The young man like other “workers” at the harbor offer those kind of services (helping travelers to secure their luggage from boats) and expect some pittance from the owners. Paying for such services is always optional, and not compulsory. The woman didn’t dispute any bit of the man’s account. The man was angry when the woman told him that she wouldn’t pay because she never asked him to work for her. Angered by that the man openly demanded to be paid. I pleaded with the woman, to give him some amount of money. The lady refused and walked away on me, telling me to pay him since I have money to “waste on criminals”. I later pleaded with the naval officer and he set the young man free. I also advised the young man to take everything calmly. He shouldn’t expect every person he works for to pay him. I left there as the naval officer who just woke up, dipped his fingers in his trouser’s pocket and drew out a huge bundle of Nigeria’s currency notes. The officer looked at it and smiled while flipping through them.
The young man like other “workers” at the harbor offer those kind of services (helping travelers to secure their luggage from boats) and expect some pittance from the owners. Paying for such services is always optional, and not compulsory. The woman didn’t dispute any bit of the man’s account. The man was angry when the woman told him that she wouldn’t pay because she never asked him to work for her. Angered by that the man openly demanded to be paid. I pleaded with the woman, to give him some amount of money. The lady refused and walked away on me, telling me to pay him since I have money to “waste on criminals”. I later pleaded with the naval officer and he set the young man free. I also advised the young man to take everything calmly. He shouldn’t expect every person he works for to pay him. I left there as the naval officer who just woke up, dipped his fingers in his trouser’s pocket and drew out a huge bundle of Nigeria’s currency notes. The officer looked at it and smiled while flipping through them.
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On Sunday, eleventh May, two thousand and eight, at the Nembe/Bony/Bille terminal, Christian Purefoy, the tall, brilliant Canadian journalist with the American Cable Network News (CNN) was arrested. He was arrested by operatives of the State Security Operatives (SSS), Nigeria’s secret police and detained in their cell at their headquarters at Forces Avenue in Port Harcourt. Following escalation of organized violence in the region, the government was worried about critical reports by mostly the international media on the situation. Scores of foreign journalists were arrested and detained in similar manner on charges of espionage for visiting where they are not supposed to visit like the wharf without permission. Because of that, the military headquarters in Abuja issue permits to any visiting foreign journalist and overtly and covertly monitor such trips around.
Around one thirty p.m., I walked into a large plank-built canoe, about twenty meters long. It was anchored at the port. The boat had arrived from Twon- Brass by two a.m. (in the morning). Humans and loads were offloaded before eight a.m. (daylight) at the harbour and was loading again to sail back to Twon-Brass. The wooden boat was powered by a huge marine engine, “BT5-EVECO gear Volvo.” A whole apartment was created as the engine room at the back close to the toilet and bathroom side. One crew member is normally stationed there to take care of the engine. The place was like a furnace and emitted terrible noise and exhausted diesel fume into the water and air. Apart from the engine room, there was a control room where the “captain” seats, wielding a big wheel steering like that of a big car. In front of the captain’s house was the name of the boat “ S.A. Marine Brass/Egweama Express”. The boat was like a two storey house. It carries over two hundred and fifty passengers with their luggage. There were two small generators with pipes placed closer to the edge on the first floor. When the generators are switched on, they suck water from the base of the boat and vomit it into the water. The boat driver (captain) wore a faded ash-coloured t-shirt. At the back was “PNC Bank”; while in front was the bold inscription, “Pirates”. On the boat, nobody had a life vest or jacket on.
The boat is owned by a man from the Ijebu Ode area, the old Yoruba town in the present-day Ogun State. The man is said to have worked with an Ijaw man from Bayelsa State for years as his boat manager. He was settled (given some money) to start his own business. Today, the Ijebu Ode man has made a fortune from such marine transport business. He owns fleet of such boats.
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I didn’t want to sit on the first floor of the boat. The second floor looked elevated and served as some kind of an observatory for me. The boat was a wonderful world of its own- there was a toilet, bathroom, restaurant and a bedroom (for the manager), all constructed with plank. I found a good place to relax. I had spent about thirty minutes there when three young girls came into the apartment and sat on the seats in opposite direction. Two of them were adults (in their mid-twenties) and another below eighteen years. They greeted me and I reciprocated. Apart from an Ijaw woman with her five boys, who were busy cooking different types of Nigerian meals for passengers to buy (who runs the boat restaurant), the seats on the second floor were empty. The first floor was overloaded with crates of beer, soft drinks, and bags of Dangote cement, rice, beans, flour, garri and most of the passengers who had goods there preferred to stay there.
