Tag: Okon

It is Christmas once again, the season of giving and forgiving. It is the season of extravagant weddings among the children of the stupendously well-heeled and even more extravagant gestures of generosity and goodwill among the fabulously unhinged. And Jesus laughed. While the pockets of the very poor bled to death, exquisite and pedigreed pink champagne flowed from the quarters of the affluent, drowning the tears of the needy in the mush of the needless.
Snooper has been in the thick of things, separating those who have been asked to slap from those who have been slapped senseless. As a gesture of Christianly goodwill Okon has been slapping everybody in the neighbourhood and wishing them happy Christmas. When he was asked what he thought he was doing, the crazy boy told his interlocutors that slapping is no violence since it was the last order he received from party headquarters.
But this turned out to be nothing but a cunning decoy. Snooper was woken up last Friday by the noise of sundry animals from the garage. It was as if the whole world has become a vast menagerie of menacing mammals. Half-dressed, yours sincerely rushed to the scene to find out what the problem was only to be confronted by the most outlandish sight anybody can imagine. There was Okon tending to all kinds of domestic captives, including goats, rams, sheep, tortoise, snakes, dogs, pigs, cats and the odd cow with Baba Lekki nodding in senile applause.
“Okon, what exactly is the meaning of this noise and nonsense?” snooper demanded without concealing his disgust even while on the look out for the meanest and maddest of the animals.
“Ha oga na Christmas come turn houseboy to dem bushmeat hawker. I been dey forget to tell you say I dey do dem bushmeat production. Dem be 100percent local sourcing”, the boy snorted as he turned to Baba Lekki for verbal reinforcement against his boss.
“Listen, you bourgeois rascal. The boy said he is into animal husbandry. Which one is your own there? Abi chanji no dey for change again? “the old codger weighed in with caustic malice.
“Baba thank una. He good say you never fire gbana dis morning. Na me be dem mama him husband, na me be dem animal husband”, Okon cooed with delight.
“Look, I am not talking to you old fool”, snooper snapped and then rounded on Okon. “Okon where did you get the two goats from?”
“Ha dem two goats dey do two fighting for Ojuelegba. Dis one he come beat dat one silly and him come reverse as if him go gather strength as dem Yoruba people dey say, but him come dey run away, naim I come arrest dem and I come sentence dem to death”, Okon submitted.
“What about the dogs?” snooper demanded.
“Dem two dogs dey knack each other for Ikeja. Dem knack each other sotey dem no fit walk again. I come look dem well well I come see dem be male. Dem be gay dogs. Naim I come arrest dem for same sex kpoi kpoi or homosex”, the mad boy crowed.
“Änd the pigs?” snooper pressed.
“Ha dem three pigs no get common sense. Dem dey do zebra crossing for pedestrian crossing and since dem no be zebra or pedestrian, I come jail dem for wandering and impersonate”, Okon remarked. At this point, the cackling from the hens became unbearable.
“Why, you even have about six hens. I bet they were fighting too ?” snooper sneered. Before Okon could answer, the old man looked at him in approval before bursting into a parody of Odolaiye Aremu’s classic tribute to Lamidi Ariyibi Adedibu.
Hun, Jagunlabi re gboro Ibafo
O k’adie bo bi onisenla
Beni kora, kota, kogbe, won o si bun
Agbako l ‘ádie se.
“Oga true true I dey go jeje when dem hen come dey start abuse me, naim I come charge dem for treason and I come surround dem and dem come dey cry, but dat one no concern me”, Okon whimpered like a shifty thief.
“Ökon, all these are domestic animals, they are not bush meat”, snooper admonished the crazy boy.
“Ha oga, bushmeat simply mean meat from bush. So I go take dem to dem bush, kill dem for dem bush and come roast dem for bush, bushmeat don ready be dat”, Okon sniggered. It was at this point that one of Okon’s indescribable reptiles made a direct hay for snooper forcing yours sincerely to back-heel into the house with automatic alacrity.

