In case you missed Part One:
I wish I had helped, I should have helped, I want to help, but alas, it is too late.
It may have been the fear of being driven to an unknown destination through this frightening unfamiliar territory, or it may have been something else entirely, but for some reason, I kept thinking of a quote I had come across recently, the quote goes something like this; “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.” Whoever said this had clearly never been kidnapped before.
With my current predicament, I can count at least five things to be scared of, but I shouldn’t, I should keep a clear head and a calm mind, devising what to do or say should I be met with the worst-case scenario. The problem, however, remains, with these men, I’m not even sure what the worst-case scenario is.
Oh… I remember, it was a quote from this book I was reading about Franklin D Roosevelt, and the more I think about it the more I get it, Franklin may have been on to something, the very fact that I don’t even know what these men plan to do with me is probably the reason I feel so hopeless and scared. Not sure if knowing would make things better but the fact that I don’t know their plan must be why my mind is doing 100km per hour.
Wait, why am I so scared? With all the scenarios playing out in my head, one would think that I was kidnapped by a bunch of hardened criminals, this is the actual police, law enforcement agents, as long as I’m not guilty of any crime, I shouldn’t be frightened right? So why am I frightened?
The bus finally comes to a halt after what seemed like an eon, the policeman closest to the door opens it and gets down, “Oya, all of you come out, halele,” he says, a chuckle follows, and his colleagues join in on the joke no one else seemed to get.
“Look at them, common crooks!” Another officer says as they lead us into the station. We get to the station, and it is every bit of the hell hole I had imagined, one look at it and I turned around to the officers behind me.
“Officer?” I say, but before I could let out another word, I received a slap at the back of my head.
“Shut up thief.”
‘I’m not a thief.’ I thought to myself, but at this moment I wasn’t even sure if I was. Was GOD punishing me for all the time I reduced the meat in the pot and blamed it on my brother, who also partook of the stealing or am I not as lucky as I thought?
“Officer please let’s talk,” I say, my two fellow detainees, looking at me as if I had a death wish.
“We will talk,” one of the officers responded, he pushed me forward as the others policemen laughed.
They took us to a cell where they first took away our phones. For some reason, they also told us to strip to our underwear, after which they took our clothes. Then they handcuffed us, it was at this point I had to reiterate “Officer what did we do, what is our crime?” The officer raised his hand to hit me again and I jerked back, he laughed and made us sit on the dirty concrete floor.
“Don’t worry, you will soon know what you did,” He said.
“But, I didn’t do anything, that’s what I’ve been trying to tell you.”
“Listen to me young man, if you talk again, you will end up in the river.” He said before he and his colleague left.
I looked at the two guys to my left, they too looked as dejected and hopeless as I did. The cell was hot and full of bugs.
“Guys what is going on here?” I spoke wondering why they had been so accepting of this predicament.
“Bro it’s a long story, one of the guys said.” He had a croaky voice and spotted short dreadlocks. The other guy was more eerily quiet, almost like a child, matter of fact, now that I look at him, he does look like a child, yes tall and built but this boy doesn’t look anything older than 18.
“Hey, you what’s your name?” I say to him. He looked at me, eyes filled with regret.
“Tobi.” He says simply as he goes back to staring at nothing.
“My name is Kunle. Why did they arrest you?” He looked at me again, eyes still looking like it was about to burst into tears.
“Bros, you no go free this matter?” The dreaded guy said to me. I looked at him, and then Tobi, and on closer inspection, I could tell they were not like me, far from it in fact. The absence of perfume to mask the terrible odour, the fake chains the policemen had confiscated from them alongside their haggard shoes and washed clothes. All of this made me realise that they were in the lower class, while I stood comfortably at the upper-middle class.
I come from a rich home, and it was at that point, I realised that I could call my parents, alas, my phone had been taken from me. Where are those damn officers? I thought to myself. If they can give me my phone, I can rectify this mess. This evident prospect gave me hope, but when I looked at the face of Tobi again, I couldn’t help but feel hopeless again, not for me, no! GOD forbid, but for the poor boy.