I chatted with the girls about travels on the boat. They shared their experiences with me. I asked them why they didn’t travel with the small speed boat (motorized fibre boat). The speed boat spends about three and half hours from the harbor to Twon Brass, though one pays three thousand seven hundred naira (about twenty-two dollars). But on the large wooden boat like the S.A. Marine Brass/Egweama Express one spends over fifteen hours and pays one thousand five hundred naira (about nine dollars). They spoke about the “high cost” of speed boat compare to that of the local ferry. We were still discussing when six boys led by a more matured, taller one and having dark sunglasses on, came into the apartment. He led a group of boys whose eyes were terribly red after smoking Indian hemp. The boys didn’t have clothes on.
They had different sizes of cuts and injuries on their back and parts of their body. Their trousers were visibly falling off (sagging). I saw some cuts on the boys’ back and I identified them to be members of the Icelanders. I saw the older girl on my right gazing at the Icelander marks on the boys back and smiled. I wanted to know why she was smiling and she said she will tell me later. The man with the sunglasses sat close to me and was observing me seriously. The invading Icelander gang members were not traveling. They saw when the girls entered the boat and came over.
I saw the Icelanders leader talking to the boys (running the boat restaurant with their mother) in low tones. He was asking question about which of the girls is my girlfriend, because he suspected that I am a military man. When he was able to establish that none of the girls were my girlfriend, he ordered his men to drag the third one (the underage girl) to him. The older girl noticed it and protested immediately. “Come, who be you? You wan die? We will sink dis boat ooo if you shake!” One of the Icelander boys thundered, while their commander smiled too.
I attempted to calm the girl down so that I can intervene. The girl told me not to worry that she is going to show the boys the other side of her.
“Do you know who I be? Who born this goat,” the lady fired back. She was referring to the boy as goat.
Tempers were rising like tidal marine waters. The other two girls were frightened. I saw that in their faces. I called the leader of the group and started talking to him to calm him down as well. The man was really mad at the girl for calling one of his men a goat. The man had threatened the girl, “I promise you, nobody will see your corpse to bury.” I saw him making calls. The girl was also making calls and describing the leader of the group too. Three of the boys had left the boat, perhaps to mobilize for action. Some fifteen minutes had passed. The sunglasses man, who appeared like a vicious bloodthirsty gangster, started talking to somebody on phone slowly and soberly. I saw him when he walked slowly away from the boat apartment and called his boys by the side and spoke to them. They later returned to the apartment and apologized to the girl. I heard when he said in Pidgin English that his men would protect them until the boat departs. I was interested in what happened. The lady later told me that her cousin is a senior commander of the Icelanders in the state. And he called the boy and warned him.
The Nigerian Icelander secret gang took its name from the name of the place of the Old Norse people of ancient Scandinavia. In mid two thousand, around June, some members of the Supreme Vikings Confraternity (SVC) allegedly with some support from the state government during the tenure of former Governor Peter Otunaya Odili provided technical and financial supports to the formation of the Icelander. Tom Ateke, Julius Oruitemeka, popularly called Juju (both from the Okrika area) and three others got the support to form and lead the Icelander. In the Icelander realm, the five “founding fathers” are called the “five wise men”.
Before the infamous two thousand and three Nigeria’s elections, Juju, one of the Icelander’s wise men left the group as a result disagreement he had with Tom Ateke and founded the Greenlanders. Julius’ Greenlanders’ name is taken from the area occupied by the Artic people in same Scandinavia. The Ateke-Julius disagreement worsened into Icelander/Greenlander bloody gang war that consumed a lot of members including innocent victims. Few months after, Ateke ordered for the capture and beheading of his opponent (Julius), his corpse was kept in a wheel barrow and displayed at one of the water fronts under Icelander control. Like a bizarre act in Nigeria’s movie, I watched the mutilated lifeless body of Julius then. Although both Icelanders and Greenlanders are avowed enemies, their codes, regalia, greetings, sally and others are same with that of the Vikings confraternity.
There seems to be conflicting dates about the birth of the Supreme Vikings Confraternity (SVC), sometimes called National Association of Adventures or De Norsemen Klub of Nigeria. Some reports said that they emerged in early nineteen eighty-two, others said it was nineteen eighty-four. Three students at the University of Port Harcourt, Choba, Rivers State were said to have founded the SVC. They were the Rising angel (his real name is Peace Belema George), Eric de Red (real name Gambo) and Captain Trupence. Apart from the Rising Angel, then history student from the Okrika kingdom of the Ijaw country and later former project manager of IPCO International Limited, a Singaporean firm in Rivers State, little is known about the other two.
