A 21-year-old student has been
hospitalised, after she was allegedly pushed down from the third floor of a
building in Lagos, following a disagreement with a man she met on the social
network, Facebook.
The News Agency
of Nigeria reports that Akabugu Nkiruka sustained multiple injuries,
including a pelvis fracture, and was undergoing surgery at the General
Hospital, Marina, Lagos, on Tuesday.
Nkiruka, a Linguistics student of the
University of Lagos, told NAN on her hospital bed
that she met the young man through the social media, barely a week before the
November 1 incident.
She told NAN that the 26-year-old
man (name withheld) last Wednesday invited her to a night club in Apapa from
where they ended up in his family home at 1004 Estate, Victoria Island, Lagos.
She noted that the young man had earlier
talked about sex on the phone prior to the outing but she told him she was
menstruating.
Nkiruka said on getting to the house,
the man tore her dress and tried to rape her.
According to Nkiruka, the man
thereafter pushed her down from the third floor of the building because she
refused to have sex with him.
When contacted, the man’s mother, who
was at home on the night of the incident, however, told NAN that she was not aware of what
happened.
She said she slept around 10pm, while
the disagreement between the couple started much later.
The mother, who pleaded anonymity, said
she paid part of the hospital bill immediately after Nkiruka was admitted, and
even tried to transfer her to a private hospital.
“I took her as our own daughter and so,
I can do anything that will make her recover quickly,’’ she added.
She insisted that her preliminary
inquiry indicated that Nkiruka was not pushed by her son as alleged, but that
she jumped on her own in the ensuing scuffle.
When contacted, the Divisional Police Officer
of Bar Beach, Victoria Island, Lagos, Mr. Fayoade Adegoke, told NAN that Nkiruka wrote in her statement
that she jumped on her own, in order to escape being raped.
Adegoke said he ordered his men to
convey the victim to the hospital immediately after he was informed of the
incident by security guards in the area.
The DPO said the suspect was released
on bail, pending further investigation into the matter.
NAN recalls that seven
young men, including two who met a 24-year-old post-graduate student, Cynthia
Osokogu, on facebook, are currently facing trial for allegedly raping and
killing her in Lagos earlier this year.