Photo Credit: BBC News
Back at the Spot We Never Left
We do not stop running. We do just as our Babas and Mamas instructs us to: keep running until you find help. God be with you. We run and run at first holding each other’s hands forming a chain-like link, then in a single file because the paths of the bush we run through is narrow, the grasses wet and slippery, chuku-chuku thorns tries to hold our skirts and blouses as we run. The trees flanking both sides looks at first like masquerades bending down to grab us. We run as far and fast as our little legs could carry us, even though our legs are like brackets and small letter k when we stand upright, when we hear the sound of gunshots or explosion.
We run past burning buildings engulfed in red flames with black, looming smoke billowing out of the doors and windows. We run past burnt cars and motorcycles and thick, choking smoke darkening our paths. We run past people lying on the ground as black as soot with their legs raised slightly upwards like I-surrender grilled chicken sold by meat sellers on the roadsides in Damaki, our town. We run until we could no longer perceive the smell of human flesh that we thought at first was a goat being roasted closeby. We continue to run even when we thought we would reel over and vomit everything in our stomachs when we saw the entrails, slimy and oozing something whitish, from the open stomach and head of a woman and her baby both lying in a violently grotesque position.
We run until we come across the main road which our parents had instructed us not to follow because it is where cars were stopped and passengers were pulled out like sore tooth and asked to lie flat on their belly. The passengers would be shaking like they were beaten by heavy downpour, crying and begging but the angry people armed with planks, dotted at the edges with nails or cutlasses or guns would bark at them.
“Are you Wasushi?”
“Are you Kamanje?”
If the angry people were Wasushi, the passengers who are Wasushi would be separated from the others like the way our Mamas separates stones from beans before pouring them into the cooking pot. If the angry people were Kamanje, the Kamanje passengers would also be taken to a side. Then there would be sporadic gunshots or sounds of blade hitting flesh and people in distress shouting until silence would reign supreme and the smell of gunpowder or urine would hang in the air as blood spiralls down the road like rivulets. It was because of this our parents said to us, please, do not follow the main road. But we follow the main road because we are tired and scared of running in the bush because the paths are not as smooth as the roads even though most of the roads in Damaki are riddled with potholes.
The road we take is empty and free. We give thanks to God in Wasushi and Kamanje language. We do not know where we are because the town of Damaki is littered with dead things. We continue walking until a black and green Hilux passes us at a T-junction ahead, then stops and turns our way. We start to run faster even though we are expecting bullets from their guns to pierce through our back, deflating our lungs of it’s oxygen and that will be our end. We continue running until the Hilux overtakes us because tyres are faster than legs. We turn left and run into the bush but the men in uniforms, holding guns jumps out of the car and shouts at us, stop there! don’t run. The men runs after us until they catches up with us and bring us back to the road. We are kicking. We are shouting. We are crying. We are scratching at their faces, but all this does not save us from the hefty and powerful arms of the men. They throw us into the back of their hilux and asks,” where are you girls running to?”
We do not answer. Then they tell us they are Damaki soldiers and are trying to protect us. When they begin to drive with us we cry for God to help us in Wasushi and Kamanje language. They asks us to be calm and that they are not going to kill us.
We keep riding in silence because we are tired of shouting and we accept our fate; this is going to be our end. We get to a place where all the houses are similar; small like huts with blue and red colour and there are plenty people, mostly children and women that we cannot count. The soldiers takes us to a small office. There we meet a black, smallish man wearing an ash framed glass which makes his eyes larger and the edges around his eyes farther and smaller. He smiles at us after the soldiers narrates our story and tells us not to worry, we are in Charitas, an NGO. It is then we relax.
Later, a young man with full beard and a woman with short hair enters. The man says.” Hi, I’m Bacham. I’m a reporter,” then he points to the woman.” This is Loila, she works here in Charitas.”
We nod at him because we are tired and hungry to split our lips open and say anything. He continues.” Are you Wasushi or Kamanje?”
It is then we begin to cry because that is what our neighbours said they ask people before they kill them — the Wasushi people asks for Kamanje and Kamanje people asks for Wasushi. Bacham and Loila tries to soothe us.” Please don’t cry. We are not going to harm you.”
After a while, he asks us again. This time, we reply him. We say we are hungry. We are tired. We are thirsty. We are sad. Loila steps outside abruptly and Bacham says.” It’s alright. You are safe here.”
We say to him If you give us food and water, we would go back to Damaki to look for our Babas and Mamas. Bacham says there would be no need for that. The bespectacled, smallish man mutters about how Damaki natives were complaining of little development in their town but went on to completely destroy the little development they had. How everything now has crumbled to the ground like buildings without foundation.
“Every protest must not result to blood shed and violence and destruction.” The man says.
Bacham replies him.”But this is’nt a protest.”
The bespectacled man nodded.” It started as one. We have to learn how to think and act inwardly in a justifiable manner so we don’t make mistakes outwardly.”
Then they remain silent until another lady comes into the room and tells them another set of survivors have been found. They rushes out as Bacham tells us to rest here for a while, they won’t be gone for so long.
