Vile racketeering

It appeared a sequel to the Ekweremadu saga: the rich pouncing on the poor to filch their kidneys — just because they can.

But as the UK government ensured the Ekweremadus paid the price, the Nigerian government must ensure those who deceitfully harvested the kidney of Oluwatobi Adedoyin, 16, are also put through the grill of justice. This was even a worse case than London’s: Oluwatobi’s kidney was actually harvested; and no one even knows the life-long peril the teen faces as a result.

You just must feel for a helpless father, sounding almost impotent, pushing for justice for his son.

“I am not sure if it is my son I’m seeing. I’m seeing him like a picture now; he is not like before,” Adedoyin, the father, told Daily Trust Saturday. ”The government should hold those people who did this to my son.”

But the elder Adedoyin is not altogether blameless — not for any alleged crime; but for glaring laxity in parental care. Poverty doesn’t exactly excuse parental neglect: how come a 16-year-old, not an orphan, got so much exposed to bad company, and his parents had absolutely no idea? More on that presently.

Right now, we must thank Daily Trust Saturday for an exquisite piece of investigative reporting. The newspaper has named names; and provided support documentary evidence that should spur the police to a thorough investigation.