As the clock ticks mercilessly away for the inauguration of Donald Trump as the forty fifth president of America, the civilized world is concentrating its attention on apocalyptic possibilities. Will the maverick rogue billionaire end what WS has called “the endless cycle of human stupidity” by pulling the nuclear trigger that same day? It has been variously predicted that the world will end up in smoke and snooper is taking no chances. No matter how wrong our prophets often are in their political predictions, they may just get this one right, just to prove a point and send their mounting critics to permanent repose.
As the Yoruba say oroburukuatounaterin— a grim situation is never without its lighter humorous undertones. The possibility of a Trump presidency has actually provoked a rash of comic projections. Among snooper’s Afro-phobic associates, it has become a favourite pastime to come up with comic scenes out of the political apocalypse, the most alarming of which is to imagine a furious and implacable Donald Trump tongue-lashing and actually whiplashing African leaders who came to felicitate with the famed contrarian in the White House. In one version, Donald Trump is known to have told a senile African leader who has presided over the ruination of his country. “I don’t ever want to see you stinking African motherfucker here again until the situation improves in your country!”
But of all these comic scenarios, the one that has held the literary world and the commune of the gloriously dishevelled in rapt attention was the threat by the Nigerian Nobel laureate to cut up his green card and throw the shreds into the dustbin should Donald Trump prevail in the American presidential election. Donald Trump having prevailed, the deadline was extended to his inauguration with Soyinka furiously charging at the time-bound chronologues not to take a trope too literally. There is a sub-text to every context, the old literary lion seemed to be warning.
The green card palaver has provoked such a furious debate and internet fire-fight that you begin to wonder whether there is more to all this than a mere red card for a green card. Pugnacious and punch-happy pundits have weighed in on either side with venom and vitriol. It was like watching a blood sports as cyber savages tore into the eccentric fabric of his leonine majesty.
Such was the rowdy nature of this debate that it even attracted the attention of landlubbers and lugubrious rogues like the duo of Baba Lekki and Okon. One morning as snooper prepared for the daily chores, the duo suddenly emerged from nowhere bristling with sadistic humor.
“Oga, make you warn your oga make him no throway him green card oooo’, becos suffer go whack am for obodo Nigeria and famine go fiam am patapata” Baba Lekki cautioned, his face glowering with maniacal relish.
“Öga, tell Baba Kongidat as demkulukulukalakala group weydey kaput Black people deyboku for America godogodo people who dey fire everybody dey for Niger kontri,.” The mad boy snorted.
“Gentlemen, it is too early in the morning and I don’t entertain this idle minded drooling and pedestrian drivel”, yours sincerely snapped.
“Pedestrian driving ko, pedestrian crossing ni. Weereeee!” Baba Lekki jeered.
Two days ago, the controversy took another turn as the Nobel laureate, like a man whose honour has been deeply affronted by sundry tormentors, declared to the public that he had actually disposed of his green card. Snooper was alerted to the direction the whole controversy was heading when Okon, with Baba Lekki in tow, jumped into the sitting room with Okon covered in dirt and soot, looking and smelling like somebody who had survived a headlong plunge into a sewage canal.
“Okon, what is the meaning of all this nonsense?” snooper asked covering his nose from the stench as the whole house was invaded by the smell of a pit latrine.
“Oga I been dey search for dem Soyinka man him green card. I don search everywhere. Dem say demdey see am for one joint but na lie, dem man naIwin” Okon said in a muffled tone.
“Okon remember you are here only to take a quick wash and put Dettol on your body” Baba Lekki ordered with a frown. “You are to resume the search immediately. By the way, have we searched the man’s hometown? Have we been to Isara?”
“Baba I sabi say you wan kill me. I go demIsara yesterday and demdey bury another big man for dem town. You know say nadem time when dem wicked Yoruba people dey hunt stranger, dem they kill dem, demdey cook dem and demdey roast dem like suya before they come dey whack dem.Naim I come pick race”, Okon chanted breathlessly.
“So if you find the green card how will you convince them in America that you are the man?” snooper asked the mad boy.
“Ha oga I don buy dem old wig and baba don teach me how I go dey walk and frown like dem man”, the crazy boy retorted.
“What if the immigration people ask you to reveal your identity?” snooper pressed.
“Baba tell me say make I tell dem say medal on konkeredey jam my thinking robes. Him say when dat one hit demgbuademyeyepeople go run for cover”, the mad boy whimpered. On that note, snooper sank into a nearby sofa in profuse mirth.

