 Welcome back to the breakfast here on PLOS TV Africa. Now let's move into our next conversation and that is on the fire disaster at the Ibanez supermarket in Abuja. Before we get into that and of course, introduce our guests to the sport and let's quickly have you watch the foundation of this conversation and where this is coming from. We'll be back. So this is the sports where the fire incident started in the store. And then if you look at the time on the screen, seven o'clock dot and we'll observe the girl, she's coming now. You can see she's just working confidently on her own. And then it's worthy to note at this point that throughout the time she entered the store at this day, she did not come here for once before now. So she's coming here for the first time today now. And we can see how she picked the lighter. She knew exactly where everything is or was at this time. So she picked the lighter. We can see she's lighting back up now. Somebody was passing in. She pretended as if nothing was happening. And when she was done, she replaced the lighter back and was going back. Can see her looking back to see what she has done. So the fire is just starting up. So it cannot be easily noted or identified by passerby or anybody. And we can see the lady at the far end, the girl is watching. She's observing what she has done. If it has lighted up or not, if you look closely, you can see her moving away. So the fire is increasing gradually. So because it's been set up on packs of lighters, it will be easier for it to explode. Okay. So we can see staffs moving around. Could not be able to identify it at this point because it's just beginning. So the fire is increasing now. And then if you notice, the lighters are now exploding. So we can see the flame is catching up and spreading. Okay. So staff has seen the incidents and he has run to get a fire extinguisher. A really shocking CCTV footage there from the Ibanez supermarket in Abuja, where that happened. This morning we're speaking with a lawyer, Mr. Emeka Okbara. Thank you very much for joining us. Good morning. Good morning. It's still very, very shocking for everyone who gets to see this footage. And of course, there's also clips of the girl after she was arrested with a couple of others. The conversations have been with regards to juvenile, you know, delinquency and what legal options are available. And also asking about possibilities of insurance coverage for the superstore. But I want us to talk about the legal options that are available here for a nine year old. What type of investigation is necessary and what options do they really have? Well, there are two aspects of this we're talking of the criminal aspect and the civil aspect. Let me go to the civil first. Before for the supermarket chain, I think the most realistic option for them is insurance. They could have ensured the goods together with the building. They could have ensured the building alone. It all depends on if they had comprehensive insurance. We are here with two billion Naira here. If they insured the building only, they can only collect for the loss of the building. If they insured comprehensively the building and all the goods they are in, then they can talk about collecting insurance for everything that was lost. Then there is the non-realistic option. I'm calling them non-realistic because of how much that can possibly be realized from suing the parents of the girl. Now, for you to actually sue, that is where the police have to do their investigations properly. And when the clip I saw, there was a clip I saw about them interviewing the girl. I think they should have toned down a bit to be able to get all the necessary things. Now, for you to be able to successfully sue the parents or the person, the mind of the girl, you have to be able to show a predisposition to such mischief. Because if you don't show that from your investigations, you're not able to establish that. You won't even be able to do anything to them. What do you mean a predisposition? Can you explain what that means? You know, this girl might have been involved in certain level, maybe not to this level but of mischief previously. And that is a notice to the parents that they could not have rightly taken this girl to the supermarket and left her alone to her own devices. Because if they do that and there was such predisposition, you have negligence here. That means they are negligent. Whoever brought her to that place and left her to be on her own, if she had this reason, maybe beating other people, maybe taking things and hiding them and doing some other things, then that is a notice to whoever brought her to the supermarket that you don't just leave that girl who will be up to mischief. And that is what she did and caused enormous, incredible damage. So the person who brought her to that place could be sued. But the point is how much will you realize? Yeah, you get judgment. That's why I say it's unrealistic actually when you come to think of it. From the point of view of the supermarket chain, that is what I'm talking about, from their point of view of recovering what has been lost, you understand. Now, outside of that, if we go to the criminal aspect, the girl has reached the age of criminal responsibility. Under the law, criminal responsibility starts from seven years. But the point is, what will you do to her? She can only be taken to a juvenile court, except there is only one exception. If you establish criminal culpability with an adult, then the two of them, or the more than two of them, could be charged before a regular court. But with respect to the girl, you can't even use the word sentence, can't use the word conviction, no court can do that. That is the rule. She can only be remanded in a juvenile center when she is found. Of course, it's so clear here that she's culpable. She can be remanded in a juvenile center for a period. A correctional center, not a prison. She cannot be imprisoned. You can't even use the word. But anybody that was culpable along with her, can be sentenced to a prison, a normal prison. So two things, before we go on, two things. How do you find another person, how do you get confirmation that another person is culpable with her? Maybe an adult. What type of investigation needs to happen to prove that she didn't act alone? That's one. And then two, you mentioned that you can't do anything to her if you don't see that she has a precedent of carrying up actions like that or acts like that. So does that mean that if they have no proof that she has done similar things in the past, then there's no case? No, I'm not saying in civil matter, when you go to the civil matter to recover whatever, or recover money from them, you cannot recover anything against the parents or against whoever brought her