anambra State Police Command days after.
But speaking with journalists when she appeared before the Anambra State Commissioner for Women and Social Welfare, Ify Obinabo, in her office in Awka, the suspect claimed she only flogged the maid for abusing her son, when she suddenly fell on the blades of her cooking gas burner.
She said, “I was driving and my car broke down at about 3 pm that day and I went to buy something.
“When I returned, I met my maid naked on top of my 6-year-old son in my car and when I wanted to beat her, she ran away.
“It was the security men in the area that even caught her and brought her to me.
“When I got home and was preparing dinner at about 9 pm, I started flogging her for what she did, and in a bid to escape, she fell with her buttocks on the blades of the cooking gas.
“She also fell with other parts of her body on the blades. I never inflicted any injury on her as alleged.”
On why she did not take the victim to the hospital when she saw the wounds, the suspect claimed it was already late in the night, adding that she did not see the extent of the injuries that night.
“I couldn’t take her to the hospital the following morning because I had to prepare my children for school. I locked her up in the house so I will take care of her when I return. I later called her people and took her to them.
“I couldn’t have inflicted those injuries on her because she is not the first person I had lived with. There were many others and this kind of thing never happened,” she claimed.
When asked why she fled her house after committing the crime, the suspect denied running away.
“I never ran away. I was the one who turned myself in to the police. In fact, the next day after the incident, my children went to school and I went to work. So how did I run?” she retorted.
Responding, Obinabo described the suspect’s story as a “sharp departure from the victim’s version”, reiterating government preparedness to ensure the case was duly prosecuted and justice served.
She wondered how the suspect could allow anger to take over her, to the point of committing such grievous harm.
“Government must get to the root of this matter to ensure justice prevailed. Meanwhile, my Ministry will continue to go after child abusers, traffickers, and their likes until they are reduced if not totally eradicated,” Obinabo added.
The suspect has been arraigned before the Anambra State Children, Sexual and Gender-Based Violence Magistrate court in Awka and remanded at the state CID headquarters in Awka.
