Skip to main content

Nok, Jos To The Tafawa Belewa’s Tomb (III) By Patrick Naagbanton

August 25, 2014

We passed Kwoi town, headquarters of the Jaba LGA. We got to Sambon Gida where massive hills spread closer to the roadside.

There was a sign along the road, “Farewell from Sambon Gida”. On both sides of the land ahead were pieces of rocks scattered on nearby farmlands. We got to a junction before Fadan – Kogoma town where women and children were hawking boiled corn and water in wrapped white polythene bags called “pure water”.

There was a rickety commercial bus in front of us. The bus vibrated from one side of the road to another, and released clouds of white smokes from its equally broken-down exhaust pipe. The deadly smoke surged into our car.

We passed through the Fulani camps, Fido, and Baira settlements. These villages have tall trees and rocks, which grasses grew on. Some parts of the area had ginger and maize farms.

Towards the end of the Jaba Road connecting the Kagoro – Kafanchan Road, the driver reduced his speed. Two bare-bodied young men were digging sand from both sides of the road to fill holes on the road. Occasionally they knelt in the middle of the road, with their two hands held firmly to their shovels raised in the air, begging any vehicle travelling through to give them alms.

About six minutes after that point was another military checkpoint. There was a huge sign which read “Military Checkpoint Slow Down”.

On the right hand side a filling (fuel) station, Bonlake Nigeria Limited and beside it was a huge picture of President Goodluck Jonathan and his deputy,  Namadi  Sambo, smiling. Under the pictures was an inscription reading “Mandate 2015”.

We arrived at the popular railway town of Kafanchan about ten minutes before 12.00 pm. Kafanchan is located in the Jema’a LGA. As I noticed that we were in Kafanchan I burst into an uncontrollable laughter. The driver turned to me and said loudly, “Oga, the millions of naira you were expecting have hit your account?” Still trembling with laughter, I nodded my head without saying a word. Everybody in the car was interested to hear the news. I recalled how I watched one of those comical Nollywood movies featuring Sam Loco Efe, Nkem Owoh, popularly called Osuofia, and Charles Inojie. In the movie, the actors were at a place in a village, arguing seriously about where is the location of Kafanchan town. Two of them said Kafanchan in Europe and one said the place is in Kaduna State in Nigeria.

Image
Sky-blue Opel Vectra car mentioned in the article, carrying 2 women in the booth along the Maraba-Kubacha junction, Kaduna.

In the film, a final year female student of the History and International Relations department from one of Nigeria’s government-owned top universities was passing by, and was called to settle the Kafanchan controversy. Unfortunately, the student didn’t know where Kafanchan is located. She said that Kafanchan was in Europe and that their professor taught them that in a course on Nigerian history.  The two characters who were of the opinion that Kafanchan is in Europe went on wild jubilation after the girl’s incorrect answer. Though is satiric, the movie is a sad commentary on the fall of Nigeria’s educational system. After telling the passengers the film story, everybody laughed.

Tension hangs over Kafanchan too. Some 28 years ago, members of the Muslim Students Society (MSS) were said to have attacked some of their Christian counterparts at the College of Education in the town.

There were reprisal attacks which swept throughout the entire area and extended to Zaria, the Kaduna border town on its north and up to Katsina and its environs. Several persons were killed and properties destroyed.

Since then, the town witnesses frequent outbreaks of ethnic and religious-induced conflicts that usually lead to killings. There are the Kaninkon and Fanstuwn tribes in Kafanchan, and there are also Igbos, Yoruba, Hausa, Fulani and others who live with the indigenous population.

Patrick Ibrahim Yakowa, the governor of Kaduna who died in Bayelsa State about three years ago, hailed from the Fadan Kogoma community in the Jama’a LGA.

The major military checkpoint we passed on the road is situated beside a major Coca-Cola depot. There were the usual sand bags where vehicles moved through slowly and those on the commercial motorcycles were asked to come down and walk slowly through under the watchful eyes of the soldiers.

We passed by the College of Nursing on the left. There were also billboards of Nenadi Esther Usman, who is currently representing the Kaduna South Senatorial district. The Usman billboards announced that she was re-contesting for the position. The senator’s husband, a former secretary to the Kaduna State government, was reportedly shot sometime ago over land dispute.

