Onovo, what nonsense is this? by Achilleus-Chud Uchegbu

Policemen, doing what they know best. Photo Credit AP

I was in the east last week to attend the burial of Chief Thomas Nwosu. You won’t know him. He was laid to rest on Friday at his home in Iyioji, Akaeze in Ivo local government of Ebonyi state. Late Chief Nwosu is the father of our political editor, Iheanacho Nwosu. Returning to Akaeze brought me some nostalgic feeling. One, this is returning to a place I had been familiar with. A place I grew up as a kid. I did not live in Akaeze particularly, but living in Okposi and Ishiagu at different times. And these brought me close to Akaeze.

The first feeling of nostalgia hit me when the bus I was cramped into drove past Mile 2. There remains the old rail line. As students at St. Augustine in Ezzamgbo, my twin brother and I always returned to Ishiagu or Okposi, along with other school mates, aboard a train which takes off from Enugu terminal. Our decision to go by train was always to save money for the next term. This was in the early 1980’s. Here was I, almost 20 years after, seeing Mile 2 again. Same old place. Not much has changed just for the road which is now better and a PDP ward office close by.

As we approached Ayaragu, another nostalgic feeling came hitting me. I cast my mind back and remembered it is the same Ayaragu where my late dad maintained some farms. Despite being a policemen working at Ishiagu, my late dad refused to forget his talents as a farmer. He moved into Ayaragu and leased some farm lands which he worked on for his family. My eyes searched the road sides hoping to locate the exact farm where my brothers and I had joined our mother to weed. Yes, we went to farms during weekends and holidays. There was nothing else for us, the children, to do than farm. It was during this period that I perfected my farming strategies. Dad did so well in farming that many people in the area did not believe he was a policeman. From his farms, dad fed his family. Ayaragu was impactful in our lives.

However, travelling on that road from Okigwe to Akaeze left me with another reality. I had read reports of police checkpoints littering southeast. But here was I, cramped into a Toyota Hiace bus, thinking of my friend and how he felt returning his father to mother earth –the same function all man must perform- and at the same time, struggling to take count of every other detail on the road. To my surprise, I counted only two police check points on the long stretch of road between Okigwe and Akaeze. One point was somewhere in Uturu, hidden between the hills and cashew plantation. And another somewhere near Ayaragu. That’s all. And I noticed that the road is so lonely that a first timer would be scared stiff. Anyway, traffic on the road is not a huge. Returning from Akaeze, the road block had thinned down to just one.

At this particular road block, I found something different from the stories we hear of our policemen. None of the policemen at the checkpoint asked the driver of the taxi we were driving in for any money. They also did not do anything suggesting they wanted it. If they hid their intention, well, that is kudos to them for behaving. The policemen only wanted to know the contents of the jerry cans our driver was carrying. When told they were empty, they inquired to know if the young man sleeping hopelessly in the back seat of the taxi was alive. One of us in the car touched him and he responded. We were asked to ‘carry on”.

My experience here left me thinking that the police had rebranded and that somehow, Dora Akunyili’s message was hitting home. I was dead wrong. The reality unveiled itself on the Owerri-Aba road.

Owerri-Aba road is simply notorious. Not for armed robbery operations, but for police operations. I had cause to run into, and out, of Aba during this trip. As I boarded another bus in Owerri, a 16 seater bus, I did not know that something awaited my curiosity. First, getting out of Owerri on the Owerri-Aba road was a nightmare. I was told it is always like that. Not a fault of bad road. I noticed that reckless driving and bad road behaviour cost people several hours to enter or exit Owerri. It was a painful experience I just had to endure because a scheduled appointment must be respected.

But that was not the source of my concern. As we progressed to Aba, I maintained a count. I counted 17 check points on that stretch of road between Owerri and Aba. These are 17 toll gates. They could also be 17 cash points. As I counted, I noticed that it is not only the regular police team that you have on that road. There were Anti riot police teams (Mobile police); there were the Anti Terrorism Squad, there were Federal Highway patrol and regular policemen assisted by soldiers. At some points, you have operatives of the Federal Road Safety Commission commissioning cash out of vehicle drivers.

Curiously, of these 17 check points, 10 are located between Osisioma on the Aba-Port Harcourt expressway and Owerrinta (Imo/Abia boundary). I just could not believe that I had counted 10 check points in about 20 minutes drive. I am not sure that Rwanda, even during its war, was so policed. Since the bus I was travelling in was stopped at every of these check points, I took more interest in what transpires between the men at the check points and the bus driver. Only one form of transaction took place: cash transaction. At these check points, money changed ownership.

Each time the bus driver was stopped, he parted with N20. Most of the time, he had no N20 to part with as we all paid in higher denominations. But that was not a problem. The policemen or anti terrorism squad or soldiers or mobile policemen, who ever was collecting the money, always gave the drive his change if he presented a higher denomination. At a point, our bus driver had to park on the road while awaiting his change from the policeman. He got it. As we parked, I watched and observed that no bus driver gave more than N20. So, to my mind, N20 was the standard fee. The Anti Terrorism squad team refused to collect theirs from the point of stoppage. They bring the bus drive to a complete parking position and ask him to “see the person wey dey inside our motor”.

All through the trip to and fro Aba, I did not see any private cars being checked. I did not see any car booth or bonnet being examined. I did not see any passengers being asked to identify themselves. I did not see any form of checking. This indicates that terrorists and kidnappers can go through these points undetected. Even stolen cars can drive through.

An interesting aspect of the toll collection is that it is like a MUST rule for every commercial vehicle operator. Those who refuse to pay are parked by the roadside until they comply. For instance, the bus driver I was travelling in was so fed up that he pleaded with operatives at one check point to allow him one free passage. Instead, he got a “park there” order. He obliged and had to secure his right to continue after he had gone back to drop. Each time our bus driver paid, the first thing I did was to look at his face. He was becoming increasingly angry. Each check point made him angrier. I only prayed that his anger is not transferred.

The driver could transfer his anger in different ways, He could forget to apply his breaks where there is need to do so. He could refuse to stop at the next check point not minding that those guns have live bullets in them. He could also transfer his anger by fighting a passenger who debates how much the fare is. I paid N250 on my way to Aba from Owerri but paid N300 to return same day. When I asked the bus driver why I had to pay N300 to return to Owerri, his response was an angry “you no see those check points?’ Is this also reason bus accident is high on the route?

A simple arithmetic here. With 16 passengers paying N300 each, the driver rakes in N4800. He dishes out N340 on each trip. This is regardless of the fact that he mandatorily gives the cost of two seats to the numerous unions existing in the motor parks. If the driver makes 10 trips between Owerri and Aba, he would have lost N3400 to the entire check points on the road. This is from just one bus. Now consider this against the background that Owerri-Aba road is one of the busiest in the east because of Aba’s strategic position as a center of commerce. It is killing. Policemen in the east farm, but only on the roads.