Girl 10, loses memory after horrific torture

A 10-year-old girl at Kpenoe, near Ho, is suffering from memory loss after she was tied up by her paternal grandmother and subjected to severe beatings and left under the scorching sun for more than four hours, a police inquest has revealed.
The perpetrator of this barbaric act by name, Aku Gbafa, a Togolese, who is believed to be in her 50s was said to have carried out the medieval torture on the helpless and starving child as punishment for using GH¢1 from the vegetables she was sent to sell, to buy food.  

The poor and traumatised child who was rescued by officials of the Department of Social Welfare and Community Development has been on admission at the Ho Teaching Hospital (HTU) with sores on her fingers and wrist, since November 19, struggling to regain her full memory.  
The Probation Officer of the Department of Social Welfare and Community Development in the Ho Municipality, Mr Wisdom Kodjo Krakani disclosed these to The Spectator on Tuesday.  
He said that some horrified neighbours alerted his outfit on November 15, leading to the rescue of the girl (name withheld) and the subsequent handing over of the woman to the Domestic Violence and Victim Support Unit (DOVVSU) at the Regional Police Headquarters, Ho.  
According to Mr Krakani, preliminary investigations revealed that the girl, whose father lived in Togo, was staying with her grandmother at Kpenoe.  
As a daily routine, her grandmother sent her to go into town to sell vegetables every morning before going to school.  
The probation officer said on that fateful morning, the victim carried out the duty diligently and returned home to realise that her grandmother had left no food for her before going to the farm.  
The starving child then used GH¢1 from the morning’s sales to buy rice and quickly told her grandmother about it, when she (Gbafa) returned home.  
That, Mr Krakani said, angered the suspect who is said to have vowed that she would not go to the farm the next day but rather stay home to teach the child a bitter lesson.  
True to her words, the woman tied both hands and both legs of the girl in the open the next morning and beat her with a cane for hours until the victim started bleeding from the injuries.  
As if that was not enough, the grandmother ground pepper and smeared it into the cuts, before leaving the girl under the scorching sun for several hours.  
Mr Krakani said that the suspect then told the child to tell her teachers or anyone who sought to know what happened to her that she accidentally fell in boiling water.  
He said that though the incident took place a few days before the girl was rescued, the girl as of now could not remember the exact day due to the trauma she was suffering from.  
The story was corroborated by DOVVSU on Monday when contacted.
Aku Gbafa is currently on bail assisting in police investigations.  

From Alberto Mario Noretti, Kpenoe