IPO denies knowledge of alleged molestation of three-year-old by ex-Dangote worker, mother weeps

Juliana Francis

Ms Favour just had a baby about a month before the defilement of her three-year-old daughter, identified simply as Success, at the Ibeju-Lekki area of Lagos State

Favour and her two children just moved into the community and her short stay there had been characterised by trauma and nightmares.

On the fateful day of October 29, 2023, Favour left three years old Success playing with other children, while she was in the house tending to the new baby.

After a while, she came and saw other children still playing, but Success was nowhere to be found.

After hours of searching for the child, Favour strapped her new baby to her back and head for the nearest police station to report Success missing.

Just then she saw Success and immediately knew something was wrong. Someone had taken time to bath the child, she walked awkwardly and appeared to have been crying.

She said, “I had worn her gown on trousers, but someone had worn her gown backwards and it was open. She reeked of alcohol and under the trouser there were four holes to show that someone used fingers to perforate it. Her face looked like someone had beaten her.

“When I asked her where she had been, she said uncle put his hand inside her body and slapped her. She was crying. This guy drugged my baby, beat and then sexually molested her. I asked which uncle, she took to the house of Mr Frederick Decrek Nukpowaku.”

She said an Igbo boy, selling close to the house, told her he saw when Frederick sent the child to go and buy biscuits for him, and after the child returned with the biscuits, she stayed long in Frederick’s room.

Favour added, “When I got to Frederick, I found him in bed, drunk. When I asked about my daughter, he admitted that she had been with him for hours and that she had just left. I asked him if he didn’t know that I would be looking for my daughter due to the long hours he kept her in his room.

“Frederick camped my daughter since 11am and by the time I was speaking with him, it was 4pm.  I then asked him what he did to Success that she was complaining he put his ‘hand inside her body.’ I also asked him why he bathed my child.

“He said that he was in the house with his friend Desmond, Success, and some Jehovah’s Witness preachers, that they were all in the house since that morning. He denied touching or doing anything to my daughter. I told him that God would punish him.

“When I took her home and removed the shorts, I noticed white stuff was oozing out of her private part and the private part was reddish.

“Success was crying, saying her bum-bum was hurting her. This happened on a Sunday, 29th October 2023. In the morning, my daughter was still in pain. She could not even sleep with pants on.

“When I wanted to bath her in the morning, she started screaming that I should not wash or touch her private part, that uncle put his hand inside her body.”

She later decided to seek the advice of an elderly man in the community, who advised her to go to one Mr Olisa, one of the elders in the community.

She said, “When I got there, Olisa asked why I didn’t report the incident that same Sunday it happened. I told him that I thought it was a minor issue, but I had to take steps to seek redress because my daughter was in pain.

“When Frederick was invited, he said he bought Success a biscuit and that when he wanted to go and bath, my three-year-old child told him that she wanted to bath with him, so he carried her into the bathroom and they bathed together.

“He was asked why he bathed with another person’s child inside a bathroom. One of the elders wanted to slap him. It became rowdy and the meeting was adjourned. This happening on the 30th of October 2023.”

The case was later moved to the Baale’s House. According to Favour, Baale said that he did not know how to handle the issue because Frederick, who works with Dangote Refinery as a foreman, is well-liked in the community.

He is said to be generous with his money and used to buy local gin, otherwise known as Ogogoro in local parlance, for interested residents in the community.

As the Baale could not do anything about the matter, Favour went to Akodo Police Station.

She said, “When the Baale called for another meeting, I didn’t go. I heard Frederick at the meeting confess to molesting my daughter, claiming that he didn’t know what came over him. He told them that he didn’t want the police involved. The community agreed at the meeting that there should be a settlement without involving the police.”

Favour was then approached by the Baale’s son, who asked how much she had spent on medical care for her daughter so that Frederick would refund it.

The Baale’s son told her that if she took the case to the police, that the police would only end up extorting Frederick and Favour. She said that Frederick also came to her, asking for clemency.

Favour said, “Mr Frederick told me that he was shy of making confessions and that the deed had already been done and that everyone was a sinner.

“They offered me money, pleading with me to forgive and forget. I told them that Success’s father was coming for a meeting with them and that they should wait for him.  When I got home, I was about to bathe my baby, when three elders from the community came to me. They also started pleading, that I should allow the case to stop at the community level. After they left, another set came; Desmond and John. Desmond shares an apartment with Frederick. Both men told me that Olisa had been asked to envelope some money to give me for the treatment of my daughter. Again, I rejected it.