there. Except you prove negligence. That is what I'm saying. Of course, it is clear she is culpable, but what can you do to her? Criminally and civilly, she doesn't have the money of her own. When you come to criminal responsibility, she will be found, you can use the word guilty, but she could be remanded in a juvenile center. That is the worst that can happen to her criminally. You understand? Civilly, there's nothing you can get from these girls because she doesn't have an estate of her own. But from the parents or from whosoever brought her to that place. If you are able to establish that there was a predisposition to search mischief that she did, then that's a notice, a previous notice before this event to whoever brought her there, that you are supposed to be more careful of her, mindful of her. You shouldn't let her out of your sight. Otherwise, you go and do mischief, which she did. So that person will be civilly responsible, civilly. The person will also be criminally responsible from the investigation. It is established that perhaps they sent her to do that. It's possible. It's possible. So I do not know what and what the police have so far unethered. It could be that those people know on the owners of the supermarket, or they have some scores to settle with either somebody working there or something like that. That is something the police shoot seriously. Investing again. And I am saying something that the manner of asking her questions I saw in a clip. It was kind of using a kind of force on her, not physical force, but verbal force on her. One has to really make her take the person into confidence. It takes a lot to be able to feed her. You make her feel at home. And for her to be able to reveal certain things, not knowing she's revealing, certain things are back her background about certain things she has done before. The same thing where you are interviewing other people related to her to be able to come to the truth about this matter. So that is what I'm saying. It is very important. The police need to really do some work here. And it doesn't have to be the decision Nigerian were of intimidating people. You don't get enough facts to be able to take care of this particular issue legally by using that kind of tactic. The Nigerian police obviously has a lot of learning to do and a lot of training that needs to be carried out because we've seen these things so many times and nothing seems to have improved even with a nine-year-old. So I want you to now speak on legal options for the girl, the nine-year-old and her parents. If she's going to get a lawyer, if her parents are going to get lawyers to represent her or them, what options do they have? Well, of course, they need the legal representation and I would believe that whoever will represent her and the parents who try to disprove on her own side that she didn't know she was just being mischief, the mischief of a nine-year-old. She didn't know the firewall and got the whole thing. Although it would be difficult to actually be able to establish that she didn't know because from the clip we saw, she actually saw to it that what she wanted done was done. So it would be difficult but there are some things that can be pleaded in our local tools to be able to bring down the way the court would look at her. On the side of the parents, it would be to disprove if they are able to disprove that she wasn't predisposed before this time to doing that kind of thing. She had been a good girl. She wasn't doing this kind of thing and the parents never knew and perhaps that they weren't negligent. She maybe ran away from them. When they entered the supermarket, she just went off or maybe she said, I don't want to put her words into their own mouth. She could have said she wanted to go to use the facility there and eventually ended up somewhere else to do whatever she had in mind. If the parents weren't aware of that, there's no way you could pin culpability on them, responsibility on them. Obviously, they need to have access to very, very good legal representation who can get them out of this mess because this is obviously... It's the type of mess that they probably had never imagined that they would find themselves. Otherwise, they will end up in prison. Whoever brought her there will end up in prison. Yeah, so Mr. Amparo, I want you to share how the court of public opinion can influence this case. The comments on social media, response to the video clips, I've also seen some very, very vile statements concerning a nine-year-old. How can we prevent the court of public opinion from influencing this case? Well, I think whatever is being said out there should not be the parameter for judging this matter. The court is not an emotional court. The court will look at it purely objectively and what the law prescribes, some of which I have been able to say here. It's not a matter of... I mean, in the present times, it's unfortunate this happened if they had controlled the fire before, if they had... People there had not panicked and they were able to control the fire. We will not say this... Talking about this is about her being a witch, about her being all these things, although Mr. Amparo being said, those things have nothing to do with the criminal law. That is not the issue. The law doesn't know those things. So that's what I can say about there. The court will not be influenced by the emotions out there in the public. That is not the way the law coursework. Yeah. Is there any hope that the legal representation can push that this was really just a child playing with fire? As we all did when we were kids, did some of the most daring things while growing up. A lot of us chased lizards. A lot of us caught, well, I chased lizards. So is there a hope that this might also help the case if they can push that narrative? Yeah. We should not be... Let's look at this objectively. We should not be so emotional about it. It's unfortunate the enormous loss that has happened here. But if you look at it objectively, this is what many, I'm not saying all, but some children at her age would engage in this kind of not knowing the consequences. So I'm actually also thinking of the damage it would do to this girl. This thing could damage her for life. And that is also where she needs help because everybody is against her and this could damage her psychologically. So we're not only talking about what has been done to the goods. This thing that has happened could damage this little girl for life. Except something is done to stop it from happening. She would mean a lot of counseling after this. It's really sad and I can't bring myself to be angry at the little girl about the amount of damage that this has caused. I've definitely considered some of the things that you've mentioned about how