Woman Who Poured Kerosene On Her daughter And Set Her On Fire- Narrates What Happened

A mother of five, Aisha Tijani, who was arrested by policemen from Ogun state Command eight days ago for pouring kerosene on her daughter and setting her on fire, has said that she is still wondering on what could have led her to take such an action against a beloved child of hers. She is also of the belief that she must have been diabolically hypriotised.

Ms Tijani had reportedly committed the act on her 10-year-old daughter which led to a report at Mowe divisional headquarters.

The reason for the suspect’s anger with her daughter, according to a neighbour who reported to the police, was that the girl took a phone she seized from one of her children from where she kept it and gave it back to the owner.

The command’s spokesman, DSP Abimbola Oyeyemi, who confirmed the story, said that the report prompted the Divisional Police Officer, Mowe division, CSP Folashade Tanaruno, to move swiftly to the scene with the detectives, to arrest the mother.

The girl, who had burns on her hands and chest was said to have been rushed to the nearest hospital, from where she was referred to Olabisi Onabanjo Teaching Hospital for proper medical attention.

In an interview with the mother, she narrated thus: “I’m a food vendor blessed with five children. My first child and son is 22 years old. He is followed by twin girls aged 18, after whom I had a second set of twins, a boy and a girl aged 10.

“Their father and I got separated nine years ago and he took all of them with him. He also remarried.

“Two years after, I got a call from the children that their father was chasing them with cutlass and had told them to leave his house. I asked people in their neighbourhood to help keep them safe, and I went there to take all of them to stay with me.

“All alone, I’ve been taking care of them. My 22-year-old son is learning welding while the first set of female twins are into hairdressing and building materials apprenticeship. The second set of twins are in school.

“Regarding my twin daughter that I poured kerosene on, I don’t know what made me to act in such a way. That was not me. I don’t know what took over my reasoning. I believe it was not ordinary.”

Speaking further on the event that led to her action, Ms Tijani said: “That Sunday, I had already bathed the younger twins, fed them and got them ready for church. One of them, Mary, had already gone to church, only for me see her returning home. I asked her what she came for and she replied that she needed N50 for offering in the church.

“Unknown to me, she came to pick her elder sister’s phone which I had earlier seized because the sister was busy with her phone while I was talking to her.

“I discovered that my younger daughter pretended to come for N50 when she actually came to pick the phone. This was when I saw the phone with the elder sister, and I had been looking for it where I kept it on the bed.

“I didn’t know how I poured kerosene on her and struck a match. It was when I saw fire ignited that I shouted, poured water on her and called a bike man to take her to the hospital. She was in my arms in the hospital when the police came to arrest me.”

Since her being detained, she said her older children had not been able to go for their vocational training because there was no one to give them money. “I was also told that my injured daughter has been asking of me. I didn’t like what happened, but I believe it was spiritually controlled. If you go to my neighbourhood, the residents will tell you how I take care of all the children. I have never been a bad mother to them,” she added.

The mother pleaded that “the government should have mercy on me so as to be able to attend to the needs of my children. Such a thing will never happen again.”