THE GIRL WHO ‘GBAA’ED, AND ‘THAT GROUP’ STORY

The only thing more annoying than long queues is joining one. It was during one of such frustrating moments that a very nice young lady walked up to me and asked,

“Did you came before me?”

I stared at her as if to ask, “Did I WHAT?”

I only gave a half smile and allowed her to have her way in the queue, while in my head, I laughed out loud. Having treated my mind to a good laugh, I continued reading the news headlines and sharing opinions on each social or political issues to myself before she had interrupted me with her grammatical incompetence. Afriyie Acquah slaps wife with divorce; she should be thankful he didn’t slap her with his bare hands. KNUST graduate joins ISIS, the headlines read. I was taken aback immediately. ISIS? If only people knew how dreadful that group is, they wouldn’t call it ISIS. They should just call it That Group.

The operations and objectives of That Group is so destructive that I would rather die in my crush’s friendzone than talk about it. Perhaps the only description I can give about That Group (that would put me and my sixty-something year old father on a safer side) is that, they are a group of brainwashed Islamists who are so extreme in their practices and doctrines, some of which beat intellectual analysis. What kind of doctrine endorses manslaughter, racism, rape amongst others? This kind of extremism is so extreme that, it would need the extreme use of extreme understanding to get to the extreme bottom of this. And extremism, is very dangerous.

Why would handsome Nazir join That Group? It was then that I looked at it from another perspective and realized there could be more. First of all, we are in Ghana. Wasn’t it this same Ghana that a certain graduate had to break security protocol just to submit a (common) CV to the first lady? Isn’t it this same Ghana that girls are more favored than their male counterparts in the job market just because they (the girls) are endowed with soft protruding features which in some cases give them competitive advantage? Isn’t it this same Ghana that people have to bribe their way into job securements? Isn’t it this same Ghana that a certain entity is sending thousand university graduates (who have toiled real hard to successfully make it out of the tertiary system) to go and direct traffic for a whole year after which they would be practically jobless because some smart person who didn’t collapse while studying in the Balme or UCC or KNUST library would be coming to replace them at the traffic post? I can’t even imagine how directing traffic for about a whole year makes one any innovative for the job market.

Isn’t it this same Ghana that has lots of young people with brilliant ideas, but because of financing among other factors, have nothing but big dreams and would resort to teaching primary schools in order to make some cedi in the right way? Isn’t it this same Ghana that prices of fuel keep going higher like StoneBwoy’s music career? Isn’t it this same Ghana that boys must engage in fraud or sakawa to be at peace with their demanding girlfriends? What else would unemployed people do apart from feeding their minds with all sorts of things from the internet and then later on hope that the countless job applications they’ve submitted would be given due consideration?

One reason why I believed President Mahama John won last elections was because he appealed to the youth population in every manner. Because he was far younger (I doubt if he still is) than Nana Akuffo Addo, we believed he would understand the concerns of the youth with less difficulty. Do you remember how he used to dance ‘azonto’ at some point, and how he spoke to the youth issues? Then one day, long after he had won the elections, he said our destinies are in our own hands. Our destinies are in our own hands yet ECG and NSS are toying with them for a while. Well, since Nazir’s destiny is also in his own hands, he decides to join That Group! The moment Nazir agreed with himself that the kind of destiny our president was talking about can’t be realized on earth, he decided to pursue the one that can be realized in the afterlife. That’s one hell of a destiny you know. And now, the one word that shadows everybody else’s destiny is fear; the fear of That Group.

-         TONY AFUTI EYRAM,

KNUST.

A LETTER TO MY UNBORN DAUGHTER.

Dear Akpene,

Before I use the usual format of 'I am very happy to write you this letter', let me quickly apologize for the name I chose to give you. Well, it wouldn't make sense to readers but to you, to be born in this era and be tagged with such an indigenous Ewe name which would be competing with names like Serene, North West, Oneisha, June-March, Blue Ivy, May Flower, Miss Anthrope and the likes, I think you deserve every bit of my apology. But you should be thankful (as your name implies) that I didn't drink any of those things some parents drunk and then decided to name their kids, Jesus is Lord, Power In the Blood, Agbodzalu, Ekomba, Agbedefu, and co. I still remember the shocking look I gave your grandfather when he suggested a middle name for me.

