Parents have a key role to play in ensuring their children learn the right values that will ensure they navigate through life without harm or abuse.
This was stressed at a sensitization drive by The Lagos State Domestic and Sexual Violence Agency for parents and teachers.
More than 300 parents from Education District 3 made up of Lagos island, Eti Osa and Epe are present for this interactive session on Safeguarding and Child Protection at Lagos Island.
The goal is for them to adopt best parenting skills amidst the menace of domestic and sexual abuse in the state.
The inter agency programme also gave participants directions for reporting cases, as well as beneficial information to address the diverse form of violence meted out on children.
As Lagos state expands its support services for survivors, activists also seek faster criminal justice mechanisms to deter would be offenders and sanitise the society.
Mixed Reactions greet Ekweremadu’s conviction in UK
Following the conviction of former deputy senate president, Ike Ekweremadu for organ trafficking in the United Kingdom, a dialogue has ensued regarding the sentence he will be handed in May 2023.
His wife, Beatrice, and middleman Obinna Obeta, a medical doctor involved in the case, were also found guilty when the verdict was delivered on Thursday.
Enugu, South East Nigeria was the capital of the Eastern Region and the home state of Senator Ike Ekweremadu, former deputy president of the Senate.
Senator Ekweremadu is the longest serving federal legislator in the state, a three times deputy president of the Senate and a legislator in whose achievements dots beyond his state and South East region of Nigeria.
The news of his arrest in October 2022 with his wife for alleged organ harvesting in the United Kingdom came as a rude shock to people of the state
Although the Ekweremadus were first arraigned at the Uxbridge magistrates court, the case was later moved to the central criminal court in London where the trial spanned six weeks.
The jury held that the Senator, wife and the middleman conspired to bring the 21-year-old at the centre of the matter to London to exploit him for his kidney.
Residents of the state received the news with mixed feelings, considering the circumstances that surrounded the incident.
Some feel his case should be treated on compassionate ground since it is an attempt to save his daughter’s life
Kingsley Okechukwu, a legal practitioner put up an argument to support the move. He also sought for review of the country’s citizens protection rights law.
The presiding judge has fixed May 5 to issue sentencing on the convicts.
Modern Slavery Act 2015 Chapter 30 of the MSA 2015 criminalises a range of offences.
it is important to note that the verdict is the first of its kind under the Modern Slavery Act 2015 of the UK
There is a likelihood that the Ekweremadus may not get the minimum 12 months option attached to summary convictions.
This implies that if the Ekweremadus are found guilty of “intent to commit human trafficking” — seeing as the kidney transplant did not eventually happen — they will be handed a sentence not exceeding 10 years.
