(A baby bump. Photo Credit: Punch News)
Former Director-General of the National Agency for the Prohibition of Trafficking in Persons, Julie Okah-Donli, has alleged that some women fake pregnancies using steroids and later obtain babies to deceive their husbands into believing they gave birth.
Okah-Donli made the claim in a resurfaced interview on Tuesday during an appearance on a podcast, where she spoke about alleged f@ke pregnancy syndicates and baby tr@fficking in Nigeria.
According to her, women involved in the practice are allegedly injected with steroids that give the appearance of pregnancy, causing their faces to bloat and their stomachs to appear enlarged despite not actually being pregnant.
She claimed the women also imitate pregnancy symptoms such as morning sickness, vomiting and spitting, particularly in the presence of their husbands, pretending to suffer from nausea and mimicking the act of throwing up.
She further alleged that the women often arrange for the supposed childbirth to take place while their husbands are away, either through travel or by sending them on errands, before presenting them with a baby upon their return, claiming that some husbands come home to find a baby already in the house or are congratulated on becoming fathers shortly after running an errand.
Okah-Donli also alleged that some women undergo f@ke surgical procedures to create the impression that they delivered via caesarean section, claiming that incisions are made and stitched back up purely to support the deception.
The former NAPTIP boss linked the alleged practice to cases where paternity tests reveal that children are not biologically related to their presumed fathers, arguing that maternity tests should also be conducted in such situations.
She said investigations often uncovered that children were not biologically related to the father through paternity testing, but that maternity testing, which would confirm whether the woman actually gave birth, was frequently overlooked.
According to her, maternity testing would help clarify whether a woman genuinely gave birth to a child and could assist investigators in uncovering cases of alleged baby tr@fficking, noting that in some cases, a man might wrongly suspect his wife of infidelity when in fact the woman had allegedly obtained the baby from elsewhere, making a maternity test necessary to confirm the child’s true origins.
She further alleged that some women claim to have twins, triplets or quadruplets because it makes the deception easier, suggesting that multiple-birth claims have become more common because they allow for a single transaction to service the deception more convincingly.
Okah-Donli served as Director-General of NAPTIP after her appointment by former President Muhammadu Buhari in 2017, leading the agency’s efforts against human tr@fficking and related offences. Her comments on the podcast were not accompanied by specific evidence, and the allegations remain her claims.
