The joy of every wedded couple on earth is to be blessed with children. Sometimes, it takes many couples so many years before they could have just a single child. As time goes on, many couple will loose hope. Many couples have fallen into calamity because they are tired of waiting for ‘God’s time.’
But having said that, it takes another dimension with some parents who normally love to be abusing their children after which God has blessed them with good children that will be taking care of them when they become aged.
Even, government on its own part has embarked on series of enlightenment programmes towards child abuse in our society.
In Osun State, there is the Child Right Law. The law has been in existence since the inception of the incumbent administration in the state.
Due to the unflinching passion of the state governor, Mr. Rauf Aregbesola, he created the Ministry of Women and Children Affairs.
This ministry has been looking into various ways of uplifting every child in the state, no matter the political or religion affiliation.
“Welfare of our children is my concern because they are the leaders of tomorrow. So we have to be taking care of them adequately and this has prompted me in establishing a ministry for them with their mothers.
“Anybody taking the issues of our children with levity is playing with his or her tomorrow as they are leaders of tomorrow; and we were like them before we too grew up to the present level”, the governor stated.
However, it was a surprise when a cleric who is supposed to be feeding people with word of God turned deaf ear to all the awareness campaigns and allowed himself to be led maybe by hunger or the devil himself against his own blood son.
The cleric, Prophet Elikanah Ajibade is now in the custody of State Criminal Investigations Department, SCID, of Osun State Police Command, for battering his son, David Ajibade.
The 12-year-old David who is now asking the Juvenile Welfare Centre of State Police Command to looked into the circumstances that led to brutal treatment meted on him by his cruel father and come to his rescue, was said to have been maltreated by his father who inflicted degrees of severe injuries on him.
According to details around the crime as obtained by our correspondent in Osogbo, the boy who is now in the safer hands of JWC, was said to have left home for a church service, though against the will of his father.
The father, a Cherubim and Seraphim prophet in Okinni, a town in Egbedore Local Government Area of the state, had earlier told his son who is his late wife’s third son not to worship in any other church except his C/S church.
It was gathered that Prophet Ajibade on the fateful day, out of annoyance went to the church, interrupted the service and brought out David accompanied with strokes of cane. Efforts by members of the church, The Salvation Army Church, Okinni, to rescue the hapless boy proved abortive as the father reportedly shunned their pleas.
The boy, who told the police that the father started maltreating him since the demise of her biological mother, accounts that the father in company of his stepmother and stepbrother, beat him mercilessly. “When we got home, my dad, the wife and the wife’s son all descended on me. They tied my hands with a rope and they all beat me mercilessly.”
With tears flowing freely from his eyes, David said “after tying me with rope, they started beating me mercilessly. The wife after beating me locked my dad and I inside and took the key away. Then my dad beat me and when he was tired he ordered that I should be rolling inside hot ashes”.
While giving his account on the matter, Prophet Elikanah Ajibade said the boy had been running away from the house for years. He said “he used to run away for weeks and come back by himself; and this one he did that made me annoyed, he ran away for one week without my consent”.
The father, who has never reported to the police anytime his son was missing, stated that he resolved to punish him owing to problems he had encountered while looking for the boy. He denied asking the boy to roll inside hot ashes.
Consequently, operatives of JWC have retrieved the victim (David). He is now in the custody of JWC for proper care.
Meanwhile, the Osun State Commissioner of Police, Mrs Dorothy D Gimba told Friday Magazine that the command would not leave any stone unturned in protecting the rights of the people of the state, most especially the vulnerable ones.
The CP further assured that her men would get to the root of the incident as the investigation into the case had commenced.