A young mother in Ebonyi State, Miss Nwanneka Susannah Nweze, has accused some police officers of the state command of trafficking and selling her newborn baby for N25 million after allegedly deceiving her with claims that she was in an “illegal marriage.”
Susannah, who spoke during an interrogation session at the Force Criminal Investigation Department (FCID) Annex, Enugu, narrated how she was arrested in Afikpo by three officers who claimed they were acting on the orders of the Commissioner of Police in Ebonyi.
The session, presided over by Assistant Inspector General of Police, Chukwudi Chris Ariekpere, was reportedly recorded on video and attended by senior police officials including the Public Relations Officer of the FCID.
According to Susannah, the officers—two men and a woman—took her to the State CID in Abakaliki before she was transferred to the Police Clinic inside the barracks, where she was kept until she delivered her baby without the knowledge of her family.
Her family, in a petition to the AIG, accused SP Loveth Uche, the officer in charge of the Juvenile and Women Centre (JWC) in Ebonyi, alongside two inspectors including Maureen Otum, of conspiring to sell the baby.
They alleged that the officers gave Susannah N700,000 to cover up the transaction and pressured her to alter her statement.
During her testimony, Susannah told the AIG that the officers had accused her of being in an “illegal marriage” because she was living with a man who wanted to marry her but had yet to perform the traditional rites.
“They said the marriage was illegal and threatened to arrest the man who wanted to marry me. I asked them, since when did police arrest people for illegal marriage?” she reportedly told investigators.
She further alleged that SP Uche, who posed as a proxy for the Commissioner of Police, told her she would receive N900,000 if she gave up the child after birth. Another officer, Corporal Linda, was said to have pressured her to accept the arrangement, warning that she would go to jail otherwise.
The family’s petition also alleged that Inspector Otum’s relatives were behind the arrest, describing the act as part of a wider scheme where girls who became pregnant out of wedlock were targeted, detained, and their babies sold.
In a counter-claim, SP Uche reportedly told the AIG that Susannah was mentally unstable and had previously threatened to poison her unborn child, insisting she was only taken in for her safety.
The case, which has sparked outrage in Ebonyi and beyond, is now under investigation by the FCID Annex in Enugu.
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