Ex-politician, wife clash over child’s custody, father-in-law’s detention

A legal practitioner, Ndidi Iyamu, has accused her ex-husband, identified simply as Elakhe, of allegedly conniving with policemen in Lagos State to arrest and detain her 70-year-old father for hours in an attempt to take custody of their son.

PUNCH Metro gathered that after the couple’s marriage was dissolved by the court in 2018, the custody of their only child was granted to Iyamu.

The mother of one said ever since she was granted custody of the child, her ex-husband had been deploying different tactics, including using the instrumentality of the police to take custody of the 11-year-old child.

She said, “After the court gave me custody of our only child, the court allowed my husband to pay a supervised visit to our son. I allowed the boy to visit him twice in Abuja but on the last visit in October 2021, he held on to him, put him in school and also forged his birth certificate while the original certificate was with me.

“So, I filed a contempt proceeding in Lagos and the court gave an order that my child should be returned to me. So, I took the judgement to Abuja, registered it and the judge gave the order for the enforcement of the judgment and that was how I brought my son back to Lagos.

“But my ex-husband kept calling me. He threatened to deal with me and said it was payback time for all the petitions I wrote to get my child back. He also insulted my father for supporting me and told my sister that he was coming to Lagos to deal with my father to get his son back.”

Iyamu’s father, Victor, accused Elakhe of facilitating his detention at the State Criminal Investigation Department, Panti, Yaba, adding that he was at his shop when his daughter’s ex-husband stormed the premises with two policemen and started harassing him.

He said, “They left when my cousin intervened, but around 10pm, he returned with some officers from the Meiran police station to arrest me.

“I am hypertensive, yet they dragged me to the station. It was at the station that the officers that came with him from Abuja assaulted me and threatened to break my eyeglasses.

“After I got bailed, I was told to return to the station and when I did on February 6, the police took me to the SCID, Panti, Yaba, before one CSP Akpama. I was told they were acting on his order. I was held there for three hours despite my hypertensive condition.”

In his reaction, Elakhe, when contacted, denied the allegations.

He, however, said his ex-wife kept his child away from him, adding that he was only interested in the affairs of his child.

Elakhe said, “She has been the one blackmailing me. She took custody of the child. The last time the boy visited me, he was between 10 and 11 years old and he was still in primary four. To know how intelligent the child is, I took him to a school in Abuja and he passed the test for primary five and six.

“He also wrote a common entrance examination and gained admission into a boarding house until she came with the police in December to take him away. The boy is free to go to another school but as far as his education is concerned, I want to be fully aware but she blocked my line. I came to Lagos with some family friends and when I got to her father’s place, he brought out a court judgement and started reading it to me.

“I was trying to talk to him but he arranged for some boys who tore my clothes. I went to human relations and the SCID to complain. I don’t think they detained him because we did that case in the middle of the night and he was granted bail.”

The state Police Public Relations Officer, Benjamin Hundeyin, said, “If the case was transferred from Meiran to the SCID, then the DC must be aware and no one can be unjustly detained as a result.”

(Punch)