Police in Lagos has on Sunday arrested an 80-year-old woman, Kuburat Ayinde, after she was caught with a dead baby boy in the Oshodi under bridge area of Lagos State.  The woman had allegedly abducted the baby alive from Abeokuta, Ogun State, and strapped him to her back. The infant, however, died before she arrived in Lagos.


Ayinde wanted to board a bus to Ikorodu from Oshodi at about 2pm on Sunday when a commuter noticed that she was fidgety. The man and other passers-by were said to have asked her about the whereabouts of the baby’s mother, but she could not give a convincing reply.

It was learnt that the baby was discovered to be dead after the octogenarian was forced to remove him from her back.

A witness, Tunde Aruna, told The PUNCH that Ayinde would have been mobbed but for her old age and the intervention of some elderly people. "The woman alighted from a bus en route from Abeokuta and she wanted to board another one to Ikorodu. While she and others were waiting for a bus, a man noticed that she was nervous. He alerted people around the bus stop and they confronted her. She was initially reluctant to remove the baby from her back, but people threatened to beat her up. When it was discovered that the baby was dead, she was told to strap him to her back again. Some hoodlums wanted to mob her but some people came to her rescue."

A trader, Tayo Folawiyo, said, "A lady who boarded the same bus with the woman from Abeokuta told us that she had asked her to remove the boy from her back while they were on the bus, but she refused.”

The Lagos State Police Public Relations Officer, SP Dolapo Badmos, said the suspect claimed to be the baby’s grandmother, adding that investigation had commenced into the matter.

She said, "Around 2.30pm, the woman was brought to the station with a dead six-month-old baby, strapped to her back. She claimed to be returning with her dead grandchild from Abeokuta to her base in Ikorodu. She claimed the baby died in transit from Abeokuta en route to Lagos and that his mother is mentally unstable. The baby has been deposited in a morgue for autopsy. The case is under investigation."