A Delta State-based socialite, identified as Madam Success, has been reportedly arrested and remanded in Anambra State for her alleged role in luring four university female students into prostitution in her state.
Madam Success was on Friday arraigned before the Children, Sexual and Gender-Based Violence Magistrate Court in Awka, where she was denied bail and also remanded in prison.
She is been accused by the four teenage students of forcing them to sleep with no fewer than five men daily and get paid N400 for the day. The students, aged between 13 and 15, alleged that the socialite collects between N1,000 and N2,000 from each of the men.
According to available information from the office of the Anambra State Commissioner for Women and Children Welfare, Ify Obinabo, the students were said to have been lured from Akwa Ibom State to Agbor in Delta State with a promised to get them jobs as sales girls in Delta by Madam Success.
However, on getting to Onitsha in Anambra State, they were allegedly put in a brothel by Madam Success, where they served as prostitutes and made to sleep with at least five men a day.
The Anambra State Commissioner for Women and Children’s Welfare, Mrs Ify Obinabo, reportedly rescued the four female students in Onitsha, from where their trafficker had camped them en route Delta. The trafficker was also arrested, sources said.
However, the Media Assistant to Obinabo, Chidimma Ikeanyionwu, told newsmen that the commissioner, working with the police, stormed the motor park in Onitsha on a tip-off and rescued the girls.
In a statement, Ikeanyionwu disclosed that Madam Success was arraigned before the Children, Sexual and Gender-Based Violence Magistrates’ Court in Awka, Anambra State and remanded in prison for allegedly luring four female students into prostitution in Delta State.
The students told newsmen that Madam Success made them promises of jobs before they left the comfort of their homes.
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,” they narrated.
The Police Public Relations Officer for Delta State Command, DSP Bright Edafe, could not be reached for comments on the incident as of the time of filing this report.
