The air is solemn and sober, the agony of wailers contagious, outbursts of agonizing pain expressed in loud wails, occasional falling and rolling on the dirt floor until a family member helps the wailer stand.
One cannot hear any sort of discussion, only the humming, the sighs, the screams, the wails, where family members called out in pain to their deceased as the candle night proceeded. Women and girls and a handful of men, you can number them, they were just five who had managed to escape and sneaked back into town tied black wrapper around their waist and the women tied it just above their breast flowing all the way down across their knee. The several lit candle made the night looked like a cluster of fire flies.
Your vision is blurred by tears as you continually peered into the flame of your candle as the melting wax rolled onto your hand. The burning sensation couldn't deter you, you weren't even feeling it, you are lost in thoughts, short of words, but deep in that flame from your candle, you can still see him. The flame reminds you of him, your Uncle Odafe, as fierce as a budding flame yet lack the ability to cause harm because of its size. You saw through him. Your Uncle Odafe, harmless, very harmless. He may lose his temper at the slightest provocation and his spirit of activism should be blamed for this, it is the fuel on which this anger issue thrives aside which he was harmless. You wonder why the Nigerian Soldiers didn't see this.
Just yesterday evening Uncle Odafe had visited your family, where he convinced Papa and Mama to join in the One Nigeria match in the morning of today, he was boiling in rage.
"If Ojukwu wants to fight for his Biafra, he should fight it alone and with his Igbo followers he should leave us out of this, we are Asaba not Aba" He screamed, almost losing his breath. Papa concurred, topping his cup with palm wine as they sat on the shade outside whilst Mama dished the evening meal, pounded yam and Egusi, your favorite. But today you didn't have appetite, what Uncle Odafe is saying had totally consumed you, somehow you could feel your own anger boiling but you know you cannot express it like him.
"You can imagine Dafe," Papa replied "all these killings are senseless. I wonder why Ojukwu will endanger the lives of Millions of these people in his selfish quest for referendum. If the British says One Nigeria and Azikiwe said One Nigeria, then so be it. After all, Azikiwe, Ironsi all of them are Igbos. What is the big deal."
"I don't care if Ojukwu wants to use all the Igbos as sacrifice for the gods in his father's village. I don't care whatever had taken over him, all I am saying is, leave Asaba out of this. We are not part of Biafra, the Niger river is enough boundary adjustment na, from Onitsha to Port Harcourt, and then to Calabar, all those places are Biafra and they have enough men to fight their cause. Why is this man selfish?" He pointed at nobody in particular, vibrating in rage. You know it was Ojukwu he was pointing at and could swear that if the bearded man appears here now, your Uncle Odafe will crack his neck and bring the war to an end. Your Papa nodded too, telling Odafe how wise his words were.
"Yesterday, the Soldiers raided the outskirt of the town. Why? The useless agitators went as far as Ore to fight them, they took Benin. Imagine the nonsense. Imagine the nonsense. Is Onitsha not enough? Is Nsukka not enough? Why can't they stay on their own and leave us alone? Now our people are dying for their greed." He spat.
"Odafe, it is war, and any side that is winning will want to advance the more. You know, like claim more lands. Who fights war and win without taking new territory?" Mama laughed. Papa hissed like she had spoken like one without a brain. He always did that whenever Mama chooses a side different from his.
"What do you know woman?" Odafe shot, forcing Mama to halt and go inside. Papa cleared his throat. "We all know how this war will turn out, Ojukwu is just sacrificing these people for nothing. Do you know my friend Uzoma from Aba came here yesterday to see me? He told me those Biafran soldiers were fighting with sticks and cutlass and their acquisition of armor was dependent on them killing a Nigerian Soldier? Apart from their Ogbu ni kwe abi whatever nonsense they call that thing, Ojukwu gave them no arms, no arms, and yet he is chanting war songs. Do people fight war and advance with sticks? Is that how to win a war?"
"Oohoooo" Papa said, opening his palm and hitting the back of it on his thighs. "My brother, ask me o".
"He's leading all of them as sheep to the slaughter, and they are foolishly following him. Where is Ojukwu now? Where is he?" Odafe said.
"It is always the masses that suffers, it is always the masses that are sent to do the dying whilst the elites take the glory. Poverty and hunger are bastard, once you are caught in any of their claws, you become summarized as the Masses, fit only to do the fighting and the dying whilst those who escaped them takes the glory" Papa said.
"Then he should do with those Igbos and the few other tribesmen that are in lieu with him. We are Asaba people, nothing concerns us." Uncle Odafe retort.
"Now that these Soldiers from Nigeria are at the Outskirts, what can we do? They'll kill anyone, Biafra or not." Papa lamented.
"No. Not us, Not all, we are not Biafrans. We are Nigerians. Tomorrow, we are matching to the Outskirts to tell them that we are Nigerians, we will not sit and watch ourselves be consumed by a single man's greed and thirst for power. We shall match, every man for Asaba. We shall declare our solidarity for Nigeria, surrendering ourselves to the officers. That way, we will be spared. That's our only salvation from this nonsense." said Odafe.
"Tomorrow? How many people are going to the outskirts?" Papa asked.
