Human Rights group, Joint Legal Action Aids, (JLAA) has petitioned the Inspector General of Police, IG Mohammed Abubakar Adamu, to immediately open investigation into the allegation against a police officer who raped a 32 year old widow in Port Harcourt for not wearing face mask.
In a statement by JLAA’s General Council 1, Barr. Kingsley Ughe, sited by Pride Reporters, the group demands that the Rivers State Police Command should immediately commence a full scale investigation into the the matter, and prosecute the police personnel who carried out the act.
According to the victim, a policeman attached to the Sakpenwa Police Division, Tai Local Government Area, allegedly abducted her on Tuesday to a guest house where he raped her at gunpoint after arresting her for not wearing a nose mask.
She narrated: “I was returning from Bori to Port Harcourt when I met some police officers at a checkpoint. They arrested me for not wearing a nose mask. They kept me long there with them.
“Thereafter they carried me from one place to the other, claiming they want to take me to the police station, but never took me to any police station.
“After some time, they took me to a guest house where one of them raped me till dawn. His name is Inspector Peter Iba of Sakpenwa Police Station.”
In strong condemnation of the crime, Barr. Ughe said, “There is no justification for the punishment of rape to be meted out to a woman because she flouted Rivers State Government order on the use of nose masks. I expect the police to take this matter seriously.
The Inspector General of Police recently charged every Command to do everything possible to make rape a thing of the past in the Nigeria. JLAA therefore calls on the IG of police to put actions to his words by urgently commencing a purge of the police hierarchy using the current Port Harcourt case as a starting point.
JLAA has therefore written to the IG of police, the Commissioner of Police, Rivers State and the Minster for Police Affairs demanding for urgent investigation I to this sordid incident.” the statement concluded.
The victim had on the spur-of-the-moment on Tuesday raised alarm in a text message posted on a WhatsApp media platform where she lamented, “I have been taken to a guess house just because of N100 face mask.
“I can’t believe this is happening to me. He wants to sleep with me. I am dying. He wouldn’t let me pick any call. He threatened to seize my phone.”
The Police Command in the state reacting to the allegation through the Police Public Relations Officer, Rivers Command, Nnamdi Omoni, said: “After hearing about this, we immediately invited the lady. After hearing from her, she made a written statement and Investigation has commenced.”
JATS Online News 