We got a call from Oshodi/Isolo Educational Board Authority, Lagos concerning Mrs. Joy Udoka who inflicted injuries on Miss Nkiru Aneke 7yrs and Emeka Obodo 13yrs who are relations of her husband and allowed them to go to school without giving them treatment (first aid) till the time we arrived.
On interviewing Nkiru Aneke, she said that her brother’s wife is very temperamental and beats her with any object at the slightest provocation. Mrs. Joy Udoka hit her face on the ground because she did not clean the gas top very well. Emeka Obodo said the same thing that anything she lays her hands on becomes the weapon she uses to discipline. He also said that his relation, Mr. Earnest Udoka who is Mrs. Joy’s husband had warned her several times because of her bad temperament. He said it was the curtain rod that she used to beat him on that same day she inflected the injury on Nkiru, she did not even bother to give them first aid not that talk of an analgesic.
Mrs. Joy Udoka agreed that she was temperamental and also going through depression, at 25, her husband did not keep to his promise of sending her to school after having their first son; “rather he made me have two boys and my education that he promised he never did” with tears as she begs for forgiveness.
We tried to take the children but they were crying all through the process insisting that we should just ask her to stop beating them because they (Nkiru and Emeka) came from a poor family and going back home is not an option for them. We recommended Mrs. Joy Udoka to a psychiatrist, who started her treatment on the depression, we also made the husband write an undertaking to see to Mrs. Joy Udoka’s going back to school to avoid a relapse and also made Mr. and Mrs. Earnest Udoka write an undertaking that they will take good care of both their wards Nkiru and Emeka..