“Even as they were pleading with me to forgive and forget, Desmond said that what Frederick did was evil, while his friend John said that if it was his child, he would have ‘silenced’ Frederick.”

Akodo Police Station told Favour that immediately she saw Frederick in the community, she should alert them. She did exactly that and Frederick was arrested on the 6th of November 2023.

The movement to and from the police station took time and Favour left Success with her lesson teacher. When it was getting late, she tried to call the teacher, but could not get her due to poor network.

Olisa got information that the matter had been taken to the police and became very furious that Favour still went to the police despite all the pleadings by elders in the community and the alluring promise of money.

While Favour was trying to get her daughter’s teacher on the phone, the teacher took the child home. The teacher was unaware of the unfolding drama in the community and unaware that her ward’s mother was not around.

The teacher got to the front of her ward’s home and saw an intimidating crowd calling for the head of the absent Favour.

Favour said, “I heard the crowd was shouting, asking for the woman who dared to get Frederick arrested. Olisa said he would not allow a stranger to come into the community and cause problems, instead, the stranger should leave the community.”

Favour said that she also heard that her landlady dragged Success from the teacher, stripped her in the presence of the crowd, shouting and asking if what happened to the child endangered or harmed her in any way.

Favour said, “A policeman living in the community told them that what they were doing to my child was wrong. They refused to allow Success and her teacher to enter the compound. They also told the teacher to stop teaching Success. The teacher called me, saying I should come and collect my daughter at her place, that she didn’t want trouble.

“She said she would no longer be teaching Success. When I got home, Olisa sent someone to tell me to come and see him around 8am, I told the person to tell him that I needed to be somewhere at that hour.

“Our landlord’s aunt said we should pack out that night; that I had the gut to arrest Frederick despite all the pleas. Different women in the community came to attack me verbally. Some said although what Frederick did was wrong, that people had pleaded with me after all and offered me N20,000, that I shouldn’t remain adamant.”

Favour said that she was tensed and scared that night because of the animosity exhibited towards her and her daughter.

“That night, I slept with my one eye close and I kept fearing that someone would enter through the window to hurt us. The window had no protector. The following day, our landlady returned our rent and asked us to leave the community,” Favour said.

She added that on the 12th of November 2024, the elders of the community went to Akondo Police Station, where the Investigating Police Officer (IPO), woman Corporal Raheem granted bail to the alleged perpetrator in the sum of N250,000.

The co-founder of Advocate for Children and Vulnerable Persons Network (ACVPN), Mr Ebenezer Omajelile, said that the granting of bail to Fredrick contravenes the Lagos State Child Rights Law (CRL) and the Violence Against Persons Prohibition Act (VAPP 2015).

He added, “Defilement and rape cases are not bailable offences anywhere in the world. The criminals who do such are the bad eggs in the Criminal Justice System.”

Favour recalled that she was given a police report to go to a hospital for a medical test on her daughter, where she was asked to pay N10,000.

It was at the hospital that one of the nurses, who heard her crying about the defilement of her little girl, advised her to go to Advocates for Children and Vulnerable Persons Network (ACVPN) if she truly wanted justice.

Favour said, “Before I raised the money for the medical report, Akodo Police Station had released Frederick. After I got the report, I gave it to the IPO, and she collected and placed it nonchalantly under a file.

The complainant and the alleged perpetrator were asked by the IPO to see the Divisional Police Officer.

Favour said: “I narrated what transpired between my little girl and Frederick to the DPO. When the DPO asked Frederick to state his side of the story, he denied touching Success. He lied. The DPO said Frederick and I should go out and discuss, and that whatever we agreed on, we should let him know.

“I went to the IPO and told him the matter should be charged to court and the IPO became very angry. She told me that if I wanted the case to go to court, I should drop N10,000 for a Black Maria and I must drop it immediately. She also said that I should drop N6,000 for a cab to court. I told her no problem that I would go and source for the money.”

Favour said that the IPO called her another day, and asked her if she had a photocopy of the doctor’s result with her.

“I asked her if she had misplaced the result I paid N10,000 for or why was she asking me for a photocopy. She said that she couldn’t find it. I told her that if she had misplaced it and needed a copy, she should go to the hospital and get a copy,” said Favour.

