A Nigerian female soldier who was dismissed from the Nigerian Army for getting pregnant after being raped by suspected bandits, has appealed her dismissal.
The female soldier had been raped by five suspected bandits while traveling to Ogbomoso, Oyo state.
She was dismissed from the military after being found guilty by the Army Board of Inquiry (BOI), and charged on a count of "conduct prejudicial to service discipline".
While describing the soldier's dismissal as unlawful, her legal counsel, Johnson Oyewole, appealed to the Chief of Army Staff, Lt. Gen. Tukur Yusuf Burutai, to upturn the dismissal decision.
”It is manifest that the purported trial of our client was tainted with substantial irregularities; there is no offence under the law and no element of the offence of misconduct prejudicial to service discipline that talks of pregnancy while in service and warranted dismissal under section 103 (1),” Barrister Oyewole said.
The female soldier was enlisted in the Army in March, 2012, as a member of the 67 Regular Recruits Intake. She was serving with the 56 Signal Command, Mile 2, Lagos, before the incident occurred.
Barrister Oyewole further revealed that his client had lawfully applied and obtained a pass for her journey to Oyo state, around October 2014, prior to the rape incident.
She had reported sick at the military hospital in December, after which the matron confirmed that she was 12 weeks pregnant.
Meanwhile, it was learnt that one of the major reasons for the dismissal of the female soldier was the time difference between the time the bandit incident and rape occurred, and the time she was confirmed pregnant at the military hospital.
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