"Henceforth, add Aglobi when writing your name," he had said.

"So my name would be Tony Aglobi Afuti?" I asked, with shocked face, hoping his response would be negative.

"Yes," he affirmed.                           

After a short while of discontenting silence which he noticed, he added;

"Or you don't like the name?"

His question was more surprising than the name. Your grandfather used to be type who didn't take suggestions. Anytime he asked for suggestions, it wouldn't be considered anyways so we just allowed him to decide for us. Mostly, his decisions were best for us and saved us the headache of indecision. Look at the middle name he suggested;

"How about Eyram, or Seyram?"

"I prefer Eyram," I quickly chipped in before he changed the idea of allowing me influence the middle name he was going to give me. And that was how I escaped having a thunderous Ewe name. Even with that, if I was to get a dollar for the number of times people had spelt my surname wrong, I would be a millionaire.

As you haven't been born yet, I'm just writing this letter to gist you on a few occurrences to expect when you come. I would start with the usual issues. Oh yes! Dumsor hasn't stopped. It hasn't ohh! On the day you come out of your mother's womb and you see midwives holding torchlights and phones, it isn't a photo-shoot okay. That's how things are done out here. Yes, I remember telling you about Yvonne Nelson's #DumsorMustStop campaign. Hmmm. The campaign didn't change anything ohh. It only infuriated the Ga gods to murder one hundred and fifty-eight (158) innocent people (excluding Justin Beiber- oh how?). Where were the Ga gods when the kwashey boy took my laptop, money and phone? Where were the Ga gods when people where dumping things in the gutters? Where are the Ga gods when elected representatives turn parliamentary sessions to nap sessions? Where were the Ga gods when some people are looting (and others are rooting)? Where were the Ga gods when I got laid-off at work? Where were the Ga gods when that pot-bellied married man convinced (without words) one of your prospective mothers away from my grab? Where were the Ga gods when another of your prospective mothers told me I was like a brother to her? Honestly Akpene, I know I am a brother to only one girl, and that's your Aunty. I've never asked her out on a date before. What then is the correlation between being like a brother and let's go out on a date? You see some of the things that gets me annoyed.

Well, if that is how the beautiful girls in modern times do it, then I guess I wont have a problem with you replicating it on the male population that would constantly be on your neck to take you out. It would only mean I'm going to have more sons than I can imagine.

In other news, a twenty two year old girl (a student of Kwame Nkrumah's dearest Institution) won the primaries and is likely to go to parliament next year. She is parliament-bound. Even if it is Barack Obama who contests against her, she would still win the elections. There's absolutely no chance of a non-NPP candidate winning in her constituency. And yes! She's twenty-two. That's a great achievement for all young people. At twenty-two, I won several trophies with Real Madrid on FIFA. You see, at least I achieved something; unlike some people who are twenty-two and are just sitting there 'procrasturbating'.

WAEC cancelled BECE results because they leaked. You see, the education system too has its issues. Exams has been leaking (e no be today). There is no credibility anywhere. And who should be blamed? You would come out to meet an environment where exams (and Mondays) is everybody's nightmare. Why won't we want to cheat? WAEC should cancel it and even cancel Fathers' day and Mothers' day!

Akpene, Fathers' day came oh! And it didn't come alone. It came with more controversies than Wanlov Kubolor has caused in his entire life. They say (some) fathers are irresponsible and stuff. I wouldn't want to delve into that now. Just like I keep encouraging myself that someday, my chest and arms and shoulders would be like Terry Crews', I would admonish you to stay calm, and do enough training for the race you would be racing against a million other Akpenes.

Till then, bye for now.

-Your father,

Tony Afuti Eyram.

FLOODING: Who should I blame? My dead grandmother?

Everybody got problems. I’ve got ninety-nine, but I would just take this teaspoon and stir my cup of rice-water, drink it cautiously (because of my deteriorating dental issues), after which I would cover myself with these sheets ostensibly to enjoy the cold weather and hope someway somehow, the rains would stop. The weather’s got all the power to give the shower, but it’s been pouring heavily for over an hour, and soon, ECG would take the power. I could hear people scooping out the rain water that was creeping into their rooms. Every time the place floods, someway somehow, I’m never live at the scene. But fate had other plans this time. It was when my mind stopped giving me pleasing accounts of how I had turned my joblessness into romantic moments with my new catch that I asked myself, “is that water?” “Tony, Tony! Sↄriooo! Nsuo nu bawodem hↄ!!” My landlady (I would explain later) called out that same moment. I jumped out of myreverie, got my yellow shorts on, and jumped into action.