After the Jama’a LGA we entered the Kaura LGA. Another village dog crossed the road again ahead of us. The driver laughed noisily, “They have come again oooooo”. Some passengers who were already falling asleep had woken up due to the driver’s “noise”.

We headed eastwards and met another major military checkpoint with lots of sandbags pilled on one another with metal drums filled with sand painted in Nigerian army colours (red, dark and blue). Before the checkpoint there is a drinking joint with a metal board with the inscription: “New American Joint”.

I asked the driver what they do there. He laughed and said is a place of enjoyment. I inquired further. He explained that they sell chilled beer and all sorts of both soft and hot drinks, with bush and cow meat pepper soup.

He said further that Americans like enjoyment and that he likes Americans and is why the restaurant is called the New American Joint. I asked him whether he has been to America.  He said that he has not been there, but is part of his dream to go to America.

I laughed lightly and he looked at me and asked, “Are Americans good people? Have you been there? I nodded my head in affirmation to that. I said that the people are good and hardworking and their country is also nice. I told him we can make Nigeria great and beautiful like America and other places around the world, and Nigeria is a beautiful country too. He laughed suspiciously and didn’t say anything to that again.

It was about ten minutes after 12.00 p.m. and we were racing towards the Kogun area. Both sides of the road were covered by rich grasslands and hills overgrown with equally rich vegetation, and even in between the legs of the hills was such rich vegetation too.

There were tall young girls, some under-aged, some just around adult age. They wore several colours of blouse. The blouses were too tight for them. They also tied same colours of wrappers on the waists and around their heads. They had several sizes of metal trays, basins and bags on their heads.

The trays contained cooked African pears and fried plantain chips, ripe banana, and bags of water. They were running after any vehicle passing through the small road.

We passed the Kogun area, entered the Kagoro road, heading towards the road that runs by the Twari Sambo Model School; when rain started falling again.

We travelled on the road until we got to a checkpoint where Highway Patrol Police team had raised a checkpoint. One of the police officers, a tall man stopped our vehicle and asked the driver to come out, though he was very polite. The driver left his seat and walked to the back to see him. The driver returned about half a minute to the car. The police walked to see the driver, but the driver said in low tone, “officer, nothing”. The officer looked a bit worried, and asked “Nothing?”

“Yes, I swear”, the driver replied, “Okay, go,” said the police officer.

We kept on our eastward movement into the straight Jos Road. On both sides are massive hills and seductive grasslands. Dark clouds descended from the unhappy skies and sat on the topmost of the rocks.

We entered the Riyom LGA, the border between Kaduna and Plateau States. There were several signs saying “Slow Down, Bumps on the Road”.

We moved to a military checkpoint where two under-aged male children who wore only pants-no shirts, were walking slowly along the road with small native hoe on their shoulders. They were returning from a farm.

At the military checkpoint were signs saying, “STF” (“Special Task Force”). A soldier at the checkpoint waved his right hand at us with his rifle in his left hand and smiled. He told us “Welcome” in Hausa, and pulled out two Christian tracts from his side pocket and gave one to the driver and another one to me. I thanked him.

On the tract was, “The Gospel of Jesus Christ – the light of the world”. The document was produced by the Revival Movement Association.

After the military checkpoint was a small bridge, and scores of villagers returning from the farms were passing by the checkpoint. There was a small bridge ahead, and a young man carrying a big mutilated dead rabbit stood at the foot of it. Blood was flowing from an open wound on its neck like water from a broken tap. The young man, who wore a worn brown T-shirt, which was stained with the blood from the rabbit, waved it at us. “Buyoooo, bush meat” he shouted severally. I waved my right hand through the car window on my right hand side at him and he laughed deeply like the driver. 

Plateau State is part of the north-central geo-political zone which sometimes called the Middle Belt. Other states of the region are Benue, Kogi, Kwara, Nasarawa, Niger, and Federal Capital Territory (FCT) – Abuja.