The matter was eventually transferred to the Ikeja Gender Unit, Lagos State Police Command and one Mr Olakunle Orebe was assigned as the IPO.

Favour said, “The Gender Unit now said I should go and bring money to hire a vehicle to take policemen to the scene of the crime at Ibeju-Lekki. I screamed! Just to get to Ikeja with policemen from Akodo, I spent over N7000.”

Favour alleged that when IPO Kunle eventually came to the community, he was accommodating and jovial with residents supporting Frederick, while he was hostile to those who tried to tell him what Frederick did to her daughter.

She said, “Before Kunle came, a woman working at the Dangote Refinery with Frederick, who has been following us to the station and everywhere, giving money to people and fighting on behalf of Frederick came again to the community. She told residents that the police were coming to the community for an investigation and that they should help Frederick.

“When IPO Kunle came for his investigation, he joked, laughed and spoke Yoruba Language with those supporting Frederick. When he asked for my witnesses, I took him to Omo Igbo, who saw when Frederick sent Success to go and buy biscuits and then camped the child in his room for hours while I searched everywhere for her.

“Kunle asked the boy questions but would not allow him to respond and at a point, the boy got angry and then IPO Kunle tried to instil fear into the guy. While the woman from the Dangote Refinery, who has been following IPO Kunle, engaged the boy in conversation in Igbo. She told the boy that he would be arrested.

“Kunle said that the boy who was my witness didn’t want to talk, I told him that he was the person who deliberately made the boy uncomfortable. As he was leaving, he said that he would call me. To date, he has not called.

“I was expecting Kunle to call me that the matter has been moved to court so that Success can get justice, but the next thing I heard was that Frederick had been released. I called Kunle and told him that the suspect he claimed to have arrested and was investigating was going about in the community.

“I asked him if that was how he used to do his investigation. He said that Frederick could not run and that he knew where and how to get him. To date, Success is still complaining especially when I am bathing her. I need justice for my daughter.”

Favour said that she eventually got connected to a member of the ACVPN, identified as Harmony Tachie, and started discussing with her about getting justice for her daughter.

Tachie, who has been following the case, revealed that the test result showed that the child was defiled. She was vexed that Frederick was released instead of being charged to court.

She said, “Since the matter got to ACVPN, we have been fighting to get justice for the child. I don’t know when the Lagos State Police Command became Judge and jury in a defilement case involving a three-year-old girl.

“Medical report shows defilement and the three-year-old girl said that it was Frederick that put his hand inside her and that her bum bum was hurting her. My question to Lagos State Police is this; if they are releasing Frederick because they believe he is innocent, they should produce the person who molested that child.

“It’s like the police are trying to frustrate the mother of the child, to make her give up on the case. For God’s sake, this is a three-year-old child we are talking about!

“ACVPN’s Position on this case is that the Ikeja Gender Unit of the Lagos State Police Command, should do the needful by applying the Lagos State Criminal Code Section 137, and the Nigeria Police Force Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) to ensure there is closure to the traumatised three years old victim and her mother.

“We will not accept any form of illegal approach to this case! The Gender Unit, Lagos State Police Command Ikeja cannot turn itself into both the prosecutor, jury and judge! The alleged perpetrator is walking free as if nothing happened. What do we call or say about what happened to the three-year-old and her mother? Victims of circumstances or what?

“No form of excuse will be tolerated concerning justice for this child because more funds were expended on this case right from its inception on arrest and visits of the Police to the scene of the crime.”

Our reporter contacted Frederick, who denied the allegation levelled against him, stressing that Favour had been feeding everyone a packet of lies.

He said that Favour had vowed to show him that she was a Warri lady and would ensure he spent 21 years’ imprisonment because he rebuffed her sexual advance, even after she entered his room and grabbed his manhood to arouse him.

He said, “Almighty God knows that I am innocent of this allegation. She wanted me to have an affair with her, but I refused. On 27^th October, I was naked, she walked into my room, that was the day she wanted to seduce me, but I refused. I am sorry to mention this, but she grabbed and held onto my manhood. I told her to stop it and warned her to stop coming to my house!”

He explained that the drama between him and Favour started when she was pregnant with her second child. She used to come to him to ask for money and food, and he used to assist her. She told him that the man who impregnated her had bolted, abandoning her with children.

“She used to cry and complain of hunger. I used to pity her. If I didn’t have cooked food, I would give her raw food. After she put to bed, she changed.

