• 10 arrested

By Christopher Oji

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Lagos State Police Command has discovered a shrine in Iwaya area of the metropolis, where children are sacrificed to an idol. The victims are allegedly abducted while on errands for their parents.
Already, 10 persons have been arrested sequel to the discovery of the corpse of a four-year-old girl in the shrine.
According to the victim’s parents, Mr. and Mrs. Suleiman Taiwo, their daughter and two of her siblings had gone to the mosque in the afternoon to pray.
The little girl did not return with her siblings, prompting the parents to raise the alarm. A search party later found her corpse, at midnight, in the shrine behind the house. Her neck was slashed and her blood spilled on the shrine.
Commissioner of Police, Fatai Owoseni, at a press briefing yesterday, said the police received a distress call that the dead body of a little girl was found in a shrine and swung into action.
He said: “On the fateful day, DPO of Sabo Division alerted me that one Suleiman Taiwo and wife came to the station with the dead body of their four-year-old daughter.
“Upon questioning, they said the deceased, with her two siblings, went to pray at the mosque by 1pm and wasn’t seen since then. It was in the course of the search that they found the deceased at a shrine where Ogun (idol) is worshipped, near their house. Her throat was slashed and blood spilled on the idol.
“We recovered the knife they used in the murder of the innocent girl. We arrested 10 persons, including the girls’ parents because they are the principal suspects. They are in our custody and are being interrogated. We are not saying that they killed the child, but there is a kind of conspiracy in the matter. The parents have some questions to answer.
“We will question all of them. The area is densely populated. These days, people have thrown morals to the dustbin because I don’t know what a four-year-old child has done to be murdered in the most horrific manner. There is a conspiracy. How could the child be killed in a densely populated area like that and nobody reported to the police?
“The shrine has been in that compound for a long time. We discovered that the owner of the shrine died a long time ago, but people come from different areas to worship. There is a conspiracy of silence. The occupants must have known that human sacrifices were done in the shrine because this is not the first time such has happened. Many children may have been used for sacrifice in the shrine.
“After investigation, we will charge the suspects to court.”