It is said that when a man is floored by a big tribulation, lesser misfortunes clamber on top. It is hard to know how the crazy boy called Okon got to know of snooper’s fiscal inability to procure his occasional after lunch cigar from the local supermarket. It may be due to the occasional lament about the evaporation of the old academic class and its occupational perks which in those halcyon days often included chomping on fat cigars.

The austerity has even extended to international travels. The last time a friend had to go abroad, he had to make do with a ticket procured from Air Shokolokobangosay, an airline which flies Tupolev aircrafts remaindered from the old Angolan civil war and a special hardship cabin known as Comrade. Events were approaching a dark climax.

It was with such heavy thoughts of looming class evisceration that snooper approached the house not knowing that an even more unworthy drama was brewing. The entire sitting area was invaded by the smell of raw tobacco. Adept nostrils already used to the smell of fumigating and public smoking quickly apprehended the culprit. There under greyish duvetthat had seen better days were four crude and clumsy rolls of fresh tobacco straight from provincial dead-ends.

“What is this nonsense smelling?” snooper thundered.

“Ha, oga no vex, na tobacco, na real kataba”, the mad boy replied with a devilish smile.

“And what is my business with that?”snooper demanded.

“Ha oga as money no reach buy dem original taba from dem supermarket, naim I come send demmala make dem buy dem better taba from Iseyin make oga mouth no come go idle”, the crazy boy noted with a sly wink at Baba Lekki who just walked in.

“Is now very clear that you have gone out of your mind”, snooper stuttered.

“ Öga, abi di thin no big enough? Abi make I put dem thin wey baba dey smoke weydey make him head dey do gbigigbigiand gbagagbaga”, the crazy boy continued.

“Add better Indian hemp make the yeye man come smoke am make him head come kaput. Put dem seed make dem come explode for him gelede face. Na dat one demdey call real local sourcing” Baba Lekki yelled.

“What? “snooper muttered in disbelief. Before anyone could comment any further, the crazy old crook suddenly lit up his monster pipe and huge fumes enveloped everywhere.

“You see, that is lesson 1 in supply side Economics. You must smoke what you produce and inhale what you exhale”, the old man noted with a professorial frown and walked away.

The times are very desperate. After spending a whole day hunting for forex to pay for a periodical in London, snooper came back home with his tail between his legs and completely famished. Comprehensively drunk on paraga, Okon and Baba Lekki were quite a sight to behold.

“Okon, what is on the menu?” snooper called out.

“Menu don become fenumonu or menuduro”, Baba Lekki whined with sadistic relish.

“I am not talking to you crazy old man”, snooper snarled.

“Oga no vex. Na Sapele water dey worry baba. Menu na pounded rice”, Okon said with a sneer.

“And what is pounded rice?” snooper shrieked.

“Na rice demcustom steal from dem smuggler and we come steal from dem. To pound rice you must to impound rice”, the mad boy snorted with malice. Snooper was momentarily speechless from the revolutionary wickedness of the whole scam.

“And how come that on Monday morning you put breakfast and also breakfast in the evening?”snooper demanded angrily.

“Oga, as we dey use formula 101, it means say if you breakfast for morning you must to break your fasting too for evening, abi make I let hunger wire you finish?” the unruly boy demanded.

“I think you are out of your mind. By the way, you put Ogi and Akara for Tuesday morning and then Ogi and Shakara for Wednesday morning. What is Shakara?” snooper screamed.

“Shakaranashakaraoloje. It mean say na only ogi you go drink after all demshakara. When akara no deynashakara remain”, the mad boy sniggered.

“And when Shakara don kaput naSakara music remain. You no see now say menu don become menukuro”,  BabaLekki interjected with icy disdain.

“You must be a lunatic. I think you lot are out of your mind”,snooper stuttered and banged the door on the crazy duo.

“Oga he better say make man dey out of mind than to dey out of pocket. If you get assets make we dey sell dem now like dem crazy federal government”, Okon croaked.

