Woman pours hot soup on five-year-old stepdaughter

Could a stepmother have deliberately or accidentally poured hot soup on her five-year-old step-daughter, Uwakmfon, who was asleep in the midst of two other children' This is the puzzle that officials of the Akwa Ibom State Ministry of Women Affairs and Social Welfare are determined to solve.But Uwakmfon from Afaha Obio Eno in Ibiono Ibom Local Government Area of the state insisted that her stepmothers action was deliberate, wondering why the hot soup did not pour on her siblings with whom she slept in the same room.Apart from Uwakmfon, her three-year-old brother and her step-brother also slept on the floor in their one-room apartment when the incident occurred last week Thursday. Their father, 27-year-old Unyime Ubiak, a carpenter, was not at home.Uwakmfon said, After my father had sent my mother (Mrs. Imaobong Akpan, a tailor) away, he brought in a new wife to take care of us. It was late in the evening and we were sleeping when all of a sudden I felt something hot on my lap and legs.Immediately I woke up, I started crying because my legs were paining me. My legs started peeling. I was crying but nobody cared. After a while, my younger brother started crying too. The woman deliberately poured the soup on me.But the girls father insisted that the incident was an accident, saying no reasonable person would deliberately pour hot soup on a child.Ubiak said, Uwakmfons stepmother did not intentionally pour the hot soup on her. No reasonable person would just wake a child up and pour a pot of hot soup on her. The action of my wife was not premeditated. It was a mistake.She removed the hot pot of soup from fire with her bare hands and when she could not bear the pain, the pot fell from her hand and splashed on my daughter. When I heard about it, I beat up my wife and sent her away from home.However, the Social Welfare Officer of the ministry, Mr. Akaniyene Smart, told PUNCH METRO that the account given by the girls paternal grandmother, who also lives in the same house, indicated that there was a foul play.He said the account given by Uwakmfons grandmother was that the girl collided with her step-mother who was bringing a pot of soup into the room and the content poured on her.Smart said when Uwakmfon was brought to the ministry; she was unable to walk as her legs, especially the affected areas, were festering because she was not taken to the hospital on time.He said the officials of the ministry later took the girl to the hospital, adding thatwe had to negotiate with the doctor to reduce the bill, which was high because the wounds required extensive treatment.Smart said the agency was alerted by Uwakmfons aunty when she brought the girl to Uyo for treatment.He said Ubiak had been advised to produce Uwakmfons unnamed step-mother or risk prosecution on Monday.
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