LAGOS OCTOBER 3RD (NEWSRANGERS)-In journalism, you are taught to get to your assignment venue early. That was what I tried to do.
I went to Ikire, in Osun State, on Saturday September 26, to sleep over ahead of the CAC Pastors Conference and Annual Convention at CAC Alasepe, in a bid to get to the venue early on Sunday for the ordination of over 600 pastors.
I left Ibadan around 6:10 p.m. The road was free. I got to Naira and Kobo bus stop, Ikire, by 7:30p.m. It was already getting dark, and the town was busy.
I needed a commercial motorcyclist to take me into Ikire town to settle down, sleep over at a relative’s place and prepare for the assignment the next day.
I called a motor cyclist at Naira and Kobo. I told him, “Take me to a place called Store in Ikire.” He said okay and told me the fare was N1,000. Meanwhile, I had been told that transportation to the place costs between N300 and N400.
I told him I would pay N500. He insisted on N700. I said I would pay N500 and he said, “No problem.” But as soon as we moved, he said in Ikire dialect, “Madam, we cannot pass the front of motor park. Motor park boys have started their fight again this night.
“There is a serious crisis there. Let me pass through different streets.”
I thought it was normal. Ikire motor park crisis is not new. I had witnessed a fight there on Tuesday, when I went for the media press briefing of the CAC Supreme Council Annual Conference and Convention, which began on Monday. I also experienced a crisis around 2 p.m., when I was about to leave Ikire after my last assignment at Alasepe. I had to take a bike through different parts of the town before I could leave because of the motor park boys’ crisis. So, I believed him and said okay.
That okay almost cost me my freedom.
Instead of taking me straight to town, the bikeman started taking me through different routes wandering through streets on the outskirt of Ikire. He entered a street around Fatima School, and said he wanted to buy petrol and asked me to give him N500. I gave him and we left. After moving down the street, he said the fuel attendant only ripped off. He said he was sure the boy only collected the money and did not dispense fuel because he was busy. I agreed. He turned back and went there, only to tell me that the boy was no longer there. He said the boy might have intentionally left because of what he had done. I believed him and he left.
So he told me he would buy petrol at another filling station because he no longer trusted the previous one. I believed him again, and said okay. We later saw another station and I told him to buy fuel there since they were selling, but he said the fuel from the station is not always okay, and not well measured. He, then, went through another street behind a market, entered other streets I did not know because I am not familiar with the town, and then came out to a lonely street. It was a new site and we were getting close to what looked like a farmland. It was fast getting darker and lonelier.
I told him, “Oga, which place are you taking me to? I said Ikire town, not bush.”
He said: “I dey dodge the crisis. How much I collect that will cost me my life? If we passed that motor park side now, our lives will be at risk.”
After about 30 minutes of going through different streets, I realised we were just circling something akin to a vicious cycle, we had passed the same street with a roundabout twice. There was no crisis anywhere. The streets he was taking me through were silent, with no signs of any fight. No police, no crowd, no shouting. Just his bike and me.
When we got to the loneliest part, where there were just a few houses, bushes and a few uncompleted buildings, I became really scared. I am a woman alone, at night, on a bike in a town I don’t know well, with a bag containing my notepad, my phone and money.
I quickly brought out my phone and started calling my family member in Ikire, whose house I wanted to sleep over, to inform him that I had been kidnapped. I was on the call crying and screaming, telling him that the bike man had taken me to an unknown place in Ikire.
On the call, he asked me to ask the bike man where exactly we were in Ikire so they could seek help. I asked him, “Where are we? Where is this place in Ikire?”
He declined to answer. Instead, he turned to me and demanded that I give him my phone to talk to whoever I was calling.
That was when I knew I was in real danger. This was not about motor park boys. It was a plan.
I refused to give him the phone and started shouting, “Help me! Help me! I have been kidnapped by this bike man!”
He asked me if I thought I was strong enough to fight him there. He held my clothes and I held his pullover tight and started dragging him. In the struggle, he told me to stop making noise but I continued to shout for help. I realised he was also scared that someone might show up, so he would jump on his bike, move forward a bit and then turn back again.
At a point, he wanted to hit me with the bike. When I sensed that he was trying to hit me with the bike, I began to run in a zigzag manner on the road to confuse him. Honestly, he was frustrated and ready to hit me, snatch my phone and go away with it, but I don’t know how I got the strength to struggle with him.
Along the line, he jumped on his bike again, rode to the front and when he was about to turn back again in annoyance, he fell down with his bike. It took him about a minute before he could stand. By that time, I had run farther, screaming for help.
I shouted, “E gba mi o! E gba mi o!” and continued running until I got to the gate of a house where I started knocking continuously. They answered and sensed that the stranger coming must be in danger. They told me to come in. As I approached, I was breathing heavily and was told to calm down and explain what happened. I told them everything. By that time, he had sped off and disappeared into the dark.
There I met three men and a woman in the house. They said there was no crisis at the motor park that day at all. They said that is how some bike men deceive innocent people late at night to rob or injure them.
I then called my relative in Ikire and told him I was currently in Ajilo village, Ikire, and he came with a bike man. On their way to Ajilo village, something happened. My relative sighted a bike man who had parked as if he was waiting for someone or looking for somebody. He suspected him but was not sure he was the one, until he heard the evil bike man’s voice and said, “Yes, his voice sounds exactly like that of the person Rukiyat was struggling with while on call with me.” Immediately the bike man heard that, he knew he was in trouble and rode away.
After that, they came to pick me up while the people I ran to for safety also followed us back to Naira and Kobo to see if he could be sighted on the way, but alas, the bike man had disappeared into the streets where he claimed there was a crisis.
I eventually got home, but I did not sleep that night. I was shaking, still hearing his voice demanding my phone and money and saying “motor park crisis.”
On Sunday morning, I still went to CAC Alasepe and covered the convention. When the President, Pastor Henry Ojo, said in his sermon that without regular overhauling the church will become dead, and when the congregation was singing songs of praise, I danced with joy even though I am a Muslim. I danced with much joy in the church, thanking God that I did not die in Ikire on Saturday night. Indeed, it was a miraculous narrow escape!
My advice to everyone travelling to a place they are not really familiar with, especially, in the evening, is that they should be physically and psychologically at alert, avoid being carried away with phone calls or chats, and to avoid taking a random motorcycle alone at night. If possible avoid travelling late in night to a destiny you are not used to.
Always ask the people you want to meet in town to send you a known bike man in a bid to be more safer.
Nigeria Tribune
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