Hyacinth Chinweuba
The Lagos State Police command has arrested two adult accomplices in connection with the initiation of twelve (12) school children aged between 8 and 16 years old into a notorious cult group known as Awawa cult group at Egan, in Igando area of Lagos State.
The Commissioner of Police, Lagos state, CP Edgal Imohimi who disclosed this at a press briefing at the command’s headquarters on Monday stated that the children were discovered to have been initiated into a nefarious association by a Guardian and Counselor attached to a public school in Egan, Igando, Lagos.
Edgal stated that the teacher, having noticed a mark on the jaw of one of the students, then asked questions, debriefed the students who mentioned other kids with similar marks who then revealed that it was the 16 year old girl who took them for the initiation rites and that the symbol on their jaw was the symbol of the notorious Awawa cult group.
He submitted that two adult suspects had been arrested in connection with the crime adding that they were assisting the police as to arrest other members of the group who were going from one school to the other trying to initiate children into the group.
“The Gender unit of the Lagos State Police command is investigating the case of 12 children who were recently initiated into an unlawful society”.
These 12 children aged between 8 and 16 years, the oldest of them is 16 and she is the only female amongst the group. The children were discovered to have been initiated into a nefarious association by a Guardian and Counselor attached to a public school in Egan, Igando.
“What is very worrisome about this particular case is the fact that these small children, 12 of them, their ages ranged from 8 and 16. They are minors; they are children who the law recognized as not to be held accountable for their action. I want use this opportunity to commend the Guardian and Counselor of Egan, Igando who was vigilant and who obviously was alive to her duty as a teacher, a Counselor in that school. She noticed the mark and immediately raised alarm.
“Let me use this opportunity to call on other schools, call on the management of those schools, call on the teachers that it is not enough to just teach these students, they also must monitor the conducts of the students, those that the children associate with and the kind of group that these children belong to so that unscrupulous people do not come into the school and initiate them at early ages into cult groups”.
Edgal assured that the command was going to take investigation into this case very seriously as it involved children assuring that at the end of the investigation, all those connected in one way or the other with the crime would be arrested and charged to court.