BY VINCENT UJUMADU

…baby boy sold for N530,000; girl – N370,000
AWKA —A 54-year-old blind man, Mr. Geoffrey Okoli, and five others have been arrested by the men of the Anambra State command of the Department of State Service, DSS, for allegedly operating a baby factory in the state.

The blind man, a 1994 Sociology and Anthropology graduate of the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, UNN, is a welfare officer in one of the local government areas of the state.

…the Quadruplets

It was gathered, yesterday, that two of the babies produced at the factory, a boy and a girl, were sold forN530, 000 and N370,000 respectively by the blind man and his major accomplice, one Mrs. Catherine Eze, said to be on the run.

Anambra State Director of DSS, Mr. Alex Okeiyi, told reporters in Awka that the suspects will be transferred to the National Agency for the Prohibition of Trafficking in Persons, NAPTIP, in Enugu for further interrogation.

Two girls, aged 17 and 19 years respectively, arrested at the centre claimed they did not benefit financially when their babies were sold.

According to Okeiyi, Okoli was apprehended in his house located within the local government secretariat with an eight-month old pregnant teenager whose name was simply given as Anisiobi.

Okeiyi said: “Her (Anisiobi’s) unborn baby was slated for sale on delivery, but unfortunately, the girl started bleeding on July 10, 2013 and had to be delivered of a baby girl through caesarian section the same day at Anambra State University Teaching Hospital, Awka. Unfortunately, the baby later died.”

I sold two babies—Suspect
Speaking, yesterday, at the state headquarters of the DSS in Awka, Okoli confessed that he had already sold two babies, a boy and a girl, adding that he started the business last year.

He said: “I sold the boy to one woman at Ekwulobia in Aguata Local Government Area for N530,000 last month and the girl who delivered him  had gone back to her place in Akwukwu in Idemili South Local Government Area.

“Also last month, I sold a girl for N370,000 and the mother is from Ojoto in Idemili South Local Government Area. The woman who bought the baby came from Aguluezechukwu.

“I know that what I have been doing is wrong, but I did it to help those girls who had no place to live when they were driven out of their homes.

“I am a social welfare officer by profession. Last year, Mrs. Kate Eze came to my office and told me that she and her husband were AS genotype and that their children used to die soon after birth, which made them childless and that she needed to adopt a baby.

“I advised them to process the adoption papers through the Ministry of Women Affairs which they agreed and left and I never knew, it will result to this.”