by AC Alegbo
‘Yes. I am receiving prayers again to drive away those evil spirits.’
I was fast getting bored with his spirits; it seemed there was nothing else to the lad and the spirits just wouldn’t go away. ‘Did the spirits make you stab TJ?’ I asked using a very direct approach.
‘I don’t know. Maybe.’ He stopped moving and looked a little distracted. I couldn’t read him. ‘I didn’t want to kill him. I don’t know why I did it. My papa didn’t like TJ too.’ He looked a little uncomfortable.
I felt a shudder. That was my question answered. TJ was dead and by Ireneh’s hands. I wondered if his father had anything to do with it.
‘My mama came to the police station and talked to the police people and they let me go with her,’ Ireneh said changing the topic. He looked more cheerful now. ‘My mama says no one can touch me here and that when I am well again, we will go to the village to live,’ Ireneh added clearing some of my confusion.
This was obviously a hideout as well as a healing centre. The mother must have reached a compromise with the police to protect her young son. It made sense that they’d go to the village as the boy couldn’t be seen to live around Ojo-Alaba anymore not after what he did. But as the victim was his brother, it must have been left to his family to decide his fate.
We were now at the entrance to the church which was the very picture of antiquity. He rushed in quite excitedly and signalled to me to come to the first pew. It was a long bench, a little wonky and I had to steady myself with both hands. But Ireneh was still beside himself. His words fell over themselves to get to me.
‘This is where my pastor stands to pray for me!’ he yelled from what served as a pulpit, a wooden platform standing two steps higher than my position.
‘Out! Out! Ari ma ma ka ba sha la la ba ka bo ko ki bo!’ His eyes were tight shut; his fists were clenched and he punched the air as he made an imitation of speaking in tongues. ‘I bind you spirits! I cast you out in the name of Jesus!’
I was beginning to settle into the entertainment when he began jumping up and down quite frantically, took off his garment and ran naked around the pastor’s preaching spot shrieking eerily.
Then I knew he was no longer playacting. I was mortified. I’d seen something like this before and was scared his spirits could have struck again. I certainly didn’t want to be alone with him at that moment and needed to get back home.
****
I never got to find out what the disturbance was that we ran away from out of Kano. Nothing came on the News; nothing was in the papers but then again only the big clashes made it to the spotlight. A lot of effort is often put into playing down reports that might hint at instability in any region. Therefore I concluded that it hadn’t been a violent conflict of the kind that hit Kaduna in June. Though it may have simply been a small disturbance between very small groups of people as are common everywhere, no one was taking any chances up north and so we’d all run for dear life in pandemonium; that sort of reaction, I knew could easily have made something small become lethally big.
The Kano Mail ran my story a week later and it made its way into the National News simply as some form of attack on the travesty of justice behind the Usuman incident. Nevertheless, with the solid and irrefutable defence put up by the police and without any strong proof that my story was true, the State succeeded in brushing it aside. Some very clever politician even pointed out that even if the Kano Mail’s story was accurate, it was simply a reflection of the corrupt state of affairs in the country’s legal system and didn’t undermine Shari’ah in itself. The Islamic penal code still remained the valid and complete way to govern the followers of the prophet. Well, who could argue with that?
I saw Tolu’s point from then on; would I have remained in Kano to help the newspaper argue with the authorities? I wouldn’t have got far. I’d have been fished out of some wasteland completely unrecognisable. But I still tried to follow the Usuman story as much as I could, not that it did much to help the mechanic.
Usuman was convicted for theft and sentenced to amputation. The sentence, though widely condemned by the media, was arranged to be carried out under anaesthetic. The Nigerian Medical Association lent its voice to the debate and threatened to revoke the licence of any practitioner in the country who amputated a limb for Shari’ah but this was not going to deter Islamic doctors in the north. They’d always be employed by their states.
In November of that year and not long after the Islamic Ramadan fast began, Kano swung for Shari’ah and Usuman went under the knife. Amid newspaper reports that displayed photos of him in a hospital bed holding up a bandaged stump where his hand used to be was the assertion that the State would help him get back onto his feet, into society and to earning a living. Backed by such a promise, the amputee was able to manage a smile for the papers and thank the Islamic State for directing him back onto the ‘right path’.
Tolu and I went back to Baba Jide’s for a little while before I finally landed a job. One of the application letters I’d posted in my search for employment sent back a reply; it wanted me to attend an interview. The job wasn’t a shout from the rooftop – a clerical assistant at a medium-sized, independent company. My job would involve carrying dusty files, dumping them somewhere, opening one after the other and copying this and that from the dust; it wasn’t much but it was legal and would keep Papa off my back for a bit; it would be a start. I’d attended the interview and got the job. I told Tolu about it and he was pleased for me.