During British rule in Nigeria, under the indirect rule system of local administration, the present day Plateau State used to be administered as part of the old Bauchi province before the colonial provincial reforms of 1926. The reforms took Plateau from Bauchi province (both provinces became separated).

As tension loomed ahead of the Biafran-Nigeria civil war, on  May 5, 1967, the then-military regime led by General Yakubo Gowon announced the creation of 12 states. Benue – Plateau was one of the states created. On February 3,1976, Plateau State was taken out of Benue State by the Murtala Mohammed military government. He was killed in a failed coup attempt ten days after Plateau State was created. Both states (Plateau and Benue) became separate states. In 1996, the regime of General Sani Abacha took away Nassarawa State from Plateau State. 

The Riyom LGA was just like the Kaura LGA in Kaduna State we travelled through; the road is full of green fields which seem to have no end. The Riyom area has very large and tall rock formations. Mostly, three tribes occupy the area. They are the Berom, Gana Wuri, and Fulani. There have been frequent violent clashes between both the  Berom and the Gana Wuri farmers or and the Fulani herdsmen. The pleasant Riyom light breeze cleaned my body, and tossed the green grasses along the road gently.

Some ten minutes before one p.m., travelling north-east on the Riyom – Jos Road we passed a village where I saw few donkeys grazing on a nearby field.

I asked the driver about the donkeys. He said, “The people in this village eat donkey”. His response was in a way criticizing the villagers for using donkey as food. I defended the villagers and said that there is nothing wrong with using donkey as food. 

Some two seconds after, rain started falling again, but women on the farms refused to leave, rather they were still busy working. We drove through the road which ran between tall hills. We were around a massive yard of the PW construction, a civil engineering firm along the road. Some few meters away, were small houses constructed with red-coloured clay soil and roofed with rusty corrugated iron sheets.

The rain continued to fall, increasing its rhythm until we got to Turu in the Jos South L.G.A. The driver was such an experienced and careful driver, he reduced his speed due to the rain. I was terribly hungry. I pleaded with the driver and other passengers to stop at Turu junction so that I could buy something to eat. They accepted and the car stopped. I jumped out.

I walked to a place by the roadside where three male children gathered around a disused metal basin. The basin was filled with charcoal burning, a small four-sided rusty iron was placed on it, on top was fresh corn being roasted.  We negotiated the price in pidgin and I bought seven pieces of corn for three hundred and fifty naira (about two dollars) from them. I also entered a nearby small shop and bought seven small bottles of water.

When I got to the car, I hand over an ear of corn and a bottle of water to each passenger, which they all accepted; except one light-skinned, quiet Fulani man. He was observing his Ramadan fast, so I had two.

Ramadan is an annual fasting ritual for Muslims to deepen their spirituality. The fasting differs; it depends actually when the moon is sighted according to the Islamic calendar.

I ate the rows of the roasted corn kernels hungrily without chewing them properly and when it finished; I nearly ate up the corncobs.

The two small bottles of water were not enough for me either.  I finished the meal and looked at the driver who had devoured his own minutes ahead of me. The lady behind him and others were taking their time to eat theirs.

As the beauty at the back of the driver finished hers, she cast a romantic smile at me “Thank you, my sweet, you are so caring a man”, she said, “That first time I saw you I was afraid. I thought you were a cultist, and I didn’t like the phone you are using. Please for my sake can you change it?”

I laughed lightly, and responded to her, “Well; if you buy me one I will accept it, but not your expensive one. We all have thoughts about different persons and groups at every time. Sometimes those things we think about people are not correct”, I said. “You see the way I responded to the driver when go to that village and he spoke in a way that eating donkey is bad”.

The driver smiled again and said, “I told you that this man (referring to this writer) is a candidate for heaven”. Some passengers laughed again.

The lady at the back, whose fare I paid because she kindly got up from her seat for me also spoke, “I am from Abia State. Of the fifty-two years of my life, I have spent 42 years in several parts of the north”, she said, “I tell you Nigeria will not divide, God knows why we are together. The north is the best place to live. I have my house there and don’t have anything elsewhere. The people are better than our people. All these crises will soon be over”.

Naagbanton lives in Port Harcourt, Rivers State capital, Nigeria.

To be continued.