The Uxbridge Magistrates’ Court in London has denied the former deputy president of the Nigerian Senate Ike Ekweremadu and his wife Beatrice Ekweremadu, bail after the London Metropolitan Police arraigned them for alleged child organ harvesting conspiracy. Easterener had earlier reported that the police on Thursday arrested and charged the couple with conspiracy to harvest the organs of a child brought to London by them.
According to Arise TV, the prosecutors said the Ekweremadus were being charged for bringing a 15-year-old boy from Nigeria to the UK with the claim that he was to be given a better life in the UK but was actually to harvest his organ. The prosecutors reportedly informed the court that Mr Ekweremadu procured a passport for the boy and claimed he was 21 years old but the prosecutors discovered that he was 15 years old.
According to the prosecutors, the duo have a daughter who has a kidney-related disease and has been on dialysis for quite some time. They added that they believe the plan was to use an organ from the boy on their daughter who appears to need a kidney transplant. Arise News reported that Mr Ekweremadu and his wife had separate legal representations and prayed the court to release them on bail but their prayer was dismissed by the Magistrate. The couple has surrendered their passports to the UK government. Easterener has obtained a late 2021 letter from sources close to Mr Ekweremadu purporting that the lawmaker had written the British High Commission in Nigeria in support of a visa application of a male.
In the letter, Mr Ekweremadu disclosed that the applicant was travelling to the UK for medical examination to possibly donate a kidney to his daughter Sonia. He said the examination would be carried out at the London Royal Free Hospital. The letter did not disclose the age of the male but UK prosecutors alleged that the victim is a minor and that Mr Ekweremadu had falsified his age to 21. The Magistrate ordered they be remanded in custody until July 7, 2022, for the next hearing on the case.
