Because their father, Ayodele Ekundayo has no apartment of his own, the little girls are always on the move with the 36-year-old man, who works as an occasional ‘motor boy’ at a cement depot at Fagba area of Lagos.
Ekundayo told our correspondent, “Sometimes, they sleep in the truck with me when we take the loaded cement somewhere. Sometimes, we sleep at the park. Any time I get a new job, they move there with me so they can sleep anywhere available in the vicinity.
“Their mother abandoned them with me when my second daughter was just eight months old. That was two years ago.”
He told Saturday PUNCH he learnt furniture making but has not been able to make a living from it because he could not afford to buy tools, let alone have a workshop.
“I sent my children to school with the little money I make working as a ‘motor boy’ or from the occasional work I get as a labourer. I realised if I needed to take care of my children, I needed a job I could do on a daily basis and get quick wages. That was how I became a ‘motor boy’,” Ekundayo said.
Before he got the job at the cement company in Fagba, he said they used to sleep in an uncompleted building.
According to him, he left his rented one-room apartment, because he could not pay the rent and so, he had to move to the uncompleted building with his children.
Ekundayo, a Kogi State indigene, said, “They started disturbing us there again that the owner of the building wanted to complete the building. Five months ago, I got this job as a ‘motor boy’ and saved about N100, 000. I used N60, 000 to enrol my children in a school nearby.”
But on Friday, November 6, Ekundayo made a discovery which he said nearly drove him mad.
Unknown to him, his co-workers had been taking advantage of his disadvantaged position to sexually abuse his children.
The alleged rapists whose ages range from 24 to 33 are security guards and drivers in the company. The Nigerian Security and Civil Defence Corps, which apprehended them, identified them as John Mahansi, Taiye Ojo (aka Ejima), Deji Adenekan (aka Orobo) and Peter Irobo (aka Apako) and another suspect named Segun who is currently on the run.
Ekundayo said, “I came back from offloading cement that Friday evening and my three-year-old daughter came to me, pointing at her private part. She said, ‘Daddy, pepper, pepper.’ I asked her questions and she kept mentioning the name of Apako. She could not explain well but I had an idea what she was saying. So, I asked her elder sister what was wrong.
“I asked her if Apako did something to her younger sister, then he must have done worse to her, who is older. She then told me that she had been warned that if she told me anything, she would die.
“I told her it was a lie and that I would beat her if she did not tell me the truth. As soon as I gave her a lash of my belt, she started telling me everything.
“She said apart from that Apako, she had also been raped by John, Orobo, Ejimma, Segun.
“Sometimes, when I go out to offload cement and I realise we might come back late, I take them along when they come back from school because I don’t like leaving them by themselves.
“When I was busy offloading cement, my children would stay in the vehicle. I didn’t know some of these drivers sexually abused them those times I was busy carrying cements. When I left them with our security guards, those ones too raped them. If I have a home, would anybody rape my children?”
Ekundayo said he initially could not report the case to the police because of intimidation from the accused men. Afraid of losing the roof over his head, Ekundayo, who shares a room with his children in a room meant for drivers in the company, said when the men warned him to forget about the matter, he simply could not do anything.
But a sympathiser, who heard about the case in the neighbourhood, alerted officials of the NSCDC and the suspected rapists were arrested.
Four-year-old Bimpe’s heart-breaking account of series of sexual abuses by these men would simply move many to tears.
The little girl said the first time she was raped; John said she should “lick the white water that was coming from his penis.”
She said Ojo even showed her and her younger sister a pornographic video before he “put his thing” inside her private part.
Ekundayo said he felt so sad that the men not only raped her daughters but did other dirty things to them.
“My daughter told me that one of them even put his penis inside her ears. It was that bad. I need help because I cannot continue like this. I love my children and want to be able to take care of them.”
Saturday PUNCH learnt the girls had been taken for treatment and tests which confirmed they were actually raped.
Even though the NSCDC has said investigation is still ongoing as the men remain in custody, the father of the children told our correspondent that he needs help to take care of the children.
Our correspondent has contacted the Ministry of Women Affairs and Poverty Alleviation over the possibility of it taking custody of the children till their father found his footing.
An official of the ministry immediately asked that the children be transferred to their custody as the ministry has now taken over their case.
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