Anambra govt shuts down ‘babies’ home’ over alleged child trafficking

Anambra State Ministry of Women Affairs has closed down Umunna Street Motherless Babies’ Home, Onitsha in Onitsha South Local Government Area of the state for alleged involvement in the use of the home as transit point for child trafficking.

The Director of Child Development in the state Ministry of Women Affairs, Mr Emeka Ejide, told newsmen at the Home, while vacating about 14 motherless children from the home to Red Cross Motherless Babies Home also in Onitsha that the ministry would equally come back with the Department of Security Services, DSS to padlock and seal the home completely till further notice. Continue...

Ejide noted that the shut-down of the home was in line with section 190 of the Child Rights Law of Anambra state, adding that the ministry was also acting on a recent press briefing by the Anambra state Commissioner of Police who disclosed that some suspected managers of the home, who got involved in child trafficking had been arrested and paraded before the press in the state, following the interception of some human traffickers by the police in the state.

According to Ejide, “today, Onitsha South Community Children Home, formerly known as Onitsha South Motherless Babies Home is being shut down and this follows cases of using the home for other purposes not essentially the main purpose it was created for. And if you heard the news, the commissioner of police had a briefing with the press last Thursday in Awka, and he paraded the managers of the home”.

Source: Vanguard