“One life taken in cold blood is as gruesome as
millions lost in a pogrom.”—Dele Giwa
(Nigerian Journalist assassinated in 1986)
After five whole years of seeking admission
into the institution of higher learning, Miss Vera Uwaila Omozuwa was
eventually admitted to read Microbiology at the University of Benin.
Obviously a very serious student, she was in no
mood to joke with her studies, probably, after considering how long it took her
to secure the admission. So, she would always go to the serene environment of
her Church when worshippers were not around to read her books. The Church
environment should be both safe and devoid of distractions.
 |
| *Late Uwaila Omozuwa |
But on this particular day, May 27, 2020, some
wicked, callous and barbarous assailants gained access to the Church auditorium
where she was immersed in her books, brutally raped her and ended her life by
hitting her on the head with a fire extinguisher which gave her a very deep
cut. They then fled leaving her in the pool of her own blood. She was only 22
and in her first year at the university.
No one knew how long she lay there bleeding
until the security man arrived and saw her. She was already unconscious,
probably due to the effect of the brutal violation she had experienced, the
cruel blow she had received, and the amount of blood she had lost. At the
hospital where she was rushed to, the doctors tried their best but were unable
to revive her. She eventually died without being able to utter a single word to
anyone about what had happened to her or whether she was able to recognize her
savage rapists and murderers.
The gory picture of her body is the most
horrible image I have tried to look at in recent times. I had to remove my eyes
immediately! A once beautiful girl had suddenly been turned into a horrific and
scary image because of the primeval exploits of some brutish creatures.
Now, what exactly could so badly provoke human
beings to descend so low to the level of wild beasts to give free rein to their
basest instincts to unleash such a barbaric violence on another human being?
Lust, anger, hatred, envy, sadism, desire to
conquer and dominate, revenge, or what? Are more and more people losing their
humanity? Has the world gone irrecoverably berserk?
Daily, dizzying reports of grown men raping
grandmothers, mothers, single women and even underage girls are roughly
slapped on our faces. I have even read bloodcurdling accounts of ten or even
eight month-old babies raped, not by confirmed mentally challenged people, but
by otherwise sane human beings! What exactly is happening? I think this should
be a very rich research subject for our scholars in the fields of psychology
and behavioural studies. We need to urgently understand what has gone wrong
with our world.
The parents of Uwaila are badly heartbroken as
outrage engulfs the country over their daughter’s barbaric murder. In a video
that surfaced on twitter early this week, Uwaila’s father lamented:
“It was not a mistake; it was not a fault; it
was not stubbornness for her to go to the church to study. She had been going
there for several years. She struggled for five years before she gained
admission into UNIBEN. I was waiting to celebrate her admission before she
died.”
When has it become an offence for a serious and focused
student to find a conducive place to read, more so, a worship centre which
should be considered sacred and inviolable? Who could be so godless, wanton and
profane as to trail a girl to a church building to unleash this kind of cruel
and deadly violence on her? Such a person or persons should have no
place within the bounds of civilized society.
Narrating the horrific incident, Uwaila’s mother mournfully
recounted:
“I saw a friend, who came to visit me, off and before I
came back, someone had called my telephone thrice. When I got back, my children
told me that a church member, Mummy Osunla, had called me and when I called her
back, she asked where I was and told me that I should come and that she did not
know what had happened to my daughter.
“I ran to the place but before I got there,
they [had] already [taken] her to a private hospital and when I saw my
daughter, I cried. They raped her; the dress she was wearing that morning was
white, but it had turned to red; all her body was full of blood. Her mouth and
eyes were tied; the hoodlums used a fire extinguisher to hit her head, which
left a deep cut.
“We were asked to take her for an X-ray on her
head; I did not have money but my church members tried and money was raised and
we bought all the drugs that we were asked to buy, but Uwa could not make it.
She was unable to say anything till she died; it was just tears that were
coming out from her eyes.”
The national outrage this grisly incident has provoked is
quite reassuring, but the security agencies need to be more creative and
proactive about how to ensure that people that commit these hideous crimes are
apprehended and punished. It should now be made compulsory that CCTVs must be
installed in all public buildings including worship centres. This will go a
long way to deter potential rapists and other criminals who will be tormented
by the awareness that their criminal activities are being observed and recorded
by some sharp, hidden eyes.