Loila enters after a while wiping her face. Her eyes are red. Later, after we have eaten, we huddle together with Loila in her room because there are no more tents or rooms for us and we tell her our story. We tell her how it all started, from the very beginning.
* * * * *
We were playing suwe – long rectangular lines drawn with sticks with box adjoining each line, clapping and hoping in and out of the boxes — inside our compound which was too small to contain a car, but large enough for us to play when our Mamas returned home from the market where they sell benniseed, kuli – kuli, locust bean and maize flour. They asked us how was school and we told them it was fine, and they muttered about how they can’t wait for us to go on holiday so we can help them in their stalls at the market.
They went into the kitchen immediately because our Babas doesn’t like to return home from work with the food not ready. Then they called us and tell us to stay inside because our Babas would not be happy to return home and see us still outside. We assisted them in the kitchen as we anticipate the return of our Babas.
Our Babas returned some hours later and we rush to welcome them. We tell them nyawo and nhaba in Wasushi and Kamanje. They hugged us smiling, patches of dampness circled the area of their armpits discolouring the part a darker shade than the colour. We take their bags into their rooms. We bring in their food after they have taken their bath and rested, going through the evening news on television.
Then they showed us the part of the newspaper they were reading where a Kamanje artist who drew the Governor and a native of Wasushi, Honourable Mazik Adume as a pig. It wasn’t a pig-pig, but a pig with the head of Honourable Mazik, just like one American movie we watched titled Percy Jackson where one man had the body of a goat. They mutter about the cartoonist being silly and why would the trust worthy newspaper, Damaki Times even publish something like that?
Our Mamas slapped their palms atop another and said they think the cartoonist was saying the truth but our Babas countered them them and said they would only cause trouble with this cartoon and what is wrong with young people of nowadays? Always in a hurry to do something rash without thinking? Always in a hurry to take decisions without analyzing its pros and cons.
Just as our Babas had said, two days later, the youths of Wasushi asked the newspaper to be shut down and every newspaper carrying the cartoon burnt. They also demanded that the picture be taken down anywhere they are showing it like Facebook and T.V. and Whatsapp. They marched to the State House and the Honourable Mazik addressed them and asked them to go home, but they went into the street and blocked the road until some Kamanje boys asked them why they were crying more than the bereaved? Even Honourable Mazik Adume was not as angry as they were. Was’nt the truth what the cartoonist drew? Were’nt the Wasushi the problem of the State, bringing in no development despite ruling for the past ten years? The Wasushi youths told them to shut up and leave with their poverty stricken selves and the Kamanje boys replied them that it waa time for a Kamanje elite to rule and all Wasushi were pigs and a fight broke out where bottles were broken, stones thrown at each other, sticks flunged at each other and three Kamanje boys were killed because they were not as much as the Wasushi. The next day, some Kamanje boys went into the market and killed ten Wasushi motorcyclists in retaliation.
Our Mamas returned home from the market earlier than usual because the market was turned upside down. Our Babas too returned home even before the chickens flew to the top of the fence and crowded round each other, even before the orange sun like a sliced lemon with the other half buried beyond our eyes their faces looking sour. They talked about nothing except the fight between the Wasushi and Kamanje youths, the burning of the market and destruction of township stadium and the killing of innocent people who knew nothing about it.
The State Government placed a 24-hour curfew immediately but that did’nt stop the fighting because all the Police and Mopol and Soldiers were escorting some bulletproof, tinted cars to the neighbouring city of Noma. Some of the rich Kamanje and Wasushi people locked themselves up in their security tight estates crowded with different Soldiers, MOPOL and Police Officers.
The fighting and burning stopped us from going to school and stopped our Babas from going to work and our Mamas to the markets. How we remained indoors in our large face-me-i-face-you compound until those boys came earlier this morning when it was still dark, banging the gate and swearing. Our Mamas were calling on God, pleading with Abazhi and Orisu to come save us, but our Babas woke us up and threw us over the fence into the coldness and darkness of dawn and told us to keep running until we get help.
* * * * *
Loila wipes her face again and makes formal introduction, how she drove in from Noma, the neighbouring town to come help when she reads about the news, how she arrived to help Charitas with her cause — lending a hand to the survivors of Damaki in distress. We tell her our names. She smiles and calls our names one after another: Awa. Libi. Labbo. Arama. She kisses our forehead and tells us she would not forget the names she had at first known us as: Hungry. Thirsty. Sad. Tired.
Contributor’s Bio
Solomon Hamza is a Nigerian writer. He is the winner of the inaugural Ngiga Prize for Humour Writing 2025. His works have been longlisted for the Kikwetu Flash Fiction 2023 and shortlisted for the Enugu Literary Society Prize 2024. His works have been published on Brittle Paper, Shallow Tales Review, Salamander Ink Magazine, Isele Magazine, Olney magazine, RoadRunner Review, Agbowo, Illino Media, Afritondo and elsewhere. He tweets @ST_hamza001.
