The victim, Folashade
carrying her twins
Life, for 28-year-old
Folashade Ayetan, a mother of four, has not been a bed of roses. Without
respite, her life has been garnished daily with psychological, emotional and
physical torture.
Folashade’s troubles began
when she became pregnant 11 years ago at the age of 17, while in Jss 3.
Naïvely, she thought that getting married to a man who promised her heaven on
earth would provide an escape route or, at least, give her succour. Little did
she know that her marriage to a police officer currently serving at Onireke
Divisional Police Station, in Ojo, Lagos, would make her sad.
MY ORDEAL
Looking haggard with her
twins, Taiwo and Taiye, Shade recounts her ordeal to Crime Guard:
“I have come to the media
because this is the only option. I want Nigerians who will read my story to
come to my rescue, save me from the cruel hands of my husband. I live every
minute of my life in fear. No doubt, I have made some silly mistakes but, I t
think I have suffered so much in silence and now, I am speaking out because I
need help urgently.
I was born in 1987. My life
is a very complicated one. I got pregnant when I was in JSS 3 and had a baby
girl and could not continue schooling. Later, I learnt how to sew clothes.
My problem started after my
father chased me out of his house. I began to sleep in a bakery in the area. It
was during this period that I met my husband Michael, a police officer and he
promised to help me out. That was when I began to date him before I started
living with him. My daddy chased me out of the house after he married his last
wife, Iya Liade. she manipulated my father till he chased my mother out of the
house.
FIVE YEARS BEFORE THE BUBBLE
BUST
“We have been together for
about five years now but, we dated for a year before I became pregnant for our
first child. He didn’t pay my dowry. When he came to see my parents, there was
serious disagreement because when I was three months pregnant, he took me to
his village to live with his family in a camp at Akure.
Initially, he told my
parents that we were going to see his parents in Akure. But he kept me there
for almost two years. While I was living with his parents in Ijoka road camp,
his mother taught me how to cook their native food because I am Yoruba and he
is Calabar. He stopped me from wearing trousers and make-up which I obeyed to
make him happy.
Any time we had
misunderstanding, he would beat the hell out of me. Even when I was pregnant,
the beating continued unabated. He refused to give me money to register in the
hospital for ante-natal.
I carried the pregnancy till
I delivered. It was in his mother’s room that I delivered. It was God that
saved me because after giving birth, they took the baby boy, Godwin, who is now
4 years old, went outside for celebration but abandoned me even while the
placenta wasn’t out. It was his father that raised alarm and rescued me.
BATTERING CONTINUES
Three weeks after delivery,
he beat me up mercilessly because I bathed my baby when his mother went to a
village market. Usually when she goes to the village market, she spends three
days before returning, which was why I decided to bath him because Mama was not
around. Two days later, I fell ill. I was sick for about ten days without
medical care.
It got to a point when I was
throwing up and also cleaning my vomit. When I recovered, I went to appeal to
the Bale in the community where we lived to plead with my husband to take me
back to my family in Lagos.
All these while, I didn’t
know my family, especially my mother, had been calling and asking him to bring
me back but he would tell them that he would give me the phone to speak with
them which he never did. When I came back to Lagos, I found out that my family
members made efforts to reach out to me but my husband prevented them because I
didn’t have a phone.
ESCAPE TO THE VILLAGE
When the trouble became
unbearable, I told them that I wanted to go back to my family with my baby,
they refused. They took my seven weeks old baby and chased me out. I
practically begged for transport fare from people which I used to get to my
village in Owo. My maternal uncle took me to the hospital. I was admitted in
three different hospitals. I was at Oke-Mopo hospital before I was moved to
Oke-oja hospital at Iyere-Owo. Later, I was transferred to Oke-Mopo-Iyere
Medical Centre.
When I was discharged from
the hospital, my uncles in Owo invited my father to a meeting to decide my fate
because they felt he contributed to my problems. He honoured the invitation and
after the discussion, he took me back to his house in Lagos. While I was living
with my father, my husband began to plead for forgiveness, saying that it was
the devil’s work and that he was a changed man, that he had gone to different
churches and they said he must come and ask for forgiveness for all the wrong
he did to me otherwise our son would die.
That his life would be
miserable without me. He went to my village to plead with relatives. He
insisted that he couldn’t marry any other person but me. I told him that I
preferred to live under my father’s roof and I was no longer interested and
that I have had enough of the beating, humiliation and misery.
BACK TO MY FATHER’S HOUSE
After I returned to my
father’s house, it did not take time for his attitude towards me to change. He
kept on lamenting that I was a source of shame and disgrace to him and the
family because I gave birth at home and also had a failed marriage. I kept
pleading with him to have compassion on me. I sold fuel. I made clothes for
people to enable me provide for my children.
All I asked of my father was
to shelter me and my children. There was a day I beat his dog for bringing in
disposed pampers from the refuse dump into the house. There was nothing my
father did not say because I beat his dog. He said I must return back to the
father of my children and that I was no longer welcomed in his house.
SUICIDE ATTEMPT
My father frustrated me to
the extent that I drank poison to commit suicide because I wanted to end it
all. Luckily for me, they rushed me to the Grace land hospital. He called my
husband to come and take me back.
