In this feature, VICTOR AYENI writes about how stalkers of different categories relentlessly pursue and invade the privacy of several victims leading to severe emotional distress, anxiety, and an erosion of their sense of safety
When Grace Osagie logged into her Facebook account one morning in April 2023 and saw over 40 notifications from the same individual, she felt like a deer caught in headlights.
The 27-year-old, who was not an avid social media user and rarely posted on her Facebook account, became quite unsettled by a barrage of unwelcome comments she received from a man named Jerry (surname withheld).
About four months earlier, the secondary school teacher had met Jerry at an event held in a Pentecostal church in Lagos and exchanged phone numbers with him.
Recounting the events that followed to our correspondent, Osagie recalled that the man began harassing her with phone calls, which became increasingly frequent as the days went by.
“When we exchanged numbers, I didn’t have any intention to date him because I was already in a serious relationship, but I noticed the way he kept coming at me and disturbing me, it’s like he wanted us to date so I was quick to define what was between us.
“When he told me he loved me, I explained that I already had a boyfriend, but he refused to accept it and became annoyingly persistent. He started calling me at odd hours.
“Very early in the morning, while I was on my way to work, he would call me on video. By the time I got to the school, I would find multiple missed video calls from him.
“When I protested, he said he wanted to be seeing me and knowing where I was at all times. That’s someone that I was not even dating. Then he began bombarding me with messages on WhatsApp. I had to mute and archive his chats because some of his chats were becoming inappropriate,” Osagie told Sunday PUNCH.
Sensing that he was losing his grip over her, Jerry resorted to stalking Osagie’s social media accounts.
“He had sent me requests on Instagram and Facebook when we first met, but when I saw he was always making sensual comments on my IG photos, I restricted his account. He then started stalking me on Facebook, spamming my photos, sending me private messages, and repeatedly calling me on video via my Facebook Messenger.
“At that point, I told my boyfriend what I was going through, and being a learned person, he called Jerry up on the phone and warned him to stay away otherwise he would take it up legally and get him prosecuted. I proceeded to block him on my social media and that was when he stopped. But it was a crazy experience,” Osagie added.
Stalker tried to coerce me into marriage – Vendor
When a perfume vendor based in Ilorin, Kemi Adesiyan, first received a WhatsApp message from a man named Kazeem, she assumed it was from one of her many clients looking to make a purchase.
However, when the tone and nature of Kazeem’s messages changed, Adesiyan realised he was seeking a relationship, which she made clear she did not want.
In a series of tweets posted on X (formerly Twitter) on April 19, the perfume vendor said Kazeem stalked her for three months which led to emotional distress.
Adesiyan wrote, “I made it clear to him that I wasn’t interested in any relationship with him. He started saying some sort of things that I wasn’t comfortable with and I went ahead and blocked him on all my social media handles because he was following me everywhere. I also blocked the number he chatted me with.
“Ever since then, I’ve been receiving different messages from this guy using different sim (cards) to send me weird text messages. I also got a weird picture frame on my birthday which I later discovered was from this guy. I wasn’t comfortable with it and I had to burn it.”
Not giving up on his stalking move, Kazeem told his Muslim cleric (Alfa) that he was in a serious relationship with the perfume vendor and asked him to pray for their imminent marriage.
Adesiyan continued, “I got a call from an unknown number one night. The caller said he was Kazeem’s Alfa and that he told him we’re in a relationship and we’re already talking about ‘marriage.’ ‘Marriage’ as in? I didn’t understand.
“I didn’t know this person. I’d never seen his picture before yet he had told his family members that I was his fiancee. The Alfa said he wanted to start (a) prayer for the so-called relationship but he said he wanted to talk to me first before he started anything.
“I told the Alfa I don’t know him from anywhere that he’s lying. The Alfa thought I was lying to the extent that I had to use the name of the Qur’an to swear to him before he ended the call.”
