Soboma had the advantage; he had read up on the subject of street fighting in preparation. Dele’s solution had been to get drunk. The group of onlookers formed a rough circle, with the combatants in the middle. Dele had a bandana tied around his head; he thought it made him look cool and menacing, but it did not. Soboma was dressed as usual in a t-shirt, jeans, expensive sports shoes, and a cap, peak turned to the back, standard area boy uniform.
Dele made the first lunge with the knife he had used to kill an old man. At least, it would have been, had it been true. He had made up the story to look bigger and stronger than he really was.
Soboma quickly sidestepped, Dele missed his mark. Soboma responded; he had the bigger knife and cut Dele across the left cheek. He had been lucky; he had been falling over in an attempt to get away. Sensing the deteriorating situation, he had tried to get out of the circle. The excited watchers, baying for blood pushed him back roughly.
‘Coward, get in there and fight.’ All the onlookers were shouting for action and Dele was not going to get away as easy as that.
‘Kill him!’ they shouted to Soboma. They wanted blood.
Forced to fight and now frightened, Dele started to bring the action to Soboma. He slashed wildly, cutting Soboma severely on the left arm; it bled profusely.
‘Come on, Dele!’ Their allegiances changed with whoever appeared to be winning. ‘Stab him in the guts.’
Soboma did not like violence, but now there was no option. He could not back out; he had to finish the fight, and he had to finish as the victor. There was no alternative. Dele had to die.
He hit Dele hard with his fist. He fell, dazed and, by now, sober.
‘You’ve got him!’ the baying crowd roared.
‘Stick the knife in!’ they shouted.
With one stride, Soboma leapt on top of Dele and pushed the knife that was in his right hand through Dele’s heart.
‘Soboma! Soboma!’ the crowd cheered. ‘You’ve killed him. You are our leader.’
He was victorious, although he felt no joy, sickened by what he had done. He would get others to fight for him in future.
One more casualty of the violence that gripped the city, Dele’s lifeless body would be dumped in a gutter.
***
‘Our people live in poverty and starve. At the same time, oil companies keep their people in five-star hotels and drive around town in expensive cars.’ In the six years since Soboma had killed Dele, he had consolidated his power. No longer the leader of a group of thirty area boys, he had managed to bring several warring factions under his leadership. Others were rushing to join his group; there was more money with him.
He had formed a cooperative to pool their illicit earnings, a fund to look after them and their families in time of need. There were three hundred under his leadership now and it looked like swelling to over one thousand in the near future.
‘Let us help our people. We know how to make money on the street, but the big money is with the oil companies. If you let me organise, then we can take them for all we can get. If we set aside a percentage, then we can use that for all the people in the shanties.’
There was little debate from those assembled. Soboma was so far advanced in intellectual capacity and organisational skills that he stood unquestioned; a villain with a brain, a formidable combination.
‘We can break into their premises and steal a few vehicles, a few computers, or we can go for something more substantial.’ He was aware of the benefits of hostage taking for ransom around the world.
‘We should rise above petty crime and hustling. We should kidnap their Westerners for ransom. They will pay millions in American dollars to get them back.’
He had become idealistic. His reference point, crime; it was what he knew, and he could see that crime in an honourable pursuit was not a crime at all. It was not a logical conclusion that he had made; but, as with many ventures in life, the end justifies the means.
‘What we must do is organise, train, and plan.’ Those that listened trusted in his wisdom.
***
In less than a year after Soboma had put forward his idealistic plan, the numbers of hooligans, street kids, and gangsters under his leadership had increased to well over the projected one thousand. He could number close to one thousand five hundred and yet more came to join.
‘You are our leader,’ they would shout.
‘We are ready for your commands,’ they would proclaim.
He was to them a messianic figure that could do no wrong. His intellect should have protected him from their false worship, their hanging on to his every word, but it did not.
‘When are you planning to attack the first rig and take some Westerners?’ Ngozi asked.
She was one of his latest playthings. As befits a messianic leader, it was important to maintain at least three women in his entourage. She was slim, young, and readily available. He would keep her for another month or two and then change her for someone slimmer, more nubile.
‘Why do you ask me? You are here to serve my needs, not to question me,’ Soboma replied angrily.
‘The men are concerned but are frightened to ask,’ she said. ‘They are afraid of how you might react.’
‘So they have coerced you to ask when I am exhausted, when you have worn me out.’ He was certainly at his calmest. She had just finished bouncing up and down on him; he had to admit, as a lay she was exceptional.
‘No, they did not ask me.’
‘If you ask me again, I will remove you from my presence, and have you thrown back on to the street. Is that clear?’
‘Yes.’
‘If you had asked at any other time, you would have felt the back of my hand.’ As irritated as he was with her for raising the question, he would not have hit her. He had killed Dele, but he did not enjoy the act of violence. There was, however, no issue of ordering others to perpetrate it on his behalf.
‘It is time for our first attack,’ Soboma stated at a meeting a week later. Ngozi, irritated as he was at the time, had reminded him that it was time for action.
