A 30-year-old member of the National Youth Service Corps, NYSC, and mother of two, has been brutally assaulted by her husband identified only as Bade at their home in the Kilo area of Surulere, Lagos State in the night of Monday, February 8, 2016.
Blood flowed freely down her cheeks after Bade allegedly battered her, stabbed her face with a broken glass and also poked his finger into her eye during a face-off.
Bade has been arrested and later released on bail by officials attached to Surulere police Division.
The victim who has not been identified was rushed to a health centre in the area before she was later taken to the Lagos State University Teaching Hospital, Ikeja for treatment.
Narrating her ordeal, the victim, an Insurance graduate, said she had followed her husband to his parent’s house on the fateful day, and they had returned around 8pm after which the husband left the house again for a meeting, Punch reports.
She said, “Immediately we got home, he said he wanted to go for a meeting somewhere and I told him to return as early as possible before they shut the street gate at 10pm.
“When it was 11pm, I called him, but he didn’t pick his calls. He also did not respond to a Whatsapp message I sent around that time. He later picked his call and I warned him that if he returned too late I would not rise up from bed to open the gate for him.
“Around 1am, I called his telephone line again and I heard a noise at the background. I overheard a lady talking. I told him I was going for my NYSC Community Development Service early in the morning, but he ignored me.”
“At about 2am, he called me on the telephone and said I should come and open the gate, but I ignored him. When I eventually went downstairs to open the gate, somebody else had done it.
“He abused my mother and I cautioned him, but he said it was my day of reckoning and my cup of iniquity was full. I was in my night gown that time.
“He picked up his belt and started beating me. As I tried to run away from him, I fell down. During the struggle, a mirror fell on the floor and he stabbed me with a splinter. He sat on me. I screamed in pain and shouted for help, but nobody came to my rescue.
“He poked a finger into my eye and gave me several blows in the face.”
The victim narrated further how she managed to escape her husband’s strong grip by biting him on the leg.
The case was said to have been reported at the Surulere Police Station, leading to the arrest of the suspect but he was later released after some family members advised the woman to let the sleeping dogs lie because of the children.
The couple were, however, said to have separated pending when the matter would be fully resolved.
However, while refuting his wife’s claims, Bade said: “All she said was a lie. It was my hand that I used to beat her and she was the one that used a plank to hit me in the back and even stabbed me with the broken mirror.
“I have a deep cut in my back and in the front. I slapped her.
“She got a swollen face because she is plump.”
The Police Public Relations Officer, SP Dolapo Badmos, said the police were preparing to take Bade to court when his wife came to withdraw the case.
She said, “A case of assault occasioning harm was reported against the man.
“He was arrested, detained and given bail to a reliable surety and warned to report back the next day during which the charges were ready.
“But the wife (victim) came back and was pleading, along with both families, not to take the case to court on the grounds that he is her husband and the father of her children.
“However, undertaking was written by the husband to be of good behaviour. The case is still on.”
