We have never had it this bad. The reality of terrible oddities in our lives. Strange acts wrought by people who seem ordinary.
A man rapes his daughter. Another and his son take turns to rape a 13-year old who they put in the family way. The man’s wife is the poor girl’s aunt. An alfa rapes a physically challenged girl in a mosque and flees. Boys go after girls’ undergarments for money ritual. Human waste becomes edible in a money making ritual. A boy rapes his grandma. Men sleep with minors in a bizarre assault on innocence. A man is found carrying a roasted human hand as if it is a trophy won in a sporting competition. Does he want to make a meal of it? Ah, the Clifford Orji days again.
What is happening to the world, our world? Why do men commit these atrocities that make nonsense of our age-long claim to humanity? Mental depravity? Spiritual powers? Spiritual powers for what? Are such powers an end in themselves or a vehicle for some ends that are selfish and destructive? Why will a human being want to destroy others just for his own well-being, forgetting that the well-being of an individual becomes a Herculean task if the society is troubled in whatever way?
Why? Money? A young man murders his girlfriend, digs a grave in his bedroom and buries her body there. But the ghost of former Ondo State Deputy Governor Lasisi Oluboyo’s daughter would not rest in peace. It tormented the hell out of her killer until the law hit him hard. Seidu Adeyemi is to die by hanging for her murder.
A young man craves fame and riches. He gets into occultism, acquires some strange powers for cash, gets so rich, spends money with so much obscenity, revels in being called “Ezego” (king of money) and ends it all in a shocking manner. He dies just when the sun of his life begins to rise; sunset before noon. The end. Why?
Is money – and its material benefits- all that is to life? Does joy actually spring forth from the fountain of cash? Can money buy happiness? The Holy Book enjoins us not to lay up for ourselves “treasures upon earth where moth and rust doth corrupt, and where thieves break through and steal…”.
We still lay claim to our membership of the human community, but our sense of right and wrong is suspect. How do we halt the way we hurt ourselves? Why bend it when we should end it?
It is not that Nigeria had been crime-free. No. Far from it. Criminals have been with us for ages – and they will remain with us anyway–. It is the heartless nature of today’s criminals that is worrisome as they battle to turn our world into a jungle in which there are no laws. All is fair. No fear.
Those men of the underworld whose stories sound like Hollywood scripts handled by first class producers and actors must be surprised at the way their bloody records are being shredded by our new gangsters, mobsters and fraudsters.
Some flashback into the hall of infamy. Salami Bello Jaguda was a Lagos musician who found fulfilment in crime. So popular was he in the nefarious trade that his name became synonymous with robbery and theft. He quit the bloody stage for the dreaded self-styled Dr Ishola Oyenusi (aka Dr Rob and Kill) who reigned from 1965 to 1971. His first reported major operation was on Herbert Macaulay Street, Yaba, Lagos Mainland where he snatched a car, killing the owner. Reason: his girlfriend was broke and needed money for her makeup. Thousands watched excitedly as Oyenusi was tied to the stakes and executed by a firing squad on the Lagos Bar Beach. The spectators had come to confirm his much rumoured invincibility. Oyenusi, according to the myth, possessed the power to be visible, invisible and invincible. Besides, his body was said to be impenetrable to bullets. It all turned out to be a myth. But the spectators confirmed that he was all smiles as the soldiers took position, awaiting the command, “fire!”.
Oyenusi died. But his gang remained active, headed by second-in-command Isiaka Busari (aka Mighty Joe), who killed many in a savagery that also crashed before a firing squad on the Bar Beach.
Horrible as it was, the Oyenusi saga had a redeeming feature. Kayode Williams, a member of the gang, later found Christ. He became the Bishop of the Christ Vessel of Grace Church and the Director-General of the Prison Rehabilitation Mission International (PREMI) after a 10-year jail term.
Army deserter Youpelle Dakuro is reputed to have masterminded the most vicious daylight robbery in Lagos in 1978. Babatunde Folorunso, Lt. Oyazimo and Mohammed Kolomi were dreaded names. But their exploits were nothing compared to those of Lawrence Nomayogbon Anini (aka The Law) and his deputy, Monday Osunbor. They killed several policemen before fate caught up with them. Before he was executed on March 29,1987, Anini, wheelchair bound – one of his legs had been amputated– sober and dejected, said of the fate that awaited him: “I am afraiding.” He also warned excited photographers to stop feasting on him. “E don do now”, he said, waving his hand.
