The Osun State Government on Sunday said it arrested a resident identified simply as Sanjo, in Osogbo, the state capital, for allegedly beating his child to death.

The state Commissioner for Women, Children and Social Affairs, Olubukola Olaboopo, in a statement, said the 43-year-old suspect, who lived around the Alekuwodo area, had been handed over to the police.

Olaboopo, who claimed the ministry got wind of the crime through a source, said government officials moved in and arrested the suspect.

The statement quoted Sanjo as saying he got married to his wife in 2008 and they had five children.

“It was the third child that I beat unintentionally to death.

“My wife left the child with me and she started crying.  I did all I could to placate her, but she kept crying. Something just came upon me and I beat the two months old baby to death. My wife and I buried the child on our farmland,” he added.

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But the statement said Sanjo’s wife, while being interrogated, claimed that four of their five children had died, leaving them with only the last child.

She explained that she conspired with her husband to kill two of the children due to poverty, while they dumped one child around the Osogbo Technical School area.

Olaboopo warned that the state government would not condone acts of violence and child abuse, vowing that anyone caught would face the wrath of the law.