That was how I left the
little trading I engaged in to cater for myself and children. When he came, he
took me to his place at Alapere in Ketu Mile 12, and we were living together.
It was as if he was a changed man. Six months later I got pregnant for the
twins. When I was four months gone, his attitude changed again.
……..AND THE BATTERING
CONTINUES
He began to beat me. He got
provoked at any slightest thing.
When I was seven months
pregnant, he beat me, hit my head on the wooden bed and my protruding stomach
on the floor. He tore the clothes I wore, chased me out with only pant. It was
a neighbour that gave me wrapper to cover my nakedness. Our neighbours are
living witnesses to all these beatings.
The constant beating led to
complications to the extent that I had to deliver the twins through caesarean
operation at Gbagada General Hospital. Yet, he could not raise money to pay for
the hospital bills. It was my elder sister and her husband that loaned him
money to pay for the hospital bills. Till date, he paid part of the loan and
withheld the balance.
He harassed my mother who
came to help me nurse my baby after I delivered the twins. She had to go
because of how badly he treated her. Immediately my mother left, he increased
the beating. While my babies were two weeks old, he kept demanding for sex even
when he knew that I gave birth via caesarean session. When I refused, I
received beating.
FIGHT FOR SURVIVIAL
When my babies were four
months, because I didn’t want to be idle, I got a shop where I paid N15, 000 as
rent for six months so that I could sew clothes. But each time we had
misunderstanding, he would destroy my wares and lock my shop. At a point,
neighbours in the compound became fed up with the entire situation and they
kept advising me to leave before he kills me. Yet, I continued to stay because
I felt my family rejected me, where do I go from there?
ABANDONMENT
There was a time he
abandoned the children and I for over a month without coming back home I had to
hawk pure water at Mile 12 to be able to feed the three children. After a
month, he came back again and continued from where he stopped. There was a
particular Sunday he beat me up, used one of the twins Taiye to hit the wall.
He tore my clothes.
REPORTS LODGED WITH WELFARE,
POLICE
The next day Monday, I went
to the Lagos state welfare office in Ikeja to report the case. They told me
that they don’t treat cases that involve officers and their spouses because
they hardly abide by the advice of the welfare. I cried, not knowing what to
do, they told me to go to the police command and report to the provost.
I went to the Police Provost
office and reported the case. He was invited alongside with my father. They did
what they could to address the issue. They asked him to stop beating me, take
care of his family and go to my father’s house and pay my dowry. When I got
home that day, he invited his mother to come and take the children back to the
village since I wanted the police to sack him. Her mother accused me of wanting
the son to lose his job. I said no, all I wanted was for these unnecessary
beatings to stop and that I didn’t want him to lose his job.
SEEKS DISOLUTION OFMARRIAGE
At this point we went back
to the provost office and told them that I was no longer interested in the
marriage. They asked him what he would be giving for the children’s monthly up
keep. He said he would be giving N10, 000 monthly. To me, packing out was not
the issue but where would I go with three children from there? My family
refused to have anything to do with me because he kept threatening all of us
openly that as a police officer, he would kill me and nothing would happen.
That he would only go to
prison for a few years after killing me. I went back to the house only for him
to chase me out with cutlass. I had to run to my mother’s house. Few days
later, they brought the children to my father’s house but he chased them away.
His mother took the children back to the camp in Akure. They lived with her for
about seven months.
PRESSURE ON ME TO CONTINUE
Within this period, I began
to work in Balogun market as a sales girl, to enable me rent a shop and I was
recovering from the hell I passed through. I don’t know how but he traced me to
where I was working and would always come there to beg for forgiveness. He said
I should come back because the children were suffering and missing their
mother.
When I refused, he would
come there and make trouble. He would embarrass me, shout at the top of his
voice, that I am his wife and that I abandoned three children for him. He began
to blackmail me saying that my children were sick in the village and that I
would be heartless to allow them die because of his attitude towards me.
He went about convincing my
family and relatives that the children need their mother and that he wanted me
back. Because of the shame, he left Ketu Mile 12 and rented a room and parlour
( self-contain apartment) at Gabriela Awolowo Street, Ijanikin and brought back
the children from Akure early January this year.
BACK TO BASE WITH SAME OLD
I had no option than to go
back. However, since we began to live in Ijaniki, he then stopped me from
working. He seized my phone and said my family must not call me and I must not
call them. The beating has continued.
He would insult and call my
mother names each time we had misunderstanding. This is the woman that catered
for him when he had accident and was in the hospital. I don’t want him to lose
his job.
All I want is for him to
take responsibility of catering for his children, stop beating me , stalking
and constantly threatening my life. He also threatened to kill all the members
of my family if I leave him. He said he has corked his gun and ready to kill
any of my relatives that questions him about how he treats me.
He also threatened to
disfigure me with acid so that no man would be attracted to me. Nigerians,
please rescue me before he kills me if for nothing, but for the sake of my
innocent children.”When contracted, on the phone, Sergeant Michael, husband of
the victim Folashade, denied beating or threatening his wife. He told Vanguard
that nothing like that happened. I am not aware and I have no knowledge of what
you are talking about
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