"Every man in Asaba, I came to inform you too. This is our only chance at living and not be rounded up in Ojukwu's mess. If we show that we are one Nigeria, the soldiers will leave us alone and face those Biafrans. If they want war, they should be able to fight it alone not include others in it" Odafe replied.
Papa nodded. Odafe had spoken his mind. Even Mama said she was going too. Odafe had broken into laughter and teased her of being a saboteur. They all laughed. Uncle Odafe told them the attire was white, akwa ocha, and take off time is six a.m they should be at the outskirts before it is eight, people from other villages will join them along the way.
That night, sleep left your eyes. You didn't tell Papa but you badly want to join them. All you can imagine as you roll on your bed trying in vain to sleep is the khaki uniform of the Nigerian soldiers, their big guns. You admire all of it and promised yourself that you will become a soldier some day. You imagined your people as they advance to the outskirts, imagined a peaceful negotiation with the soldiers, in your mind's eye you have concluded the day already as you keep rolling on your bed.
You doubt if you had slept an hour before the sound of Papa's feet woke you up. You pretend to be asleep. Mama followed. Papa told her about staying back and looking after her children, but she was already making the day's meal. You told yourself that that was an opportunity to get up and join them. After greeting your parents and washing your face, you picked your chewing stick and began chewing like Papa would do and you joined your mother making the meal. Though they were surprised, they didn't ask you any question, Mama was even happy that you are up, now she has a helping hand.
"Take care of your younger ones" they told you in unison as they left with Odafe for the Outskirts, but you know today is not the day of taking care of anybody, it was for wild adventure. You are following them.
You waited for them to go a distance before running inside to ensure your younger ones are sound asleep, you slide into your white short and a white Polo Papa brought from one burial. To the outskirts, you made your way.
It is easier to mix without being spotted by a relative, they were so many people, more than what you had imagined the previous night. It didn't take long before you found your mates, some on bare foot, some without shirts, all marching to the outskirts. You feel a momentary wash of adulthood, you even tried your bass voice and smiled. Today, you are an adult, the task you are embarking on is one for adults and now you are one even though it won't last the day.
As the day brightened, Asaba took a new shape. The morning sun hotter than what it use to be, the sound of the morning birds excites you, the ground with the many feet that threaded it looked like war scene. You imagined for once that your Papa and Mama and Uncle Odafe and everybody out there aren't going for a negotiation but an actual fight. It makes your stomach leap for joy, the sight of Odafe smashing the head of a soldier like you heard Biafran soldiers did. You wanted to scream that they shouldn't be cowards, they should fight! But you know that will mean selling yourself, Papa will find out you are not at home and it will be more trouble for you, so you quietly chant the war songs you know. You chant nzogbu nzogbu and Iwe Iwe, as quietly as you could, only your walking steps betrayed you, it moved in rhythm with your chants you noticed you were walking faster than you should walk and your skin was limiting you. You turned around to look at others who had began their day playing, you consider them childish and wondered who raised them. To you, everybody should move in the rhythm of the event of the day. This day will go down history.
You stop under a shed because your feet hurt, you had walked a long distance from your village and now even your throat burns, you have been overwhelmed by the euphoria stemming from the event of the day that you had forgotten to carry water, and had hurried over your food, you swallowed as much as saliva you can make to quench your thirst. You sat on the bare floor trying to catch your breath. Your eyes fell on young boys playing shooting shooting, you watched as they shot bullets to their opponents, as they died and stood up again like they had previously not died. You imagine what it feels like fighting in the war actually. For a moment you wanted to abandon whatever brought you from the house this morning and pour your building rage into your carved stick that will serve as a gun and shoot at your opponents, those retarded Biafrans that had caused your community grief, you wanted to shoot them, kill them; uncle Odafe had stirred that anger and now you want a means of expression even though just mere acting. You catch yourself laughing at those who had died, laughing at those who got the bullet first as they slowly slumped, you imagine they were Biafrans and every lucky killer was Nigerian, so consumed were you that you never knew when you stood up and threw your fist into the air and screamed, "Kill them all" everyone halted, all eyes fell on you, their eyes reverted from you when they found out that you were only a kid, an armless kid. What follows next was the sound of guns. At first, you felt it was a thousand echo of the ra-ta-ta-ta the children playing shooting shooting were chanting, but then it became louder, the sound of machine guns spraying bullet, then people started running. What you remembered was standing up to look at the crowd retreating, scampering for safety, people falling down and being trampled upon, people hitting heads against poles and falling down covered with their own blood. You didn't wait for them to get to your before you stood up and took to your heels.
It was Mama who returned, her blouse were badly torn and she had marks on her face, she leaped, couldn't stand aright, and when she finally collapsed you saw the blood that stained her wrapper. You wondered what had happened, what had happened to Papa, why is Mama this way? What had happened to Uncle Odafe? There's no one to ask, the gloom in the air was silencing. It remained that way until the evening, until the candle procession, until you lit your own candle and followed them as it began to register in your mind that the sounds you heard were the bullets from the Nigerian Soldiers on your community men, who had only wanted to negotiate peace.
You look into the flame of your own candle, seeing Uncle Odafe's face from yesterday evening and wondering whether it was bravery or cowardice to die without fighting.
That day, Asaba fell!
Chines Zoe.
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