‘Congrats Rez,’ he said pulling out a huge smile. Did I not tell you that God is not asleep? See?’
I wasn’t so sure but didn’t care to say. There wouldn’t have been any point; I only hoped that God would wake up to his own plight as well. A week after I got the job, I received a letter from Banjo. He was still in Lagos and but had heard from Kano before writing. The letter said a lot but it was the bottom bit that caught my attention. It wasn’t reprimanding or judgmental; it was questioning and slightly baffled but seemingly on my side. Bayo didn’t know the half of what happened.
…I just wanted to see that you’re okay. Alhaji Sanni is fuming that you betrayed him and brought a mob to his doorstep. He said you said something insulting about Shari’ah to the papers and he had to pay plenty of money to the rioting men for housing infidels in the first place. He’s not going to be much of an accommodating host after this, I think. I won’t be able to help you much with any contacts in the north now and this will mean you won’t be hearing from me that often as most of my godfathers are northerners. But when I can, I will help. I’m sure you understand. I have got my own problems to sort first and my own brothers and sisters to support. Please reply as soon as you can so I know you got out of Kano okay. This will put my mind at rest.
Take care
Banjo
A blanket of fear and relief descended on me, not because we escaped the mob – we would have anyway as they came after the story was published, but because I had escaped a gruesome fate, full-stop. I sighed several times as I wrote a reply to Banjo. Of course, I was fine, my letter said. He shouldn’t worry and yes, I understood his situation.
I took time to consider my reply. I tried to be as concise as possible in a positive way after all not everything had been negative in my four month stay behind Shari’ah lines, in a city that was a ticking bomb. Those months had been trying times and Tolu and I had only had us to look out for each other. We’d eventually proved to be our own protection – perhaps, the real God that wasn’t asleep not that I was going to be telling Tolu that in a million years.
****
News of Ireneh’s death reached me in school. Apparently the mother had come in and spoken to the class teacher. Mrs Deji made a formal announcement that didn’t tell us much except that the boy had an accident in the village. She had seemed genuinely sad, taken a little time to talk about the boy honourably leaving out the not so glamorous bits – that didn’t leave much else but somehow she’d managed quite well. But more news ha
d spilled from whatever source; before long, there were a thousand variations of what had happened. Everyone seemed to be an expert on Ireneh’s life all of a sudden but through the media circus, I picked up the one common fact that he’d fallen into a well.
He had gone wild again and had to be restrained but he’d run off like crazy, lost his pursuers and stumbled into a newly dug and quite deep well. By the time, he was discovered, he’d very drowned.
I saw his mother the week after. I don’t know what exactly drove me to her shop but as she was my last link to my late friend, I suppose I needed some more explanation. I wasn’t going to demand one; I guess I simply hoped my presence might spark some outpouring from her.
She had aged some and looked absolutely worn out. It took her a while to recognise me out of sheer distraction; she couldn’t seem to hold a gaze on any fixed point for longer than two seconds and shook her head twice to get her mind to function when she saw me. But slowly she did and she began to sob. Not the loud ostentatious kind that can be categorised as wailing – just a quiet but vigorous shake that hit her large frame, muffled sounds coming from her. ‘You heard that my child died?’ she asked with tears in her eyes. ‘Death has taken my child from me and I am here, I can’t do anything.’
I listened attentively a little overcome by her state.
‘It was his papa who took him. You know that? That evil man never wanted to leave us alone even from beyond the grave.’
This bit of information was new and shocking. ‘Is Ireneh’s papa dead?’ I mumbled back. ‘But Ireneh told me that he would go and live with his papa.’
‘Yes, that’s what has been happening,’ the woman replied drying her eyes. ‘His papa’s spirit has been disturbing Ireneh for a long time. His papa’s people have got very strong juju and when I refused to follow him to the village just after I gave birth to Ireneh, his papa said he won’t ever let me rest. Since then, he has been disturbing Ireneh even after he died in the village two years ago.’
I was thoroughly confused by this. ‘But ma, one day when we were walking home from school, Ireneh acted like he saw his papa. He even shouted out “Papa”,’ I said recalling the weird incident in the street on the way home several months back.
‘Yes, that’s what I am telling you,’ she said a little impatiently. ‘That was his papa’s spirit disturbing the boy. His papa wanted to take him away and now he has taken him. Ireneh saw his papa’s spirit many times. Sometimes, the spirit told him to do things and other times, the spirit just chased him. And that was why he fell into the well. He was running from the spirit and shouting “Papa abeg!” My son was tormented and I tried to stop his papa but I couldn’t. And that was why I took him to the village because our pastor couldn’t drive the spirit away but the native doctors in the village couldn’t drive the spirit away too even after all the sacrifices they performed and all the money I spent. I didn’t know what to do,’ she started shaking again as she sobbed. ‘You heard that my child died?’ she repeated. ‘You see how Satan won?’ she spread out her hands in desolation.
