{"id":17522,"date":"2019-05-04T15:22:28","date_gmt":"2019-05-04T15:22:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/?p=17522"},"modified":"2019-05-04T15:22:28","modified_gmt":"2019-05-04T15:22:28","slug":"video-how-police-raped-beat-us-women-arrested-at-abuja-nightclubs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/?p=17522","title":{"rendered":"VIDEO: How Police raped, beat us \u2013 Women arrested at Abuja nightclubs"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>By <strong>Nike Adebowale<\/strong> (<strong>PREMIUM TIMES<\/strong>)<br \/>\nSome of the women arrested at the different nightclubs in Abuja for alleged prostitution have narrated to PREMIUM TIMES how police officers raped and assaulted them.<br \/>\nThe ladies said they were also teargassed by the officers while in detention.<br \/>\nThe women were taken before a mobile court in Abuja, where they were convicted and sentenced to one-month imprisonment with an option N3,000 fine.<br \/>\n\u201cWe were arrested on Friday and detained for several days,\u201d one of the women said.<br \/>\n\u201cSome people were bailed the next day, while the rest of us were left behind.<br \/>\n\u201cThe officers picked us and slept with us one after the other because we did not have money to give them.<br \/>\n\u201cThey picked us from Banex and took us to Utako police station. When we got there, the police station was empty.<br \/>\n\u201cWe were told to pull off and then when we obeyed, they raped us,\u201d one of those arrested said.<br \/>\nAnother woman said, \u201cThey beat us well, abused us sexually and also collected money from us before they released us.<br \/>\n\u201cThey beat us up after they arrested us at Gwarimpa. And when we questioned them about what we have done, the officers used pepper spray on us.<br \/>\n\u201cThe more you question them about your offence, the more beatings you receive,\u201d she said.<br \/>\nThe ladies spoke at a media briefing by activist Dorothy Njemanze, in Abuja on Thursday.<br \/>\nThey said many of the rapists were policemen attached to Utako, Life Camp and Gwarimpa police stations.<br \/>\nThe police high command has promised to investigate the allegations. On Friday, police said they had set up a team and invited relevant parties for the investigation.<br \/>\n<strong>Multiple arrests of women in Abuja clubs<\/strong><br \/>\nAbout three weeks ago,\u00a0Premium Times reported\u00a0how some officials of the Federal Capital Territory Administration (FCTA), raided a popular night club, Caramelo, and arrested 34 female nude dancers.<br \/>\nLast week, another\u00a070 women\u00a0were reportedly arrested from different clubs in Abuja and detained at Utako police station.<br \/>\nThe acting Abuja police spokesperson, Danjuma Tanimu, confirmed the arrest of 65 women by members of the Joint Task Force on Wednesday and Friday.<br \/>\nHe said they were arrested for \u201changing around nightclubs\u201d in Abuja.<br \/>\n\u201cThey were arrested in Aminu Kano Crescent, Gwarimpa, and Katampe extension. And they are being charged to court. It was the Joint Task Force that arrested them. They were hanging around night clubs. This is the only information I got,\u201d he said.<br \/>\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"How Police raped, beat us - Women arrested at Abuja nightclubs\" width=\"696\" height=\"522\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/_KUo_Vk86-E?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><br \/>\n<strong>27 women convicted, they were forced to plead guilty<\/strong><br \/>\nOut of the 32 women presented before the mobile court sitting in FCT, 27 of them were convicted and sentenced to one month in prison for prostitution, PREMIUM TIMES learnt.<br \/>\nThe women were sentenced after pleading guilty to the charges read against them.<br \/>\nHowever, the lawyer representing the women, Jennifer Ogbogu, said the women were forced by officials of the Abuja Environmental Protection Board (AEPB) to plead guilty.<br \/>\n\u201cBy the time I got to the court, the sitting had already started. After reading the first information report, I saw some of the ladies pleading guilty and I asked them why they are pleading guilty to the charges?<br \/>\n\u201cThey said officials of the AEPB told them to plead guilty to avoid prison time of 6 months and they were scared because their families don\u2019t even know where they were at the moment,\u201d she said.<br \/>\nThe ladies also said they were not told the consequences of pleading guilty.<br \/>\nAccording to Ms Ogbogu, only about four out of 32 ladies did not plead guilty and the matter was adjourned to Tuesday last week.<br \/>\n\u201cThose that pleaded guilty were sentenced to one month imprisonment with a fine option of N3,000.<br \/>\n\u201cWe paid the fine and all of them have been released from custody,\u201d she said.<br \/>\n<strong>Authorities aware of allegations<\/strong><br \/>\nThe Social Development Secretariat of the Federal Capital Territory Administration (FCTA) acknowledged the allegation against the police officers,\u201d a spokesperson said.<br \/>\n\u201cThe Social Development Secretariat and the FCTA is a responsible administration that looks into the welfare of the residents of the FCT.<br \/>\n\u201cThat somebody is compromising the law does not give the advantage to an enforcement agent to begin to abuse them.<br \/>\n\u201cThis accusation is already being investigated. Our team is well trained and they have been warned against such an act. They are all aware that if any of them is been caught to have abused these persons, such a person will be dismissed and persecuted,\u201d he said.<br \/>\nThe FCT command deputy spokesperson, Gajere Tanimu, said a team has been set up to probe the allegations against its officers.<br \/>\n<strong>Activists react<\/strong><br \/>\nHuman right activists within and outside the country have continued to express their dissatisfaction over the arrests of women in nights clubs.<br \/>\nA coalition of human right activists\u00a0had earlier threatened to take legal action against the state to challenge the legality of the raid.<br \/>\nA human rights activist, Chioma Chuka, said the arrest is an act of discrimination against women because only women are being arrested.<br \/>\n\u201cI also heard one of the women was arrested while she was standing with her husband.<br \/>\n\u201cSo why were the men not arrested? Shouldn\u2019t they be focusing on the increased criminality going on in Abuja?<br \/>\n\u201cI don\u2019t think this is an issue of prostitution. You go into a night club to arrest women and there is no proof they were prostituting. If prostitution is a crime in Nigeria, you have to catch the person in the act before arresting.<br \/>\n\u201cI am bearing in mind that prostitution exists both for male and female. Of course, we have male prostitute too. So why are only the women getting arrested? So it\u2019s not a question of legalisation of prostitution. It should be a straight up call for the government and the Abuja Environmental Bureau to desist from victimising and criminally discriminating against women in Abuja.\u201d<br \/>\nMs Chuka also frowned at the alleged abuse of the arrested women by the enforcement agents. \u201cThere are also reports that these women who have been arrested are violently assaulted by men who should be protecting them. This is wrong,\u201d she said.<br \/>\nChika Offor, also a human right activist, said \u201cNobody has the right to arrest anybody without investigating what the person has done. As an adult, you are allowed to go to night clubs and anywhere you want to go to.<br \/>\n\u201cSuch arrest is an infringement of the women\u2019s fundamental human right and the women have the right to sue them to court,\u201d she said<br \/>\nMrs Offor called for an investigation into the alleged assault on the women.<br \/>\nShe said anybody found guilty of an assault should be arrested and prosecuted according to the law<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Nike Adebowale (PREMIUM TIMES) Some of the women arrested at the different nightclubs in Abuja for alleged prostitution have narrated to PREMIUM TIMES how police officers raped and assaulted them. The ladies said they were also teargassed by the officers while in detention. The women were taken before a mobile court in Abuja, where [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":12234,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5777,7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-17522","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-features","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17522","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=17522"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17522\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=17522"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=17522"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=17522"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}