- Safiu Kehinde
The Young Progressive Party (YPP) 2024 Edo Governorship candidate, Paul Okugbowa, have been sentenced to six-month imprisonment by Oredo Chief Magistrate’s Court for insulting a woman.
In the judgment delivered on Thursday, the presiding Magistrate, Caroline Oghuma, sentenced Okugbowa to 6 months imprisonment with an option of N100,000 fine.
Okugbowa, who is the proprietor of Calvary Crown Academy, Benin, was arraigned before the court alongside three of his teachers for calling the woman, identified as Mrs Blessing Aigbudu, a prostitute following her complaint over the negligence of her two children by the teachers.
The three teachers, Blessing Osarodion, Egharevba Esosa, and Isioma Nimen, were charged with negligence and abandonment of the pupils in their care.
Osarodion and Esosa were sentenced to one year imprisonment or an option of N100,000 fine each on each of the two counts bothering on negligence, leading to the injury of a 6-year-old pupil, Salma Aigbudu.
Nimen, who was convicted for unlawfully abandoning another pupil, Zuri Aigbudu, bags three months imprisonment with an option of N50,000 fine.
The Prosecutor, Austin Enababor, said Okugbowa committed the offence on Sept. 8, 2023, at the AIG Zone 5 headquarters in Benin, where he conducted himself in a manner likely to cause breach of peace.
Enababor said Okugbowa publicly called Mrs Blessing Aigbudu, the mother of the two pupils, a prostitute in the presence of her husband and bystanders to the hearing of the public.
He told the court that the three teachers worked with the Academy and assigned as the caregivers for the children.
The prosecutor held that the teachers failed to carry out their duty on the six-year-old daughter, which led to an injury on her face on Sept. 29, 2021 and caused her a serious harm.
He said Salma Aigbudu was wounded in the waiting room of the school during the closing hour without any first aid administered on her by the teachers on duty.
This, according to the prosecutor, contravened Sections 167(2), 412, 270, 412 and 267 of the Criminal Laws of Edo 2022.