this might also damage her mentally for life. And if she also has to, which brings my next question. If she also finds herself in juvenile detention, can you share with us what those facilities are like in Nigeria? Are they actually correctional facilities? And how much time is she likely to spend? It's unfortunate. We have one in Lagos. We have one in other places. And unfortunately the reality is that those juvenile centers turn out in reality to be breeding grounds for criminals, many of them. Overseas in many jurisdictions they have upgraded to this kind of pain now. It shows the parents have their parental failure to an extent here. It's there, it's there, their parental failure. We cannot dispute that. So you take the child away and she goes to another home of a setting and a family that will be ready to take her and train her. The state will pay the foster parent for a period. And then there will be visitation by the person in charge from the welfare office. There will be periodic visitation to make sure that she is doing well, to make sure that this thing does not damage her and she is built for the rest of her life, to make sure that she is removed. I mean this kind of mischief is taken away from her. She is properly trained. And over a period, after some time, when it is satisfied that she can return to the parents, she can be able to. After it is also satisfied that the parents will be able to come up in their responsibility in responsibly bringing up a child of her level. So that's the way it is done in many jurisdictions now. We haven't done that. So this particular incident now has opened up the fact that we still need a lot to be done in terms of our criminal laws and our administration of criminal justice. Especially when it concerns juveniles and children. Yeah, how much time do you think she might get? I cannot say. If it is for us, if it is prison for an adult, I think it's seven years, seven years. But she might get not imprisonment. I have stressed that. Yes. Is there a problem? In prison, there is nothing like a conviction. She cannot be convicted at her age. But she could be remanded for a period of years, maybe three years or there about four years. But the thing here is that she might come out from such a place worse. She might come out worse. It's painful. Of course, this is a child who still needs her parents around her who still needs some guidance. She, of course, will start to experience a menstrual cycle at some point. She needs her mom around at a time like that. I don't know how to tell people to forgive her, but it's just difficult to imagine what she possibly would have to go through for this. And I think we can wrap up by talking about insurance and what lessons need to be learned. Something also that I mentioned yesterday is the failure of big superstores across Nigeria to have adequate sprinkler systems. We don't have institutions. We don't have systems. We don't have some of all these things that should be normal operating procedure to have a sprinkler system in a store like that. You don't spend $5 billion or $10 billion on a building such a store that doesn't have a sprinkler system, that doesn't have adequate safety procedures. With regards to fire. And so what do you think that a lot of stores would learn from this? Well, I think you've already said it all. It is also important for our planning agencies, the approval agencies, to make sure that they do their work. These are things that they should insist on. Before you want to apply for use of a particular facility. It is where a lot of people will be coming. A turnover of so many people in a day. These are certain things that the planning and approval authorities should insist on. And it is not something that will just be on paper. These all these things can be avoided. There is some other thing too. Now, if somebody had been watching the... The CCTV cameras. The CCTV cameras. Yes. Camera, now you go to some banks. You find out that the CCTV is not in the manager's office. The manager is writing. The branch manager is writing. Is seeing a lot of other things. The other screens are before her. The monitors are before her. But she's not seeing them. She's not knowing what is really happening. So they really need to have... If they can double it and they have security. That whose job should be to watch these monitors per minute. To make sure they are watching. This kind of thing could have been avoided. Smoke detectors and all that. All those things are necessary. And these are things that once in a while the planning authorities should be able to visit these facilities. And be able to ask questions. To make sure that the requirements are confirmed with. The fire service department could be giving these duties to be able to make sure that requirements are adhered to. Now when they don't do these things. I mean because of maybe extra money to be spent. Then we are opening ourselves to having these kind of things further in future. So we talk of the banks. We talk of the biggest supermarkets. And all those centers. They should have this kind of thing. And we are lucky nobody died. We have been talking about human life now. And one other thing I want to add. I do not know the parents. I do not know the girl. I think a lot can be done by the supermarket owners. Forgiving to a very large extent for giving this girl. Perhaps something can be done to the parents. If they are found to be negligent. Whoever brought her there. If it is found at the person's center. Because she could have been a hand of some other person. If that is eliminated. I would say I would urge the owners to forgive her. And face insurance. Their insurance cover over the place. Yeah well I don't even think the parents. I presently don't even want parents to have to go through this. You know if this was just a you know a stupid mistake. By nine year old. But we'll have to wrap up here. Thank you so much for joining us. And for sharing your thoughts with us on this very very touching issue. Have a great day ahead. My pleasure. My pleasure. Thank you. All right there's so many angles to take out of that last conversation. You know and of course one of the things that I'm happy that he mentioned. Is the mental state of a nine year old. And how this might damage her for life. So you know I'm going to hope that it was just a you know a nine year old being a nine year old. A little mistake. That doesn't of course do more damage to her or her family. And hope that there's insurance also. If you missed out on these conversations remember to join us on our social media platforms. It is simply at plus TV Africa on Instagram and Facebook. And also subscribe to our YouTube channel. A plus TV Africa and plus TV Africa lifestyle. I am also gay. Oh boy. See you tomorrow.