A socialite, identified simply as Madam Success, has been remanded in prison for allegedly luring four female students into prostitution in Delta State.
The defendant was arraigned on Friday before a magistrates’ court, where she was denied bail and remanded.
PUNCH Metro learnt that the victims were lured by the suspect from Akwa Ibom State to Agbor, Delta State, on the pretext of making them sales girls.
The students, aged between 13 and 15 years, were said to have been put in a brothel and made to sleep with at least five men daily.
Our correspondent learnt that the Anambra State Commissioner for Women and Children Welfare, Ify Obinabo, rescued the four female students in Onitsha, where their trafficker kept them en route to Delta State.
The Media Assistant to Obinabo, Chidimma Ikeanyionwu, told journalists that the commissioner, working with the police, stormed a motor park in Onitsha on a tip-off and rescued the girls.
Ikeanyionwu, in a press statement, disclosed that Madam Success was arraigned before the Children, Sexual and Gender-Based Violence Magistrates’ Court, Awka, Anambra State.
The female students, while narrating their ordeals to journalists, stated that the socialite promised them jobs.
One of them said, “Auntie Success told us that she had job opportunities for us in Agbor, Delta State, where we would be selling drinks in a beer parlour, but on getting there, we discovered that it was prostitution work she brought us to do.
“The men paid the sum of N1,000 or N2,000 directly to our madam, who only gave us N400 every day for feeding. The direct payment to Madam Success made it difficult for us to have any cash at hand.
“These dresses (skimpy clothes) were bought for us from the proceeds paid to our madam.”
The girls, who claimed that it was in their quest to secure their school fees that they got lured into the act, maintained that they had made several unsuccessful attempts to escape but were always caught and punished severely.
“After the punishment, we were taken to a herbalist, who forced us to take an oath that we would never run away or we would die”, another victim said.
The state Police Public Relations Officer, DSP Bright Edafe, could not be reached for comments on the incident as of the time of filing this report.
