Gombe State Commissioner of Police, Shehu Maikudi on Monday, Paraded four human traffickers, with 12 children.
Maikudi said the arrest of the syndicate was done painstakingly by the police with support from parents.
According to Maikudi, “A complaint was received from parents sometime in 2017, who lost their parents who complained that their children were adopted One of the suspects was arrested last week, in her custody we found. Investigation took police to Anambra where they recovered two children.
“The suspects we have in our custody today took to her heels since 2017, she has been on the run changing locations and in her custody we found 12 children from various locations, we can’t comfortably say they are all from Gombe. This break through was done painstakingly by the combined team of the police and parents in conjunction with the state government because they provided all the logistics.”
Also speaking, Hauwa Usman, an indigene of Gombe was alleged to have sold more than twenty children to partners based in Anambra and Asaba.
She said, ” I sell female children for two hundred and fifty thousand naira (N250,000) and male children
for (N300,000) three hundred naira.
On her part, Nkechi Odiliye, who runs an orphanage in Anambra, said she in turn sells each of the
children bought from Hauwa at seven hundred and fifty thousand naira (N750,000) each. “I was arrested in my motherless babies home, world peace community home , it is registered. I sell at N750,000.”
Commissioner for Internal Security and Ethical Orientation, Dauda Batari said the state will beam searchlight on illegal motor parks in the state to curb child trafficking.
“One way we can mitigate child trafficking state Gombe is to stop illegal motor parks from operating in the state,” he said.
Ibrahim Akko, The secretary of Almagamation of parents who lost children in the state said he lost a child
He said, “we reported to Gombe division and later to State CID. Later we saw in the news that two women were caught with two male children in Anambra. Hauwa Usman has confessed to taking my child but my child is not here. All Gombe children are not among the twelve found, 23 were taken from Gombe, 2 have been found, while 21 are left unrecovered. We have called our members to identify the children, none have been identified by the parents.”
