A student of the University of Lagos (UNILAG) on Tuesday told an Ikeja Domestic Violence and Sexual Offences Court that she was gang-raped by eight fellow students and blackmailed with a video recording of the assault.
The 19-year-old student made the allegation while giving evidence during the trial of five students over the alleged crimes.
The students are -Moboluwaji Omowole, 19; Chuka Chukwu, 19; Peace Nwankama, 19; James Aguedu, 20; and Osemeka Josephine, 20.
Other suspects allegedly involved are still at large.
The suspects have been charged on three counts of child defilement, permitting the defilement of a child in a premises, and procuration.
The victim, who was 17 years old at the time of the alleged gang rape, testified in court for over 2 hours.
“In no particular order, the following took their turns – Daniel, James, Yinka, Bolu (first defendant), Seriki, Emmanuel and two other people who I don’t know their name. They were eight men.
“After they did that they all came into the room including Josephine and they started playing music, four people held me down and were touching me all around while Josephine was either kissing one or dancing with one of them.
“At a point Josephine asked if she could kiss me while I was trying to fight off the people around. I was thinking of leaving but I was outnumbered and I didn’t know if those downstairs were part of them.
“Eventually Josephine kissed me and they made comments like it’s not that bad etc. When they were molesting me, there was a guy who was sitting down and video recording all that was happening on a phone.
“My first instinct was to get the phone from him but I thought I was outnumbered. At a point when they were leaving, they led me outside the building and they told me they had a video of what happened.
“They said if I don’t want to be popular in school, I have to answer them anytime they wanted to have sex. They collected my number and shared it among themselves,” she said.
The victim said she was gang-raped mutitple times a week or two after the alleged incident.
She told the court that things become worse when she started hearing rumours about the video tape being leaked.
“I started hearing stories and the narrative was as though I wanted it, Henry a friend of Peace told me that I was popular at Jaja Hall and that there was a video and I wanted to get away from it.
“I had a friend (name withheld) who we both belonged to the an organization in school, he liked me and he is the type to find out about everyone he likes when he heard about the story and video he asked questions.
“Unknown to me, he reported to the school authorities and on Mar. 1, 2017, he told me to follow him to Ecobank to withdraw money but unknown to me, he wanted me to see the school counselor.
“The school counselor beckoned to me, I saw my biodata in her hands, she asked me to follow her and at this point I knew who she was.
“I thought I was going to be expelled, she pulled out a form and asked me to state what happened and I told her everything, she told me the school was behind my back and she said they will be caught,” she said.
She said the counselor asked her to lure Omowole (first defendant) to a place within the school premises where he was arrested, taken to the office of the Dean Student Affairs where he provided the names of the rest of his alleged accomplices.
Justice Sururat Soladoye adjourned the case until March 18 for cross-examination of the victim.
