Ogun State Police Command has arrested a 30-year-old woman identified as Risikat Olabintan, for dumping her one-day-old baby in a toilet at Ibukun Oluwapo Community Ishaga Surulere in Owode-Yewa area of the state.
Police spokesperson in the state, Abimbola Oyeyemi, who confirmed the incident said the mother of six, Olabintan, threw her son into the pit shortly after birthing him on Sunday morning.
Fortunately, children who were playing later that day heard a baby’s cries from the pit located at the back of the compound and raised alarm.
Community leaders who assembled by the pit, alerted the police at Owode-Yewa Division who moved to the scene and evacuated the newborn and arrested the woman.
The police spokesperson said investigation later revealed that Ms. Olabintan gave birth secretly to the baby and threw him inside the soak-away at about 5 a.m.
Upon interrogation, the woman confessed to committing the crime because she discovered that she had no means of properly feeding all her children.
The suspect told the police that her husband and father of all the children had since absconded to an unknown destination without any hope of coming back to the family, so when she delivered the sixth child she had no choice but to get rid of him.
Mr Oyeyemi said both the baby and the mother are presently in the hospital for medical attention and the baby is responding to treatment.
He said the Commissioner of Police, Imohimi Edgal, had directed the case transferred to the Anti-Human Trafficking and Child Labour Unit of the State.