Suspected Trafficking: FCTA Rescues 23 Children, Begins Profiling Of Orphanages

The Priesthood Orphanage, located in Karon Majigi village, has been sealed by the Federal Capital Territory Administration (FCTA).

This was as it said it rescued 23 children, aged 1-14 years, who were allegedly trafficked from Plateau state.

Mandate Secretary, FCT Women Affairs Secretariat, Mrs Adedayo Benjamins-Laniyi, who disclosed this on Monday, said the FCT Minister, Nyesom Wike, had authorized the Secretariat to profile and recertify orphanages operating in the nation’s capital.

She said; “There is no question, yesterday, with immediate effect, that ‘home’ was sealed, shut down. We have the name of the proprietor of the orphanage home, but we are not naming names now for obvious reasons. When the entire material investigation is concluded, there will be an officially gazetted presentation of the facts, the findings and the delivery of this intervention we have started here today.

“NAPTIP, as we speak is already on it. Using this as an example, one of the first things I have done is to get approval for the recertification of orphanage homes in Abuja. The Minister has approved that there will be a full, thorough reprofiling of anything that has to do with orphanage and recertification status of all orphanages in Abuja”.

According to her, the Secretariat is working with the Plateau State Ministry of Women Affairs to reunite the children with their families, some of whom she said had been at the uncertified orphanage for five years, since 2019.

“We are working with the Plateau state government to reunite the children with their families in Plateau state. This is a transition arrangement”, she said.

On her part, the Plateau State Commissioner for Women Affairs, Mrs Caroline Dafur, said the Proprietors of the orphanage abandoned the children under the care of one Pastor Abraham, in a terrible condition of hunger.

“Three of the children had then escaped and were discovered by officers of the Federal Road Safety Corps, who reported the case to the NAPTIP and took the children to the Human Rights Radio, who then notified the Plateau State government and the FCT Women Affairs Secretariat.

“We came in yesterday and on reaching here, we were told that they went to church. We kept going from one church to another, looking for them until we found them in a Deeper Life Church, where we were able to pick them up, and we went to the home and we saw the place, in fact, it is not supposed to be called a home.

“The place was just so unkempt. I wonder how the children were sleeping in the small room. Nine girls were sleeping in a very small room with just two mattresses. And then for the boys, they were in a small room too, with two mattresses just on the floor. And I mean, it is so pathetic the way human beings treat human beings in this country”, she added.

Credit: Vangaurd