Those who thought the worse of the beasts had been seen off were wrong. Enter Shina Rambo. With Yemisi Akinsanmi,alias Yemo and Tony “Montana” Ikiagwu, Rambo rumbled through the 90s. He was notorious for striking in several places at the same time, driving snatched exotic vehicles in a long convoy all the way from Lagos to the Republic of Benin.
Okwudili Ndiwe (aka Derico Nwamama) held Onitsha, Anambra State’s commercial city, and other parts of the East by the throat early 2000. A former “area boy” and pick pocket, he became the most dreaded gangster of his bloody time, smashing banks at will. The police on August 1,2013 gunned down Abiodun Egunjobi (aka Abbey Godogodo), who reportedly killed scores of policemen. His arsenal included 60 AK 47 rifles, which the police recovered. He reigned for 14 years.
Henry Chibueze (aka Vampire), who terrorised Imo and neighbouring states, fell in March 2017. His gang was said to have murdered no fewer than 200 people, including the victims of the 2013 bloodshed in Igando on the outskirts of Lagos, among them his girlfriend, her expectant sisters and their children.
Ruthless and brutal Chukwudumeme Onwuamadike (aka Evans) is on trial for kidnapping the rich and collecting ransom in hard currency. The police described him as Nigeria’s “cleverest” kidnapper who evaded arrest for seven years by using 126 mobile phone SIM cards.
Anambra State Governor Willie Obiano has been in holiday mood since last week’s arrest of murder suspect Ikechukwu Udensi (aka Ikanda), whose gang allegedly killed 38-year-old businessman Ndubuisi Nwokolo in Onitsha.
Five Nigerians were arrested the other day in the United Arab Emirates after smashing their way into a currency exchange shop, injuring the staff and carting away some cash. Their fate hangs in the balance.
Back home in the North, Boko Haram seems to be yielding the headlines to herdsmen-farmers violence. By the way, where the hell is the loudmouth Shekau? He hasn’t released a video for a long time. Now, the new criminals have no name; they are simply lumped together as bandits.
Why are they killing in Kaduna, Katsina, Sokoto and Zamfara, where the Federal Government has just banned mining? Is it all economic? Where are the guns coming from? Who exactly are these gangsters? Are they more powerful than the government? Why has it taken this long – and many lives of innocent Nigerians, including women and children – to think of reining in these murderers?
Defence Minister Gen Mansur Dan-Ali has accused traditional rulers of aiding the criminals, leaking information on security moves to curtail them. He should do more. Any monarch who fuels the bloodshed does not deserve any respect. He should be seized like a common criminal and brought before the law.
Our rich men have fled the Kaduna-Abuja highway for fear of being kidnapped. Train ride is it now. Kajuru, Kaduna State residents are crying for safety. Cultists are striking in Rivers State. Kidnappers have just let go of the Lagos Fire chief and others.
The government should go after the big masqueraders behind these evil ventures. This should be part of the “tough decisions” President Muhammadu Buhari should take. Now.
Coping with the heat wave
The full effects of the prevailing heat wave are here. Sleepless and sweltering nights. Dry fields stripped of their seductive lush greenery. Dusty streets. Humming air conditioners shattering the peace of the workplace. Medical experts are warning of the effects on our health. Dermatologists are having fun, their clientele rising by the day.
Trust Nigerians. Some are considering taking up insurance covers for their glittering skin. Others are checking the manifesto of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) to see if it promised to install air conditioners on our streets. Could the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) have turned the table if it had promised this?
The scorching sun emits the heat that has turned our towns and cities into huge cauldrons. We are all sweating like bakers retrieving hot loaves of bread from the oven, with its burning charcoal. Young women are going about in bum shorts. Environmentalists are saying these are some of the effects of the global warming they have been warning against, asking the world to plant more trees.
And this on the social media: “We sincerely apologise for the intense heat all over the world. This is due to the maintenance going on in hell fire. The maintenance is imperative to accommodate more Nigerian politicians when the world eventually ends. We regret any inconvenience this may have caused. Signed. Angel Gabriel.”
