Professor Arrested For Defiling Minor In Southeast Nigeria

Felix Anyaegbulam, a Professor of Geophysics at the Alex Ekwueme Federal University, Ndufu-Alike (AE-FUNAI), Ebonyi State, Southeast Nigeria has been arrested for allegedly defiling a 13-year-old.

Loveth Odah, the Police spokesperson, during a press briefing said the professor admitted to the crime. 

She also said Aliyu Garba, the Commissioner of Police, has ordered a discreet investigation into the matter ahead of a medical screening/report of the victim.

According to a DailyTrust report, Faithvin Nwancho, the state coordinator, Gender-Based Violence (GBV), who reported the incident to the Police said the Professor consistently defiled the minor who is the daughter of his security guard. 

While demanding justice for the victim, Nwancho said “This Professor at the AE-FUNAI has been having sex with the 13-year-old girl. The girl stays with him, but every blessed day of this girl’s life, this man violates her sexually.”

“He sleeps with her. As God may have it, we were told about it and we moved into action and the girl was rescued. A complaint was made to the police and he was arrested,” she said.

According to the report, the victim while narrating her experience in the hands of the professor said “I was living in the village with my mother. My daddy brought me to live with Prof in Abakaliki. Since June this year, the Prof has been disturbing me. He always comes into my room and does what I don’t like.”

“One day around 2 a.m, I ran to my father at the security house and told him that Prof was pressing my breast. My father told me to go back and that he will talk with him in the morning. Sometimes, I will wake up and see myself naked. The other day, somebody was touching me at midnight when I woke up, turned on the light, I saw Prof lying on my bed not wearing anything.”

“He tried to touch me but I slapped him and pushed him out of my room. I was crying. One day, I woke up and my bed was soaked with blood. I didn’t know what happened. I told my father in the morning but he didn’t do anything. He used to tell me that, if I leave Prof’s house, who will pay my school fees? That is how the Prof has continued to disturb me until I told my aunty in the school because I don’t like that nonsense Prof is doing.”

The victim’s father, who is a security guard to the professor, narrated how he tried to talk the man out of such an act.

“I am shocked and disappointed. I am the gateman in the compound where the Prof lives. My daughter has been complaining to me about what Prof is doing to her and I have always told Prof that what he is doing is not good.”

“This professor did the same thing to my wife’s kid sister who I brought to live with him as a house help in 2017. But we didn’t know that, prof was having sex with the girl and later got her pregnant. That time, she was 17 years and was in class five in secondary school but when the professor impregnated her, she dropped out of school.”

“That time, Human rights people came into the matter and called the police but Prof quickly went to the girl’s village with wine, wrapper and money and deceived them that he wanted to marry her. The mother of the girl came to the police with Prof and helped him destroy the case. But after a while, she gave birth to her baby, the Prof collected the baby and sent the girl away. The baby boy is still living with Prof now but that girl is hawking groundnuts in Abakaliki.”

When interrogated, Felix Anyaegbulam had initially denied all allegations against him but later admitted as he pleaded for peace and blamed everything on “the devil.”