Ondo church missing boy: Group knocks police over delay in investigation
Two weeks after a one-year-old boy, Gold Kolawole, got missing at a church in Akure, the Ondo State capital, a group has lamented the slow pace at which the police were investigating the matter.
Gold allegedly went missing during a church service on Sunday at the Sotitobire Praising Chapel and his whereabouts were still unknown. The mother of the missing boy, Mrs Modupe Kolawole, has called on the founder of the church, Prophet Alfa Babatunde, and the state police command to help her find the boy.
Although the police command initially said the matter was not officially reported at the station, the boy was later declared missing.
The human rights group, the Sunshine for Integrity and Justice, frowned at the way the police were handling the matter.
The coordinator of the group, Mr Odion Mathew, in a statement issued on Tuesday, alleged that the police command was being lackadaisical in its investigation into the matter.
The statement read, “It would be a thing of shame and ineptitude for the Ondo State Police Command not to have taken any serious step on the matter. A whole human being was missing, not an object and the police seem to have kept quiet about it, it is unfortunate.
“For over two weeks now, nobody has been arrested nor interrogated among the caregivers in the church, under whose care the boy was. How could a boy get missing among many children at the juvenile section of the church and the police is keeping quiet? This is not good enough for a country like Nigeria. We believe we are not in a jungle. So the police must act on this matter.
“The perceived silence of the police on the matter and the experience in the past in this country is luring one to believe that there is an attempt to let the matter suffer a natural death. ”
The group called on the Inspector General of Police, Mr Mohammed Adamu, to order a full investigation into the matter.
However, the Police Public Relations Officer of the Command, Mr Femi Joseph, denied being silent on the matter, saying the police were still investigating it.
He said, “We are not keeping quiet on the matter, the CP ( Commissioner of Police) has ordered the matter to be transferred to the CID ( Criminal Investigative Department) for proper investigation.” Punch