“Tell me what the problem is, so we can all get out of here.”
“Oga e don do!” The dreaded guy warned.
“Obiano, shut up, no be you carry me go thief, see now dem don catch us.” Tobi blurted.
“No be you tell me say you must blow, say you no go poor for this life, because I gree show you the way, now you con dey talk nonsense.”
I looked on, understanding the situation from their brief exchange.
“What did you steal?” I inquired, ignoring the warning of this Obiano fellow.
Tobi took a deep breath. “Na crate of malt wey we wan thief from person shop go sell before police site us.”
“Crate of malt?”
“Na the hustle chairman, we thief something go sell am, na so we dey take chop.”
“But were you carrying arms when they caught you?” The two guys looked at me with utter confusion. “I mean you were not carrying guns?”
“Shut up for that place.” A yell came from down the hallway, but we couldn’t see the person who yelled.
“No, how I go take carry gun?” Tobi said.
“From where we for wan find am sef?” Obiano insisted.
“I say make una no dey make noise.” One of the officers said as he badged into the cell. “Wetin una dey talk for here?”
“Nothing officer,” I replied, and he landed me a slap. That was the third one tonight, and I found myself apologising for being hit, again.
Not even my parents hit me, but here I was slapped more times in one night than I have been my entire life. He dragged me out of the cell still handcuffed and still nude, he took me outside the station and dragged me through the bush and down a narrow path till we got to the bank of a dark long river. He tossed me in the water and left me in the cold water for about a minute gasping for air as I drowned, before dragging me right back.
“Next time I will throw you inside this river and I will not bring you out,” He said. By now I was in tears trying to catch my breath and blowing out chunks from my nose, as I had breath in a lot of water.
“Shut up!” He said as he led my wet self right back to the station. We got to the cell and he tossed me in like a rag doll.
“No more noise!” He yelled, and I finally got the message.
I shivered and cried in the now cold cell, well the cell wasn’t cold, just I. It was the stuff of nightmares, matter of fact since managing to find sleep, all I had were nightmares.
Suddenly, I felt a tap on my shoulders, and it woke me right up. ‘There we are’ I thought to myself, from a subconscious nightmare back to a conscious hell. The police station was every bit as miserable as the movies depict them, even with sunlight illuminating it.
I looked up and the same officer that had tossed me in the river was standing in front of me, looking down at me with a look I just couldn’t read, I looked to my left, Obiano had found comfort on my shoulder, snoring and drooling over it. My head ached and my body was fatigued, my mind felt more defeated though. I imagined that this was what an empty broken shell must feel like.
“Get up and follow me.” The officer demanded. But I couldn’t. It was difficult, so the officer lifted my almost lifeless body after he had tossed Obiano’s head from my shoulders. Obiano fidgeted before regaining his balance and resting the back of his head to the wall. Tobi too was asleep.
I sluggishly followed the officer to another room, dragging my feet and counting and struggling to catch each breath.
He led me to the interrogation room, where he asked me to sit and write a statement. I couldn’t believe it took them this long for them to ask me to write a statement, but I was semi-relieved that they did. It reminded me that I was in police custody and not a slavery camp in Libya. He left as I wrote down my statement.
Moments later he and one other police officer returned. I couldn’t quite place my finger on it, but I recognised the other officer even though he wasn’t part of the men that had for a lack of a better term, kidnapped me last night.
They both sat in front of me from across the table as they began reading my statement. The other officer looked at me, and that look suddenly became curious, he squinted his eyes and drew closer, he looked to be trying to figure out something. By now, my breathing was no longer as loud, and some life was coming back to me.
“Americana!” He said with a smile. It was then I Iooked at his shirt and saw the same name tag I had seen the previous day, it was officer Jide, the polite policeman I had encountered on my way to work. “What are you doing here?” He asked”
“You know this man?” His partner asked him.
“Yes I do, I saw him yesterday, this one is a gentleman oh.” Jide said.
“Gentleman keh? We caught him stealing a car last night.”
