17-year-old boy abandons home after dad threatens to kill him

Riliwan

SEVENTEEN-year-old Riliwan has said he ran away from his father’s house in Abuja to Lagos because he threatened to kill him.

Riliwan told our correspondent on Saturday in a bus coming from Abuja, to Lagos that he ran away from home at Tungamade, Abuja without the knowledge of his father, who he described as a disciplinarian.

Our correspondent, who joined the bus in Ibadan, observed that Riliwan looked scared and tired.

Though, he claimed to be going to  Church Street in Idumota, Lagos Island, to meet his mother, his descriptions did not show that he knew his destination.

According to him, he decides to run away from home due to maltreatment and death threats from his father.

He said, “I left home without the knowledge of my father. He has always maltreated me. He is always threatening to kill me. Each time I needed something from him, he would turn me down. I am not feeling the fatherly love and I am not happy to be with him any longer. That is why I decided to run away to meet my mother in Lagos. I was told that my parents divorced since I was three-year-old.

“For instance, I had to abandon my education at Junior Secondary School one because my father refused to pay my school fees. Each time I came home to tell him that his attention was needed in my school, he would not go.

“I believe that things will turn out for the better in Lagos when I see my mother, although she is not also aware that I am coming. But I had earlier called her on the telephone to know where she was because she married another person after leaving my father.”

Rilwan added that before he left his father, he worked as an assistant in a bakery to survive.

He said, “I feed myself because nobody cares. Anytime my step-mum gave me food, we had to sneak into the house  because my father must not know.

“So the bakery became my life. I earlier tried to apply as an apprentice with an engineer but he requested to see any of my parents. When I informed my father, he ignored me.”

When our correspondent visited Church Street, Idumota, on Sunday, he could not locate Riliwan.

Residents of the house where his mother supposedly  lives, could not confirm Riliwan’s arrival in the house or the area.

Culled from Punch