I scooped, and scooped; praying the water level would go down a bit. But the rains wouldn’t stop. The sight of my old landlady, her daughter and fellow tenants scooping made me feel like I was Jonah. I asked God to forgive me for a certain sin I had committed the previous evening. Close to an hour after saying that prayer, the rain ceased. Three to four hours later, we were done fetching all the water out, and we returned to our rooms to count our (wet) losses. When you pray for rain, be prepared for mud (and in places like Circle, Teshie, Ashiaman, and my hood, be prepared for flood). Forget about the ‘mayweather’, this is the ‘Juneweather’ and yearly, we make noise about floods, and a month or so after the floods, we forget the devastating effects it had on us, until it comes again, then we start scooping out, our leaders (wear jeans and black t-shirts) and start promising, Ghana Fire Service and NADMO become baffled, sirens blare, Korle Bu becomes full,  fuel containers explode, people drown, lose their belongings, lives (and virginities), electricity poles catch fire, ‘kwashey’ and sakawa boys return home because water may be creeping into their ghettos, Ashiamantrotro drivers wonder if it was a good decision to go on strike since water would’ve entered the engines of their vehicles and money to fix them would be another headache. Nothing is more disheartening than the fact that the waakye seller wouldn’t come to work the next day because she spent all-night saving her cooking pots from being carried away by the raging water.


So who should we blame? If not our leaders, then who? My late grandmother? You must be joking! Nobody prevented nobody from dismantling my property that was in a waterway. All I wanted was appropriate compensation. If you demolish my structure (mostly done without notice), where do you expect me to spend the night? In my grandmother’s grave? What have you done to stop those who wouldn’t stop polluting the drainage system? How about covering it? How about making more underground drainages? How would I dump rubbish in an underground drainage? Stop blaming me for your inability to be creative in seeking solutions to the problems you’ve been elected (or appointed) to solve.You said we should do Sanitation Day, we obeyed. That’s rather a short-term thing. How about your long-term goals? It is about time these suit-wearing and SUV-driving people we call leaders leave Legon girls alone and think about how to solve problems. We put you there to solve problems. So that when we come back from selling our yoghurt, and carrying the ‘kponkpos’, and other places of work, there should be electricity, armed robbers wouldn’t trouble our peace, and when our undergraduate kids leave school, they would get some sort of ‘nokofioo’ employment to hold on to.


It is just the rains and see what’s happening. Can you imagine what it would’ve looked like had these floods been caused by tsunamis, snowmelts, dam breakdowns, unusual high tides amongst others? What’s happening to our Meteorological Service? If salaries were unpaid, they would’ve been on strike. But they can’t sensitize us on the imminence of bad weather, and constantly remind this forgetful government on the need to appropriately prepare for the heavy rains.


We have monies to pay judgment debts, undertake questionable projects, and bid to host sport tournaments, yet we can’t build dams, weirs, and series of reservoirs and canals that would solely serve for the purposes of flood control.When South Korea has spent over 18billion USD to completely solve the problem of flooding, what have we put in place? When Korea spent that much in four years to build sixteen weirs, creating artificial wetlands and ecological waterways, a section of us down here just prays, another section loots, another promises (and then promises to stop promising when the going gets tough and the promises don’t look promising), another turn the lights off and on every second, another is searching for acid to attack another, another is laying off another, and at the end of the year, the same issues appear before us again.


What do we use our (if we even have any) technology for? And Kwame Nkrumah’s dearest institutions are producing students with ‘memorized knowledge’ instead of making us have the benefit of practical knowledge. Dear KNUST students, let’s go beyond solar traffic lights (though it’s remarkable) and designing ‘dumsor’ android applications, and doing sextapes,and exploit technology to make our existence easier. Life’s hard; it’s harder when you don’t learn from past mistakes.


Oh wait! My lights went out!!


TONY AFUTI EYRAM,
KNUST.