An Anambra-based apprentice, identified Chinecherem Ugwu, is currently facing one of the most painful moments of his life, given the severe torture he got from his Boss, Mr. Peter Ozioko.
Mr. Ugwu, who hails from Nsukka in Enugu State, was said to be serving his master, Mr. Ozioko, as an apprentice in one of his shops in the commercial city of Nnewi, Nnewi North Local Government Area of Anambra State, where he recently received the worst beating of his life.
According to a video currently trending on social media, the brutalization came following a suspicion by Mr. Ozioko that his apprentice (Ugwu) bought a phone.
The video, credited to ‘Henry and Abigail’, also shows the brutalized apprentice with varied degrees of irritating injuries on different parts of his body, with some black spots suspected to be signs of internal bleeding or congealed blood; while one of his hands was also said to be cracked, to the point that he can no longer properly move it or use it for anything.
Recounting his ordeal, the victim said it all started when his Master was informed by one of his agents that he bought a phone.
This, he said, made his Master to start interrogation him about the how-come and the whereabouts of the said phone. He explained that while he was telling his Boss that he did not buy any phone, he ordered him to close the shop, and then immediately carried him (with the help of some people) to a location in the outskirts of the market.
“When they took me to that place, they tied me up with rope and started beating and flogging me with cane,” Ugwu recounted (in Igbo language).
It was also gathered that Ugwu’s Master and his accomplices were intermittently pouring hot schnapps (kaị-kaị) on his bare body while flogging him under the hot sun, to enable the beating sink well on his body.
The apprentice further recounted that his Master, who also hails from the same Nsukka in Enugu State with him, remained adamant to his wailing, his explanations and his excruciating pains throughout the period of the torture which lasted for long.
Efforts by this reporter, Izunna Okafor, to get the reactions of the Police Public Relations Officer of the Anambra State Police Command, SP Ikenga Tochukwu, on the incident, proved abortive, as he was yet to respond to the message sent to him, while his phone number was also not connecting as at the time of this publication.