“She suddenly started coming to my house at past 11pm or 5am. I had to warn her to stop because people might start thinking something was going on between us,” said Frederick.

He said his warning did not go down well with Favour, who felt he no longer wanted to be assisting her.

“I told her that I wouldn’t stop assisting her, but she must come at an ideal hour. There was a day she came, I was watching a movie with my friend Desmond when I heard her voice, I asked her to come back, but I was busy.

“She forced herself into my apartment. There was another day she walked into my room, went straight to my pot and started dishing food. I was angry, I asked her when such behaviour started. She should have asked me. She’s not my wife or my lover!”

He said that Favour also complained that he was limiting her entrance to his apartment and she did not like it.

“She used to ask me if she was not woman enough or pretty enough for me. She also asked me if it was because she was breast-feeding, that after six months, she would take the baby to her grandmother in the village. I have never told her that I was interested in her,” said Frederick.

He stated that it was after she entered his room and grabbed his manhood, that he stopped her from coming to him anymore.

He recalled that the incident happened on a Friday and on Sunday, Favour came, pleading with him to assist him with his cooking gas, that she needed hot water to bathe her baby.

Frederick said, “It was after she returned the gas and left that I saw the daughter. I asked the child if she hadn’t left with her mom, and the child said that she wanted a biscuit. I gave her money for a biscuit and didn’t see the child after that.

“This was at about 11am and then around 4pm, Favour came, asking if I had seen her daughter, I reminded her that she had come and left with her daughter. She left and returned to ask me what the daughter ate at my place, I told her since that morning the child left, and I had not seen her. Favour even admitted to seeing the child with the biscuits.

“She came back the third time, asking me what I gave the child to drink. I didn’t understand her question and I told her as much. She said that I wanted to use her daughter for a money ritual.”

Frederick said another day, Favour came to call him that community people wanted to see him, when he got there, Favour alleged him of sexually molesting her three-year-old daughter.

Frederick, “The child was questioned and she said that I didn’t touch her. Favour has now left a money ritual allegation, claiming defilement. A child that was not up to three years with a man like me in my forties? I didn’t agree to have sexual intercourse with her as a woman, is it her daughter I would now want to have intercourse with?

“Right there and then I insisted that we should take the child to the hospital for medical examination, but Favour refused. Two weeks later, she came with policemen from Akodo Police Station to arrest me.”

Frederick said that when they got to Akodo Police Station, there was no evidence to back up the allegation that he sexually molested the child.

Frederick said, “I never for once touched that child. Almighty God is my witness! I had to later bail myself. She went to the police asking for her share of the bail money. She also came to me, saying that I had N250,000 to bail myself and I refused to help her with money, that she would deal with me.

“The truth is that I didn’t give police up to that amount for bail. She made me lose my job and now I am suffering. Even as I am speaking with you, there are tears in my eyes.”

However, it was discovered that last month, Frederick called a member of the ACVPN, Mr Toyin Okalawon, urging him to speak with IPO Kunle on his behalf, not to be angry with him.

Frederick in the voice recording made available to this journalist, said that he was now in Port Harcourt, where he has a new job.

He said the Police kept him in detention for over a month and he had to spend Christmas in detention.

When he went back to Dangote Refinery, he discovered that his name had been “dropped because I have been away for a month.”

He said that a friend of his got his current job for him and that Kunle had been calling him, but that where he was working, was too far from Lagos State.

He said, “When I told IPO Kunle about my new job, he was happy for me and he has called me for an interview, but the place I am working is very far. I can’t come for the interview. He thinks I don’t want to come. He said that he helped me and that I now want to use bad to repay him. Please talk to him for me, let him understand my situation.”

On March 3, this reporter reached out to the Lagos State Police Public Relations Officer, Benjamin Hundeyin, asking why Frederick was released by the Ikeja Gender Unit and if it was true Akodo Police Station collected N250,000 from the suspect as alleged by Favour.

According to Hundeyin, the DPO of Akodo Police Station, who is new on the seat, said that he was not aware of the incident.

The DPO asked the PPRO for the name of the complainant and the date on which the case was reported at the station.

The DPO also told Hundeyin that he had called corporal Raheem, who was the IPO of the case, but she maintained that she did not handle such a case.

On March 7, this reporter forwarded Favour’s full name and the date she complained to the Akodo Division, to Hundeyin, but he is yet to respond.