“Okon, I don tell dem foolish man make him run comot go him village, When hunger wire am well him go run comot Lagos. Ile kokont’agbe” Baba Lekki added.

As the rumours of the death of a leading Second Republic politician who has contributed immensely to the political and economic misfortunes of the country began to gain considerable traction, Okon has been huffing and puffing with malicious gusto asking the almighty God to make sure that the departed crook and sleaze merchant rot in the hottest part of hell.

For days, Okon has been nursing the wounds he sustained in a nasty street brawl while posing as a rogue WAI official arresting pedestrian violators of the overhead crossing at Oworo. But given the nasty mood in the country, it was obvious that an irate populace was not about to buy into the new WAI nonsense, particularly given the background of economic and political miscreants roaming the streets without any remorse or shame. An angry crowd had pounced on Okon and handed him the beating of his life. He had been carried home with his nose bulging, his uniform torn and his swagger gone.

“Ha oga, katakatadey for town.Famine dey road and hunger dey highway.  He be like if say dis WAI thin no go work dis time oo. Dem come wire man well well for Oworo. Why WAI now, dem Ibo man dey scream as him dey slap man like dem Taekwondo boy”, the crazy boy moaned.

“Okon, you are a fool. There is time for everything. We have told the man that you cannot step into the same river twice”, snooper offered. But the crazy boy’s capacity for swift recovery is a tad short of the miraculous. A few days after this and resplendent in resource control attire with Marrakesh fez cap to match, Okon barged into the sitting room with Baba Lekki in tow.

“Oga, man wan quickly reach demolosi man’s residence make man sign demcondomness register. He don reach time make we dey tell demyeyepeople dat God go punish dem”, Okon announced.

“Ha Okon, but I heard that the man was going to be buried in Israel where he died”, snooper noted.

“Israel ko, Ishmael ni”, Baba Lekki jeered with a vicious grin.

“Ha oga you dey behind news. When dem tell dem illustrate village wife dat Israel be dem place where demdey wake after three days dem woman ask make dem bring dem body quick quickbecosdem useless man must never to wake again”,Okon retorted.

“So what will you put in the condolence register?” snooper asked.

“I go ask God make him punish the crook, make him never know peace and make hunger dey wire him as hunger dey wire us”, the mad boy drooled endlessly.

“But Okon, you don’t speak ill of the dead”, snooper said hushing up the crazy rogue.

“Ogana Yoruba wuruwurube dat. If a man don die, how come he dey ill again?”Okonrejoined as he dragged out his drunken accomplice.

There were you in Summer 1996? It was twenty years ago when the Green Eagles at the Semi-final stage of the Atlanta Olympics performed one of the incredible soccer feats of all time by going ahead to defeat the mighty Brazilian football team after clearing a two-goal deficit. In the final game, the eagles went ahead to trounce Argentina to become Olympics soccer gold medalists. Despite the draconian rule of General Sani Abacha, it was a golden moment for Nigeria, to be eternally savoured and never to be forgotten.

Snooper remembers watching the epic match in Birmingham, England with his eleven year old son now a looming and looping adult of American basketball proportions. On the dot of twelve midnight, with the situation apparently hopeless and with Brazil and Romario threatening to increase the two-goal lead, the boy was sent to bed as there was school the following day.

Shortly thereafter, a modern football miracle began to unfold. The Eagles not only cancelled the two-goal deficit but went ahead to score a spectacular goal which ironically reminds one of Brazil’s concluding flourish against Italy in the 1970 World Cup Final. When the younger snooper was told of the result the following morning, he was so incredulous that he raced downstairs to switch on the tele-sport. And there it was starring the young man in the face.

On Wednesday, as the Green Eagles locked horn with a German team notorious for its precise passes and Teutonic thoroughness, one was gripped with fear laced by nostalgia. Miracles hardly repeat themselves and 1996 is not 2016.Nigeria’s soccer feistiness has since disappeared. In the event, it turned out a damp squib as a drained and exhausted Nigerian Team took on the Germans and their machine-like ferocity.

