by Soyombo Ayomikun

“Abacha is dead,” the person yelled. Our pastor pause.  Someone right on the front row jumped up.  He leapt onto the streets

1.I was in church

   The Pastor was preaching

   Nigeria was then on fire

   You dare not sneeze in public

    I daily felt that snipers were everywhere

   Ready to shoot anyone who shrugged at the government

2.Suddenly we heard a scream

   From just outside our church

   “Abacha is dead,” the person yelled

   Our pastor paused

   Someone right on the front row jumped up

   He leapt onto the streets

3.The second member ran out of the church

   The third followed

   I saw a mama in one corner

   Sheding tears of joy

   Our church service scattered

   The streets became our chapel

4.We all danced

   We sang praises

   Nigeria burst out in tears

   Tears shed in a rapturous joy

   As a child I felt freedom

   I knew terror just died

5.All the bars declared free drinks

   Palmwine sellers distributed free kegs

   Markets all over Nigeria scattered

   Everyone celebrating redemption

   All because dracula just passed

   The nation breathed liberty again

6.Relatives called themselves

   To pass across the rare sweet news

   We didn’t really care what killed him

   An apple,bullet or woman

   We began dreaming of sweeter climes

   We never knew a leader would one day honour terror

7.Nigeria became 100 years

   A golden list was compiled

   Of sacrificial hearts that laboured for the country

   Of martyrs who bled for all

   Lo and behold

   We found “Terror’s” name on the list

8.We didn’t ask for a list

   Of the good,the bad,& the ugly

   We were expecting a roll call

   Of rare beautiful idols of our land

   But then our president shocked us again

   By doing the unthinkable

9.Nigeria knows her heroes

   We know our warriors

   Within the Aso villa choose whoever you want to celebrate

   In our hearts we know those to honour

   We can’t all just forget the miracle we felt

   On the day Abacha died

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Soyombo  Ayomikun tweets from @alabaster85

Op-ed pieces and contributions are the opinions of the writers only and do not represent the opinions of Y!/YNaija.