Some accounts claimed that the three founders of the Vikings were estranged members of the Sealord Association of Nigeria also called Buccaneers Association of Nigeria. Some of the secret codes of both groups are same. The Vikings tagged the University of Port Harcourt where it was founded with the following names, “Mother Deck,” “Victory Cossa” or “Alpha Marine Patrol”. Some writers claim that five persons founded the Vikings, and not three, and went ahead to add others like Shaka De Zulu and Bankana De Busha (not their real names, they are code names in vikinical terminologies). The two were not amongst the original founders, but the earlier initiates of the group after its establishment at the University.
Around four thirty p.m., they were still loading crates of Star and Heineken beers into the boat when another group of twelve young men arrived. They were led by a short young man, in his mid- thirties. He wore a neat black oversize bowler hat on his head, well-ironed fire trap shirt on strip trousers with a shiny Italian shoe. The guy really looked neat in his attire. One of his team members was holding a bloated black leather bag and walking in front of him. He had a small patch of goatee beard and his eyes were extremely red as if he had just finished smoking Indian hemp. He stood at the harbour and beckoned on the boat driver to come to him. I walked out of the place I was standing, to get closer to see what was happening.
The man brought out a photocopy of a typed letter and a wooden pen which looked like the tail of an Agama lizard. “Take, and act immediately so that you don’t have problems in the sea.” He handed the paper and pen to the boat manager who had arrived from his room too and said calmly. The letter was undated and riddled with errors. Part of it read, “Krikakiri community, Kula kingdom, Akuku-Toru L.G.A. Rivers State. This is to inform you that the Krika Kiri is about to do is community end of year party therefore you are ask to pay the sum of five thousand naira (N5,000.00) to assist the community”. The man put his name as chairman. The boat driver took the letter and gave to me that I should see what they go through on daily basis. I advised him to call the boat owner and inform him that he shouldn’t pay any money yet and should contact the boat owner. The young man heard me and asked what I said. I repeated it. He was mildly angry but was afraid of my size and did not know who I was. He kept his calm.
I knew the young man and even had his phone numbers. He stole glances at me like one he had met before but couldn’t recollect when and where we had met. I had met him in his community when he was a youth leader. I refused to remind him about where we had met, because I was upset with the whole drama of threat and extortion. The boat manager had contacted his boss, and approval given to pay the squad when another man appeared. He wore a pair of short and had a black t-shirt on with a black canvass. Had wide chest, very dark and had scabs of injury cuts on his face, head and other parts of his body. There were tiny scars on his lips – several years of smoking Indian hemp and other hard drugs had left indelible marks on his lips. He walked boldly to the “Krikakiri chairman” and stretched his hands and clawed his fingers firmly to that of the man like that of a swing crab. Looked straight into his eyes and yelled loudly, “Strike Chief”. After that, he took bottles of Heineken beer from a crate by the jetty side and smashed against one another. The bottles broke into pieces. The woman who owned the beer couldn’t say anything. She was frightened. “Hurry up and give the strike chief and his men the money let them go and enjoy”. He barked at the boat manager who had already brought out the money and was stretching his hand to give the man. One of the Krikakiri chairman’s boys collected the money and left for another extortion game in the port.
At intervals while at the harbour, fireworks would fly into the sky and burst like bomb or gunshots. Droves of white smoke from it roamed like insects filling the air. The manager was angry that the man we heard him addressing the “Strike Chief” destroyed the two bottles of Heineken.
“I didn’t destroy anything, I was only telling the water spirits that we remember them”, he said to him.
“I don’t like the way you destroy the poor woman property. She is a widow with five children”. The manager said angrily.
“Will you stop that?! Slave like you”, the man said, while his drug ravaged lips vibrated ceaselessly.
“I have warned you severally, don’t call me slave, I am not one”, growing more angrily, the manager cautioned.
It wasn’t up to fifteen minutes that the self-proclaimed Krikakiri chairman left with his coterie of boys. The manager was about returning to his room when the new man demanded for his own end of year party money. The absurd dramas that take place at commercial motor parks on land over money also take place at the harbours.
To be continued.
Naagbanton lives in Port Harcourt, Rivers State capital.
The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of SaharaReporters
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