Yours sincerely had hardly settled down to watch the match when the screen began flashing that the Germans were a goal up. Thinking that it was a glitch which would clear up when the telecast came back to its senses, it turned out that the Germans were actually looking to increase their lead. The Eagles were lucky not to be submerged. As soon as the match ended, Okon shambled in with a tipsy Baba Lekki in tow. Since the last confrontation about budget padding, the boy has been on his best behavior.

“Oga, no be di thin we dey say be dis? Make dem bring back our boys come help dis yeye boys make dem stop disgrace country?” the crazy boy moaned.

“Which boys?” snooper inquired.

“Our boys dem Oyinbo people don capture with dem Boko Halal. Dem Alaba boy dey play for dem Austria, dem Dave Alli for dem England, Dave-Kanu for Wales, Iponkiri for dem Sweden, Badegi for even common Ghana and Lakukulala for dem Belgium,” the wacko boy screamed.

“Okon, you are fool. I don tell you say Lukalu is from Congo and Boateng is from Ghana.” Baba Lekki drunkenly interjected.

“Baba na burukutu dey worry you. Congo dey Zaria and Badegi na Nupe. Oga dem thin be say make una give us mobilization and TAM money make we go finish dem for Abuja.” Okon gloated.

“And what is TAM?”

“Ha dat one na turn around maintenance. Suppose dem Kukuruku soldier come say make we turn back quick quick? You no fit argue with dem. Dem go remove your eye with clipper, so make man turn around jeje”.  It was on this note that snooper dismissed the duo.

As the economic hardship bites harder in the land turning hitherto strong men into human fiascoes, snooper has devised a series of stringent austerity measures to stem the steamrolling tide of economic adversities. In addition to physically tape-ruling yam tubers and monitoring the outflow of foodstuff from the pantry like some ancient teacher, yours sincerely has stopped the unbudgeted inflow of country bumpkins and upcountry yokels to the house by cancelling existing visas. These days snooper tells his agrarian folks that he prefers to visit them, which is what the Americans call immigration control at source.

But trust Okon to find his way round the severe economic blockade. Unknown to snooper, in addition to his petty pilfering of foodstuff and moving the yam tape whenever his master chose to be away, the crazy boy has resorted to the twin strategy of padding and anticipatory approval of emergency expenditure. Playing on his master’s failing and fading memory, Okon conspires with market women to pad the budget and inflate price without any decorum or discretion. One morning, the pyramid scheme collapsed on the mad boy.

“Okon, we budgeted ten thousand for meat, why has it turned to fifteen thousand?” an irate snooper demanded.

“Oga na me pad dat one. Market and kitchen don catch fire”, the mad boy whined with a sheepish smile which further infuriated yours sincerely.

“And what is padding?” snooper growled.

“Ha oga, you no sabi padding? Where you come dey for obodo? Everybody dey do am, dem house, dem soldiers, dem judge. Even dem  Dogara boy come say padding no be crime. We come dey paddy paddy kontri, abi no be so?” the crazy boy snorted.

On that note, snooper elected to sue for peace from the implacable loony. But the kitchen erupted again.

“Okon, where is the omelet?” snooper thundered .

“Ha oga omelet o ma late ooo”, the crazy boy sniggered with venomous relish.

“Then you give me scrambled egg”, snooper raved.

“Oga even dat one dem done scramble. And dem don poach dem poached egg.  Even dullard sabi say when dem dollar don climb over 400 to one naira, egg must to disappear”, Okon retorted. At this point, snooper opened the steaming dish gingerly placed on the table by the mad boy and was confronted by something that looked like boiled unripe pawpaw instead of yam.

“Okon what is this nonsense?” snooper stuttered in implacable rage.

“Ha oga na new yam be dat. I go market and dem women tell me say no yam, but dem say if I wan buy new yam, make I go dem Iyanfoworogi village. I come reach dem village near Ife and dem old man come tell me say for dem village yam dey grow for tree. Him come show me dem tree with dem  obonge breadfruit. Na him I come buy one sack. Oga dem say him good. Boku  vitamin C, D, A, K, L P G dey there. Efen Viagra sef he dey there”, the mad boy whooshed and winked.

“Don’t tell me that nonsense! Okon before I come back you must leave this house”, snooper thundered and stormed out.