With a dose of desperation, Kemi said Kazeem continued to bombard her with calls and text messages using different phone numbers.
“I kept on blocking all the numbers and he was still calling with other numbers saying all sorts of things. When I finally answered the call and I asked him why didn’t he stop calling me after the blocking and all, he said he thought I was forming hard to get. Like how?
“In the last video of myself I posted here (on X), I never shared my location or tweeted anything relating to where I was. I got this message from him. I was really scared when I read the message because I didn’t even understand what he was saying. He has been stalking me!
“I told him I was going to report him to the police station if he didn’t and he laughed and said I should stop joking because he knows I can’t. He has been coming to my school calling my phone and also giving people my number to call me out if someone wants to buy perfume in the night.
“Luckily for me, I wasn’t in school. It was later that he told me he came to look for me in school and he wasn’t able to see me that night. He stays in Ilorin,” Adesiyan added.
On April 20, the perfume vendor shared an update on X that Kazeem had been arrested by the police following her report.
She wrote, “Concerning the issue of Mr Kazeem, I reported him to the police and I was asked to convince him to meet with me and he agreed. I never knew he was going to show up. He did show up at the agreed location and he was apprehended.
“He was taken to the police station for proper interrogation. Mr Kazeem was made to sign an undertaking that he’ll never message, call, or stalk me again.”
A disturbing pattern
The United States Department of Justice defines stalking as “a pattern of repeated and unwanted attention, harassment, contact, or any other course of conduct directed at a specific person that would cause a reasonable person to feel fear.”
According to the Rape, Abuse and Incest National Network, stalking, like crimes of sexual violence, is about power and control, and laws defining it differ from state to state across the US.
Anti-stalking laws were enacted in the US when a young actress named Rebecca Shaeffer, who was living in California USA, was shot to death by an obsessed fan who had stalked her for almost three years.
In Nigeria, the provisions outlined in this section of the Violence Against Persons (Prohibition) Act 2015 “send a clear message that stalking is a serious crime with severe legal consequences and survivors can seek justice and protection from their stalkers,” according to the Centre for Social Awareness, Advocacy and Ethics.
Sunday PUNCH gathered that in Nigeria, a former partner, lover, acquaintance, coworker, or even a stranger can become a stalker who frightens their targets and manifests in a variety of ways.
Findings by our correspondent revealed that stalking behaviour often involves unwarranted contact, harassment, tracking, or threatening someone including making threats against someone, and non-consensual communication, such as repeated phone calls, emails, text messages, and unwanted gifts.
Other forms of stalking include repeated physical or visual closeness which involves waiting for someone to arrive at certain locations, following someone, or watching someone from a distance.
A study published by Jude Okoye et al, in African Journals Online in 2022, pointed out that “although anti-stalking laws are gender neutral, most stalkers are men and most victims are women.”
The United Nations Women identifies online stalking as one of the “new forms of violence” and technology-facilitated gender-based violence which exacerbates existing forms and patterns of violence against women.
In an online article, RAINN highlighted several examples of how stalkers deploy technology in a bid to harass their victims.
“Posting threatening or personal information about someone on public internet forums. Video-voyeurism, or installing video cameras that give the stalker access to someone’s personal life
“Using GPS or other software tracking systems to monitor someone without their knowledge or consent. Using someone’s computer and/or spyware to track their computer activity,” the article noted.
Checks by our correspondent showed that while there are statistics of criminal stalking in several developed countries, there are none in Nigeria due to few instances of people reporting the crime.
Victim curses stalker
Also sharing her experience with a stalker, a mechanic engineer, Precious Adenle, said despite blocking the man, he kept harassing her with phone calls until she resorted to placing curses on him.
She said, “I experienced something similar years back I resorted to curses at some point because I was frustrated and teary at some point. This person would call me as early as 6 am I kept blocking and blocking his numbers. He said he was in love with me.
