Edu
A 13-year-old girl, Precious Edu, has accused the brother-in law of her employer of pouring hot water on her.
Edu, who said she was denied the
opportunity of attending school after she was brought to work with
Esther Amunde and her brother-in-law, Papa, in Calabar, Cross River
State, said Papa poured the water on her after accusing her of splashing
water on him.
She said after the hot water left some
burns on her neck, shoulder and chest, she was left to wallow in pains
for two days until neighbours took her to the hospital for medical
attention.
Narrating her ordeal to PUNCH Metro
on Saturday on her sick bed, Edu, who is currently being treated at the
Calabar General Hospital, said she was brought to Ekorinim area of the
state from Obudu in the northern part of the state to work as housemaid
on the agreement that she would continue her secondary education.
But the situation changed as she was
allegedly denied schooling by Amunde, who insisted that Edu must not be
distracted from taking care of her little son.
Edu said, “Sometime in 2012, one woman,
Amaman appealed to my mother to release me as a housemaid to her sister,
Esther Amunde, residing in Calabar because she needed somebody to stay
with her.
“When my mother accepted, it was with
the understanding that I would continue my schooling. I initially stayed
with Amunde’s mother in Obudu for three months before Amunde came
during Obudu new yam festival in August 2012 to take me to Calabar.”
Edu said on getting to Calabar, she
worked full time as housemaid until September when she expected that she
would resume school with other children.
She said she reminded Amunde to register
her in a school in Ekorinim, but she turned down the request, saying
her work was to take care of her son.”
Edu said, “Amunde refused to register me in school insisting that my duty in her house was to take care of her (Amunde) son.
“I was attending Girls Secondary School
in my village and I was in JS-1. Even when I was with her mother
(Amunde) briefly before coming to Calabar, she allowed me to go to
school. But my boss said because of her son, I cannot attend school.”
Edu alleged that in the course of carrying out her duties, she was maltreated and abused by Papa.
She alleged that it was Papa that poured the hot water on her after a slight misunderstanding.
She said, “In the morning of March 9, I
unplugged a kettle and was turning the water in it into a bucket when
Papa said the water splashed on him. He soon brought a smaller bowl,
dipped it into the bucket of hot water and poured it on me.
“When I told my boss about the incident,
she neither reacted nor did anything to the burn. It was after my skin
had had started peeling because of the burn that Amunde gave me two
tablets of Panadol to use.
“However, when I went to fetch water
from the borehole five days later, some neighbours saw my peeling skin
and screamed. One of them took me to the general hospital.”
At the hospital, a nurse, who identified
herself as Alice, said a child rights activist, Mr. James Ibor, was
called and he, in turn, alerted the police.
Ibor said, “We have made written
requests to the Cross River State Commissioner of Police to effect the
arrest of Amunde and Papa to face the law because what they have done
amounts to felony.”
The activist said what they did by taking Udu from her mother to serve as housemaid was human trafficking.
He said Udu would thereafter be taken to
an orphanage where she would eventually be taken back to her parents
after the wound had healed.
Efforts to get Amunde and Papa to speak on the issue proved abortive.
When contacted, the state Police Public Relations Officer, Mr. John Umoh, said he was yet to be briefed of the incident.
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