6th May, 2024
By Okafor Ofiebor/Port Harcourt
There was pandemonium on Monday morning at Silver Bird International School at Agip, Mile 4, area of Port Harcourt as members of a family of J.S.S.1 student identified as Favour assaulted a female teacher for allegedly flogging their child.
Members of the angry family who invaded the school also locked up the Administrative officer, Joy Ajayi, inside her office while threatening to beat her up over claims that their child was flogged inappropriately by the teacher.
It was not clear why Favour was punished by the teacher.
It was learnt that it took the intervention of other parents to prevent the family who had physically assaulted the female teacher from beating up the Admin officer.
In an interview with journalists, the Admin Officer, Joy Ajayi said ” This morning I was in my office when a group of boys, three boys marched into my office, locked my office door and said they wanted to flog me. As one of them was about to flog me, there is a scissor we use in doing school work, the other one carried the scissor that he will to stab me, that why should his brother be flogged in this school?
“All the teachers came out that there is no need for them to take this thing to that extent, but they refused to open the door. There was a parent inside there with me, we were resolving an issue. So the parent has to start begging them that they should calm down. They were here for more than 15,20 minutes, my teachers were outside trying to get inside, but my teachers could not get inside.
“They were saying they will flog me, we should go and call Police, we should go and call lawyer. I now said I have a right to defend myself. Allow me to defend myself. As I was talking, that is when their father now came, and said they should open the door. They opened the door, the father now said he want to carry his family and go that he will come back later.
“Before they came to my office and locked me up, a teacher was flogged on the road as she was coming to school. That was my English teacher, by name Sonia Amadi .They flogged her seriously, she is in the office I have to tell her to calm down. The mother of the boy also slapped her as she was coming to school.
“The same people who came to my office had already accosted my teacher and flogged her seriously, as she was entering the gate they followed her and marched straight to my office”.
When contacted, the mother of the student dropped the call after our reporter inquired about the incident and introduced himself as Journalist.
The mother of the J.S.S.1 Student was yet to respond to text and WhatsApp messages sent to her which from network response has been delivered to her.
Meanwhile, the School Management has lodged a formal complainant at Ada George Police Division where the teacher was issued a medical form to proceed to clinic for treatment .
In the meantime, the National Coordinator of Centre for Basic Rights Protection And Accountability Campaign, Prince Wiro, has condemned the assault on the female teacher and invasion of the school by the student’s family
Wiro stated that the parents of the student should have reported to the Ministry of Education if they felt their child was treated inappropriately or the Police in case of physical assault rather than taking laws into their hand .
The Rights Advocate called on the Police to ensure a thorough investigation of the incident and anybody found culpable should be made to face the law.
At the time of filing this report Police had not reacted to the incident.