A one time aspirant for the position of Honourable member representing Egor constituency in Edo State House of Assembly, under the platform of the All Progressives Congress, Mrs Josephine Iyamu has been convicted for human trafficking in United Kingdom.
The party described the conviction as unfortunate.
The party said it was unaware that she was a human trafficker.
Iyamu, a UK-based nurse, who is from Edo State, was jailed for 14 years by the Birmingham Crown Court for trafficking five Nigerian women to Germany for prostitution.
She was reported to be a ring leader of an international human trafficking network, which used a witch-doctor to convince her victims that they were under her control and exploited them.
The convict was also reported to have charged each of her victims 30,000 euros and 38,000 euros to arrange for their travel to Europe.
Days after she was reportedly jailed, a campaign poster, allegedly portraying her as an Edo State House of Assembly aspirant, under the APC, went viral on the Internet.
The poster with her name as ‘Mrs. Sandra Josephine Imaghodor’, showed that she aspired to represent Egor Constituency in the House, with a mission to ‘inspire support for the empowerment of women and family.’
The state Chairman of the APC, Mr. Anselm Ojezua, said, “Though the name (in the online report) is not the same as we have it, the person appears to be the same, particularly when she (Josephine) was introduced as a nurse.
“We see her conviction as an unfortunate situation, in terms of the party and the government’s stance on human trafficking, sex slavery and others.
“We know her to be a registered nurse in the UK. But one did not know that she was engaged in any other business other than her profession. She did express interest in contesting but she did not contest eventually.’’
Ojezua, who spoke to SUNDAY PUNCH on the telephone, also reiterated that the party was committed to tackling human trafficking.
Asked whether the party’s state chapter would take any disciplinary action against the convict, the state chairman said Iyamu was already convicted and serving a jail term outside the country.