“Officer?” I interrupted.
“Common shut up, thief!”
“No, no, no, Frank, no be this kind person abeg, this guy na model citizen.” Jide said.
“You sure?”
“Yes I sure, give me one minute with am.”
“Jide you sure so?”
“Frank I sure na, abi you no sabi English?”
“Okay oh, just know say DPO share dey.” The other officer said as he exited the room leaving only me and Jide.
Jide looked at me with a smile, took up my statement and tore it.
“I like you, you know say you be my person abi? So let’s make this easy, 300k and you are free to leave.”
In my mind, I yelled ₦300,000? But I kept calm outside. What made him think I had that type of money? Oh, he has seen me in my red Venza.
“Officer Jide, 300k is too much.” I said in hopes to negotiate my release.
“What’s that your name again?” He inquired, and I told him. “Listen Kunle, if I leave you to these men, trust me they will collect more than 300k, and if they can’t collect it, then I can’t even say what they will do to you.” He concluded, and to be honest, he didn’t have to say more than that, I got the message, coupled with the fact that I’m not broke, 300k at this point was nothing compared to my freedom, and of course my sanity.
“Give me my phone, let me transfer it,” I said, and Jide smiled. He left the room and returned with my phone. Five minutes later, my account balance was ₦300,000 short, while Jide’s was ₦300,000 richer. We waited a while for him to get the confirmation, but in less than 20 minutes he did, and I was a free man.
Jide escorted me outside, and even gave me a lift back to where they had picked me off last night, turns out it was about time for his shift.
While in the car, I called back my mom, who had called me 22 times through the night. I reassured her that I was fine, and had decided to sleep at a hotel that night due to the traffic. God knows I couldn’t bring myself to narrate the truth, saying it will only make me relive the ordeal and make it all the more real. Right now, I was just trying to convince myself that this was all a nightmare, and las las, I will be alright.
The journey back seemed shorter than the journey last night and I was glad we had gotten to the destination. Sharing a car with people who had tortured and extorted me was not an ideal way to spend my morning. The officers dropped me off, but not after I remembered Tobi and Obiano. By now they had done their worst to me so I wasn’t afraid to speak.
“What of those other guys you carried?” I asked.
“Don’t mind those hoodlums eh, a gentleman like you should not worry about common criminals like them.” Honestly, and I’m ashamed to say this, but I nodded in agreement and went to my car, where I drove home.
I was given the week off, after I had explained my ordeal to my company’s HR. I didn’t tell them everything, especially the part about the river, but I did tell them that I was arrested and extorted and it was enough for them to take pity on me. While at home on my recovery vacation, I did everything possible to forget that day, including spending all day on social media, and movie streaming platforms. I never gave myself even a one second window where my mind could drift back to the night.
The plan was, if I watched enough movies, not any of that depressing nonsense, but silly comedy movies, and I spent enough time online watching comedy skits, maybe I will be able to get over it.
But alas, social media managed to bring that experience flooding back into my mind. “Don’t mind those hoodlums eh, a gentleman like you should not worry about common criminals like them,” I remember Jide saying, I also remembered agreeing with him, after battling my conscience to go help them.
Now that I’m online, I know with more conviction that I was wrong not to have done something, it brought me to tears that I just went about my way, forgetting that the young boy they had caught stealing only wanted to eat.
Gosh! How could I have forgotten the sad look on his face, I wish I could help, I should have helped, I want to help, but alas it’s too late, I had failed, and will never live this down for the rest of my life, the image of the bloated body of two young men, found washed off the same river I was almost drowned in is not what I had hoped to see when I decided to open social media again, but it was what I saw, and what’s worse is that these two young men were identified as Tobi Isiaq, and Chukwudi Ulo, also known as Obiano.
PS: This account is a work of fiction, inspired by the story of Chijioke Iloanya in the hands of the notorious Akwuzu SARS, who’s father had to swim in a pool of corpses to find his son’s body because he was unable to raise ₦3 million to release his son from police custody.
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