I was uncomfortable and a little frightened and could only murmur my sympathies.
****
I didn’t care this time if it was a dream or not. I knew it was. Mama appeared as usual with White coat and, this time, papa was with them. They talked in quiet but as always, they were rubbish at this.
‘He keeps bringing up the Tolu boy,’ White coat said to my parents. ‘Do you know how he died?’
‘In the rioting in Kaduna in 2000,’ papa replied. ‘They had finished their youth service and were about to board a bus for home and Arinze had gone to buy pure water when the mob hit the park. He saw Tolu hacked to death and only escaped death himself narrowly.’
I smiled, unperturbed. Tolu was at home. We beat the mob.
‘I see,’ said White coat. ‘And do you know a Banjo?’
‘We were going to bring that up,’ mama said. ‘We found letters in his room all stamped and addressed to Peter Banjo. That must be the one. And we saw some more of the same letters at the Foursquare Gospel church where he’s been going every day. There were five letters scattered on the ground.’
‘Where is this church?’
‘It’s on the next street from ours – Izoba street,’ said papa. ‘The church is large with wooden poles and a zinc roof. It is uncompleted. We just found out that is where he has been going every day.’
‘I see,’ said White coat. ‘Because he said he’s working in a garage in Kano.’
‘Since when?’ asked mama holding her hands to her chest in pain.
‘Since the last three months and that he’s still working there now.’
‘Jesus!’ Papa said. ‘I can’t believe this.’
‘You didn’t notice anything wrong with him?’ White coat asked.
‘We didn’t think he could be.....you know?’ mama said.
‘Mentally ill?’ asked White coat.
My parents nodded.
‘He is obviously living another life that isn’t real,’ said White coat.
I smiled at their ignorance.
****
‘Mama, what does werepe mean?’ I asked my mother as she busied herself in the kitchen. I’d done a little thinking and couldn’t piece together Ireneh’s mother story and the effect I’d known his father to have in his life. For one, he’d given him the juju with which he’d punished Jegbe and Oscar.
‘Werepe? Where you hear that from?’ Mama asked surprised. ‘Why are you asking?’
‘Nothing Mama,’ I said. It was getting harder to get a straight answer from her and that annoyed me. ‘I heard it from one of my friends. He didn’t want to tell me what it means.’
‘Werepe is something that would make a person itch. Like Devil Bean, you know what that is?’ she asked.
‘No.’
‘It is a plant. People call it werepe. If it comes into contact with a person’s body, then that part would itch like crazy, make them go crazy.
‘E-h-en,’ I said.
I left the kitchen, crossed the front room and made my way to the veranda. I sat on the floor, my back upright against the cool wall. That is what I remember when I look back – me against the wall, not thinking, clear-headed.
Ireneh had only been armed with a plant wherever he got it from; I hadn’t had anything realistically to fear. We’d all been silly; he’d been silly too.
I didn’t mourn Ireneh in the traditional manner but I mourned him all the same. Well, I’d say I did even without knowing it. It all hit me seven years later just before I got into university that I’d been mourning him quietly in my sustained bitterness against everyone who I considered failed him; his brothers who tortured him; his mother who could never seem to have done enough in my opinion; against myself who should have pushed for more powerful Catholic solutions and even against those who dug the well; they should have known better.
It wasn’t a heavy kind of bitterness, barely felt; nothing that would make me swear or curse when I remembered his life. But I’d shake my head in reproof at everyone on the blame list; there was so much we could have done better.
Right from the start, I let his father’s spirit go free; the man only wanted his son with him like most parents do but, in time, as I grew older and began to understand the various anomalies that can afflict the human mind, I saw reason to blame the spirit – or any spirit - even less.
I’ve always been constantly torn though to think of the agony that must have characterised the confused existence of my delusional friend without even counting his fall and drowning in a well. But as time passed, I found it easier to simply forget; that helped.
I developed a mild devotion to old churches which usually led me to cathedrals, a fascination that has continued long after I renounced Christianity. I didn’t stop being a Christian because I held anything against God; he wasn’t even on the blame list when this whole Ireneh incident blew up. Back then, I didn’t think God was given that mu
ch of a chance to act after all God was Catholic and nothing else. Even now, I simply can’t think of anything to blame God for since I’ve exhausted my blames on all the actual people involved in the life of the lad.
No, instead, a lot of my later actions have simply been more tuned to the memory of a sick boy who offered me more bases for sanity than the environment that nurtured us.