“At first, I thought it was a fake person or using someone’s identity but after probing I found out that he was a real person. He was the best-graduating student of his set at Kwara State University and I wonder how he achieved that.
“He would boast and disturb me with calls saying he’s destined for me. It was his conviction that we were destined together for me. It was crazy and confusing. He was also giving material or financial promises. I kept ignoring his calls and stopped responding to him yet it wasn’t stopping It’s scary because these stalkers always know something about you before they even reach out to you.
“My last ever response to him was one morning at 6 am. It was then I cursed him for putting me through such (I normally don’t curse people) I actually think he still called after then but I didn’t pick up as usual I can’t remember everything vividly but somehow I got free after a while.”
More survivors speak out
A financial analyst, John Etteh, in an interview with our correspondent, narrated how his former girlfriend created different profiles that she used to harass him on social media.
“We dated for a while before we broke up,” Etteh stated. “But this lady was determined not to let go, but to make my life a living hell. She began to stalk me on X and leave insulting remarks on my posts. She did the same to me on Instagram until I had to change my account’s settings to private. She went as far as stalking me on LinkedIn and messaging my former workplace.”
He added, “She later turned on my current girlfriend and began trolling her to the extent that it nearly affected our relationship. She still stalks us, but we now changed the settings of our social media accounts.”
Also sharing his experience, an engineer, Collins Nwanze, told our correspondent how he was stalked by a gay man on social media.
He said, “I first received this guy’s friend request on Facebook sometime last year. His name is Bolaji (surname withheld) and he started messaging me almost immediately after I accepted his request.
“There was nothing on his account that would suggest that he was a homosexual, so I had no suspicion when he started chatting me up.
“He got my phone number from my profile and started sending me messages and complimenting my physical looks. When he asked me a lewd question one day, I just told him off. But that didn’t stop his messages which I muted. One day, out of the blue, he sent me a nude photo of himself. That was it for me, I blocked him everywhere. That was how it stopped.”
In October last year, popular beauty influencer, Adeola Diadem, met a stalker whom she said had created different Instagram accounts to harass her, professing to love her.
In a video shared by Sabi News, the mother of one slammed the man for stalking her and showed him the security agents who were present with her.
“What kind of love is that? You are looking for trouble. He has different handles he is always using to message me ‘my love,’ ‘my wife,’ ‘my this.’ Who is your wife?
“After today, I don’t want to see you here again. If you come back here they will beat you up o,” she can be heard saying in the video while the unidentified man wore a weird smile on his face.
She revealed the stalker had shown up in the past and got beaten up, yet he was undeterred.
In another video, the influencer, amidst tears, revealed that the man’s stalking was becoming frightening, with the suspect insisting that he wanted her love in return.
“I only watch things like this in movies. This is getting scary at this point. I’ve asked if he wants money he keeps saying I want you. I’m tired,” she lamented.
In another post on May 9, Diadem raised an alarm that her stalker sent her a text message from inside prison.
“Not my stalker texting me from Kirikiri. My tired is tired! This guy has frustrated the living daylight out of me. Look, I’ve done everything to this guy. Nothing dey shake am o. Tell me why someone who’s supposed to be in prison texting me and telling me he’s planning a better life for us. Iwo ati tani (you and who)?” she wrote on Instagram.
A fearful ordeal with an e-hailing driver
A Lagos-based hair stylist, Sade Adehun, who spoke with Sunday PUNCH claimed that she was stalked physically and virtually after she patronised an e-hailing cab driver.
Adehun said she had hired the online ride from Apapa where she had gone to pick up some skincare products but noticed that the driver whose name she gave as Stanley was trying to engage her in conversations.
She said, “During the ride, he kept cracking jokes and I tried to be polite and maintained a smile. I don’t normally engage drivers in chit-chats because it could invite unwanted harassment, so I kept my cool.
“When I alighted at my house, my sister who was outside told me this driver waited for a while and had leered at me as I got down. For several weeks, he kept calling me on my phone, sending me messages on WhatsApp, and trying to ask me out.