‘There is a drilling rig in the Niger Delta swamps,’ he continued. ‘It is ideal for our first operation, and sufficiently remote for the rapid response security forces. There will be high security on the rig. They will be heavily armed, ex-Nigerian military, at least six of them. Do not underestimate their capabilities.
‘We will need to be in and out within thirty minutes. There are always some Westerners on board and we need to capture and remove all of them to a location of our choosing. Do not harm them. Dead, they have no value; alive, they command substantial money. Anyone who kills a Westerner will be killed themselves. Is that clear?’
‘Yes, understood.’ They either nodded or affirmed verbally.
‘The training we have conducted these last months has ensured that all those who are coming on this mission know how to shoot and to shoot accurately, so I will accept no excuses. If any Westerner shoots at us, aim for their legs to disable them. Do not aim at the body or the head.’
***
‘Stand by that pump. Be ready to switch it off.’ Larry Herbert, a laconic and hardened oilman from Texas, was dealing with the latest crisis. A pump channelling the extracted oil was leaking badly. He had to isolate it and transfer the oil to the standby pump.
The rig, set in shallow water in the Niger Delta swamp would normally have upwards of fifty personnel. On this night at the end of a six-week shift, the number had dropped dramatically. Soboma knew the details; he had a contact within the oil company’s administration office in Port Harcourt.
‘There are only twenty-five on the rig and we know at least four are Westerners,’ he said, giving his last-minute briefing before the imminent assault. ‘We want those four and we need to ensure they are unharmed. Remember, a dead hostage has no value. There will be security on the rig, they will be heavily armed and they will shoot.’
The two launches mounted with machine guns at the front headed up the wi
nding tributaries of the Delta.
‘Keep quiet,’ Soboma whispered. Stealth was paramount as they closed in on the oil rig. They could see its derrick rising into the night sky. The people on the oil rig could not see them. ‘Keep the motors off until I give the word.’
The boats were silent, save the splashing as they manoeuvred closer, using their paddles.
At the ideal moment, Soboma gave the command. ‘We go now.’ There was a distance of a hundred metres of open water and the full moon and cloudless night would give them little cover. The motors fired into life and, within fifteen seconds, they were alongside the rig.
‘We’re under attack!’ Idris shouted. He was the first to see the boats coming at speed. A tall, well-fed, Nigerian ex-military sergeant, he was as tough as nails. They paid him well to protect the rig. Tonight, he was going to earn his money; tonight, he was going to die.
The approach had been rapid, the machine guns mounted at the front of both of the boats firing at full force. Idris and his team had responded as best they could, but it was a moving target, and all they could do was empty their automatic weapons in the direction of Soboma and his people.
‘Keep firing!’ Soboma shouted. ‘Remember, it is for our people.’ He was inspirational, even though he sat close to the back of the second boat. This was not his scene. He had come this first time as the great leader at the head of his troops as he led them into battle, but he was no Alexander the Great. He vowed that, if he survived, he would never partake in another similar activity. This was dangerous.
Quickly, as soon as the boats touched the side of the rig, the freedom fighters were off and onto the rig. The fighting was intense; Soboma took a bullet in the foot and fell to the ground. He soon recovered, just in time to see the crew of the rig being subdued.
‘How many did we lose? he asked. He was weak and unable to stand without assistance.
‘We’ve lost at least ten,’ Benjamin, one of his lieutenants replied.
‘The Westerners, did we get them all?’ Soboma was more anxious for this news.
‘One of them was killed. It was an accident; he took a bullet to the head. He had picked up a weapon from one of the guards that we had taken down, and he was firing at us as we drew alongside. One of our men failed to heed your instruction.’
‘Who was it?’ Soboma responded angrily.
‘It was Akin, one of our best fighters. He was carried away by the excitement of the attack.’ Benjamin attempted to defend him.
‘There is no excuse. You know what needs to be done.’
‘He is a good person with a wife and two children,’ Benjamin explained, attempting to obtain a compromise.
‘Discipline must be maintained. I cannot show weakness. Do it now, and do it quick.’
Benjamin realised it was futile to debate more. Raising his pistol, he shot Akin in the head.
‘How many Westerners do we have?’ Soboma asked.
‘Three, they are all unharmed.’
‘Get them into the boats quickly. This place will be crawling with security personnel soon, we cannot hold out against them.’
‘What about the locals on the rig?’ asked Benjamin. ‘Eight of them died, but some of the security guards are still alive.’
‘Kill them all. There are to be no witnesses.’ Soboma’s command implemented immediately. ‘Take the hostages to our camp in Ogoni. Make sure they are bound securely and blindfolded. Do not harm them.’
He took off in a different direction; he had a foot that needed medical treatment.
It was his first attempt at ransom, and it had been successful. The three captives fetched seven hundred thousand dollars in total.
With some of the ransom money, new teachers were brought into the school he had rarely attended as a child, attendance compulsory. A new medical clinic established; no one would die of malaria or the myriad of diseases that perpetuated those areas.
