In the state’s Aluu, Ikwerre Local Government Area, the Rivers State Police Command has discovered a “baby factory” run by a child trafficking organisation.
Six expectant women were freed from the factory that made babies by the command.
The women, who ranged in age from 20 to 23, were being held with the intention of trading their newborn children when they gave birth.
On Tuesday, the pregnant women and Akudo Azoroh, the center’s owner and confessed child trafficker, were both taken into custody.
Azoroh clarified that she does not give the babies to ritualists but rather to families without children of their own.
She said the women came to her already pregnant, and that she paid them between N800,000 and N900,00 depending on the stage of their pregnancies at the time they came in and the gender of the child they gave birth to.
According to her, “I started the business three years ago, and I have previously given out six children. The girls who came to me on their own were already pregnant; I don’t have any boys who get the girls pregnant.
Only non-parental families and not ritualists are eligible to receive the babies, which I distribute for between N1.4 and N1.5 million depending on the baby’s sex and pay the mothers according to their stage of pregnancy at the time they arrived.
Some of the expectant women admitted that they had brought their pregnancies to the factory with the intention of giving the babies away once they were born because they lacked the resources to care for them.