The installation of these cameras should equally be extended
to the streets and even highways. No amount of money spent to enhance the security
of lives and property should be considered too much. The police must
equally be empowered to acquire more, modern crime-unravelling
equipment, so as to be able to track criminals no matter how they try to evade
justice
It is however encouraging that the Edo State Police Command
has announced the arrest of one of the suspected killers of Uwaila. Its
spokesperson, Chidi Nwabuzor, said that fingerprints on the fire extinguisher
used in killing the hapless girl has led to the arrest of the suspect. We can
only hope that the fingerprints reading is accurate and that this
first arrest will lead to the arrest of the
remaining criminals who are now on the run. We don’t want to
hear tomorrow that the suspect was wrongly arrested due to a malfunctioning machine.
When perpetrators of crimes are punished, prospective criminals are dissuaded
and society is made safer for everyone.
When the news of Uwaila’s murder broke, Edo State
Governor, Mr. Godwin Obaseki tweeted: “I have ordered the Nigeria
Police Force (@PoliceNG) to thoroughly investigate the circumstances that led
to the death of Miss Vera Uwaila Omozuwa, a 100-level student of the University
of Benin (UNIBEN).
Later, on Tuesday, June 2, President Muhammadu Buhari
added his voice to the high profile orders handed down to the
police to their job. "I expect the Nigeria Police Force to
speedily and diligently investigate this case and ensure that all the culprits
responsible for this barbaric act are brought to justice,” the
president reportedly said.
Good! Heartwarming response! But I would always cherish a
country where the police and other security agencies can always do their jobs
without being ordered to do so by the governor or president. Each time there is
an attack by terrorists or bandits in which the casualty figures are high
enough to attract national outrage, we will be served with the news that
President Buhari has ordered the security agents to apprehend the perpetrators.
I always recoil with shame each time I stumble on such strange reports.
It has even been reported in this country that the president
had ordered the Air Force to bomb terrorist strongholds! This one is even more
sickening and preposterous because it is like informing the terrorists to
relocate because bombs will soon start raining on their locations. Who does
that in any other country except our badly run and chaotic Nigeria?
I would like to see Nigerian security institutions grow and
be truly independent. They should be able to do their jobs conscientiously
whether the crime attracted widespread uproar or not, whether they got
instructions from the president, governor or nobody. Unraveling crimes and
arresting the people behind them should be normal, routine work for them. They
do not need to be prodded or ordered to go after criminals to apprehend and
bring them to justice.
There is also this little but very injurious matter that
deserves mention here since it keeps reoccurring. When crimes like rape or any
kind of violence are committed against women, there are usually some outspoken
ladies who are quick to not just condemn the crime and call for justice for the
victim, but readily turn the incident into an opportunity to initiate an
anti-men campaign. They would stretch their power of oratory and emotional
outbursts to brand ALL men rapists and women-killers in order to widen the
valley of animosity between the male and the female and swell the tribe of
men-hating amazons.
This might earn them the very lucrative identity they are
craving but would not make our world any better. When the records of rape cases
are a thoroughly examined, it might even be discovered that male rapists may
not even constitute up to one percent of the male population.
Both genders are needed in the fight against this hideous
crime – which is even committed against both women and men. Demonizing all men
each time gender-based crimes occur may help those who insist on doing so to
achieve some self-serving credentials, but it will eventually inject a serious
setback in the larger campaign by depleting the support from men which is
highly required to lend the war some beneficial balance and eventually win it.
All men are not rapists or supporters of rape, that should be
very clear. Since the Uwaila incident, many men have gone all out condemning
the crime and calling for justice for the victim. It will NOT help to seek to
discourage them by going into overdrive with a fallacious generalization that
aims to tar all men with the egregious brush of women-haters and violators.
As I tried to tidy up this piece, another ugly news broke
that an 18-year old female student of the Institute
of Agriculture, Research and Training, Ibadan, Miss Barakat Bello, has been raped and stabbed to death in her own father’s house
in Ibadan. Narrating the incident, the obviously shattered father said: “Somebody called me on the phone that I should come home but
he refused to tell me what happened. When I got home, I saw that my daughter
had been raped and stabbed to death.”
I hope the Oyo State Police Command will not wait for any
“orders” from the governor or a national outcry to thoroughly investigate this
heinous crime and bring the perpetrators to book. Rape is ugly and
ungodly and leaves a lasting injury on the victim. Let’s all help to discourage
it by ensuring that its perpetrators are always smoked out and punished
according to the law.
*Ugochukwu Ejinkeonye, a Nigerian Journalist and Writer, is a Columnist with Daily Independent newspaper (scruples2006@yahoo.com;@ugowrite)
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