Soboma was a hero, a benefactor of his people.
***
With time and the money acquired through ransoms and oil theft, it took only a few short years before Soboma had transformed from visionary back to criminal.
The amount flowing to his people in the shanties reduced. There were expenses: foreign bank accounts, luxurious properties to renovate, expensive women to maintain. The priorities reprioritised with the school and the medical centre at the bottom of the list.
The poor and honest people who had believed in him soon came to realise that he was like all the others before him, whether politician or businessman. They were all in it for what they could get, and the common person was just to receive the verbiage and the dregs at the bottom of the substantial money pot.
He now travelled in a fleet of four-wheel drives, with guns bristling. His home was a luxurious compound and the women were as plentiful as was the money. He did not care about the misery that resulted; the deaths did not cause him any sleepless nights. The campaign for justice, corrupted. He was satisfied that a man such as he could achieve so much.
His pronounced limp from the first oil rig attack, a result of the bullet in his left foot. It was to him, a badge of honour, and he would proudly recount the tale of how it had come about for all to hear.
‘There were twenty of us that night,’ he would brag. ‘It was late, and the oil rig was heavily defended. We came in fast, two boats moving fast, machine guns mounted on the front. They had the advantage of a stronger position and certainly better weapons than we did, but we were smarter. We lost some of our people, at least ten, but we made up for that. We killed all of theirs and took three hostages – two Norwegians, one Englishman. We took them off for ransom.’
‘It is truly impressive, you must be very proud of what was achieved. What was your role in this?’ He had told the story many times and always someone felt obliged to ask. If no one asked, Soboma Tom would have flown into a rage at their insolence in not indulging him his moment of glory.
‘I was in the lead boat, I was the leader and I was the first off the boat and onto the rig,’ he would say. ‘I was ruthless in cutting down those who had fired at us and I made sure that their leaders were dealt with first.’ A gasp of admiration heard from the assembled group of sycophants.
It was a great story but, as with Dele before him, it was not true. He had been on the second boat and last on the rig. Time and success had transformed him. He believed in his infallibility, his benevolence, his bravery.
He had used his superior intellect to control a group of poorly educated people. A benefactor initially, but now no one benefited from the money apart from himself and a select inner core of fighters, and his bravery, an illusion.
Some knew the truth of that first raid, but he had ensured that they had long passed on. Five had met their deaths in gang-related violence; the remainder had died leading attacks.
Chapter 10
Eight years had passed since Soboma Tom’s first hostage taking. The success and the ensuing confidence had led him and his group to attempt increasingly ambitious raids and kidnappings. Some had failed, most had been successful; but, with enhanced security and the Nigerian military showing greater resolve, he had reasoned that their luck was bound to run out at some time.
He was not concerned about his fighters; they were expendable. His lifestyle concerned him. It was time for him to put his money and efforts into legitimate business endeavours. The transition from a street hooligan, to the visionary leader, to gangster, to honest businessman was almost complete.
‘We have had a good run,’ he said, addressing his core group of lieutenants, ‘but it is not going to last. We need to consider the next assault as our last attack. I propose we attack an oil platform out at sea. The financial gain will far outweigh the risk.’
A master strategist, he had calculated the attack carefully. He only needed to convince his people of the benefits. His core group had become wealthy, lazy and risk-averse. He knew that he had, but with one final raid, he could retire from crime, become respect
able. In his early thirties, he had risked his life too many times and besides, he was not brave, regardless of what the others believed. He feared being shot, as much as the next man. So far, he had made sure that it was the next man who had been on the receiving end of the bullet.
‘I will be in the lead boat,’ he said. ‘We will go for the maximum number of hostages, and this time we negotiate hard and long until we get what we want. I can see close to ten million dollars.’ The teams always functioned better when he was there. He had sent them on their own before, but invariably something went wrong. His presence always maintained their motivation and enthusiasm.
‘Exxon has an oil platform,’ he said. ‘It’s about twelve kilometres off-shore. We will follow our practice of getting close and, once the sun dips below the horizon, we move in fast – three boats, heavily armed and at least thirty fighters. The advice that I have been given indicates there should be at least six foreigners, and most should be Americans. They always pay the best. This time we ask two million dollars for each one. Any delay, any attempt at negotiation and we’ll send those procrastinating over the money various body parts.’
‘We will follow your advice,’ the assembled members of his core group echoed in unison.
‘Fine, then we will plan the raid for next week. This is to be the big one. Make sure all those you bring are aware of the special bonuses. Remind them, anyone that kills a foreigner will receive the same fate as the person they have just eliminated.’
***
Up till now they had concentrated their kidnappings on oil rigs and boats transporting workers out to the rigs within the confines of the Niger Delta tributaries. A raid across open water, a new challenge, but that was where the high price targets were; the most senior personnel brought in by helicopter. Soboma Tom knew the risks and they were proportional to the reward.
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