“What annoyed me the most was the audacity he had to start showing up at our house from time to time. This was a married man, yet he wouldn’t leave me alone. I felt unsafe because I felt this Stanley guy was always watching me.”
Adehun disclosed that the stalking stopped when her siblings confronted Stanley and warned him to stop visiting their house.
“I had to cry out for help to my family that if anything happened to me, they should hold him responsible and they confronted him one day he came. That was the last time I saw him. My siblings said he was laughing like a fool when they confronted him. I think that man is a psychotic being,” she added.
Stalking punishable by law – Lawyers
A legal practitioner, Chinedu Ugonna, in a chat with our correspondent, noted that survivors of stalking should file a restraining order as the Violence Against Persons (Prohibition) Act 2015 protects them against all forms of violence including stalking.
He added that such culprits should be reported to the police, especially if they are issuing threats to their victims or their friends and families.
“They can file a petition for a restraining order, under the Violence Against Persons (Prohibition) Act 2015. This act provides legal protection against various forms of violence, including stalking and harassment. It’s important that they also keep evidence of the stalking behaviour in the form of text messages, emails, voice notes, or witnesses’ testimonies.
“The acts of ride-hailing drivers fall under the purview of Nigeria’s Cybercrimes Act of 2015, which creates criminal responsibility for a variety of forms of cyberstalking, including repeatedly sending offensive, indecent, obscene, or menacing messages via public electronic communication networks.
“Stalking is a criminal offence in Nigeria and the provisions of Section 17 of the Violence Against Persons (Prohibition) Act 2015 address stalking. It outlines its criminalisation and prescribes strict penalties for offenders. Section 17(1) provides that any individual found guilty of stalking faces imprisonment for up to two years, a fine not exceeding N500,000, or both.
“Also, Section 17(2) extends accountability to those attempting to perpetrate stalking, imposing a penalty of imprisonment for a term not surpassing one year, a fine not exceeding N200,000, or both while Section 17(3) highlights the culpability of individuals inciting, aiding, or counselling others to engage in stalking, punishable by a similar term of imprisonment or a fine not exceeding N200,000 or both,” Ugonna explained.
Also, a lawyer and social worker, Ayobami Richard, pointed out that in line with Section 24 (1, 2a, and b) of the Cybercrimes Prohibition and Prevention Act, 2015, “it is crucial to be aware of the legal implications of our online actions. This act serves as a reminder that cyberstalking and cyberbullying are not only morally wrong but also punishable by law.”
She added, “The prevalence of cyberstalking and cyberbullying on social media in Nigeria is a growing concern. The consequences of these actions should not be overlooked, as outlined in the Cybercrime Prevention and Prohibition Act 2015. Our online interactions have real-world legal implications and are essential is that we are all responsible for our actions on the Internet.”
‘Stalkers may need counselling’
Speaking with Sunday PUNCH regarding the different categories of stalkers, a psychologist, Kolawole Afolabi, explained that these individuals are motivated by different impulses.
He explained, “Some are rejected stalkers – they were rejected by former partners or individuals who scorned them, and their motivation may involve revenge or reconciliation.
“Some stalkers also seek intimacy, even if the target is someone they barely know. They strongly believe within themselves that the victim is their true love, despite evidence to the contrary. Then some resort to stalking because they lack social skills or are unable to verbalise their sexual needs.
“The potentially dangerous category of stalkers are predatory stalkers who stalk their victims as a prelude to a sexual attack or resentful stalkers who intend to frighten and distress the victim.”
Afolabi further stated that stalkers may be influenced by a range of factors which include attachment issues, personality disorders, and cultural notions.
“Certain personality disorders, especially Cluster B types (like borderline, narcissistic, and antisocial personality disorders), have also been found to be prevalent among stalkers. They would need psychological intervention which might include professional counselling to reduce the tendency towards stalking.”
