A Collection of Short Stories

Fourteen Years
Bankole Banjo
“…to do as told, to defend as needed, to fight, to die, to kill, to protect, whatever it
may cost me, even the ultimate price, to defend the honour of the Hyenas worldwide.”
At the sighting of them, congregants seated close to the exit sprang up in frenzy and
pandemonium ensued. Soon, the hysteria spreads across the massive cathedral like a fierce
tidal wave. Horror had come to church.
*
He hears the familiar chant from afar. It is something from his past, from a dark corner of his life
he never wants to relive. He sees them as he turns sharply towards the exit. They look like a
Nollywood version of The Expendables: purple bandanas draped securely across prominent
foreheads, taut biceps encased in snug black T-shirts. They look exactly the way he must
have looked that Friday afternoon fourteen years ago.
*
Akeem became the Amir of the Muslim Students’ Society, Federal University of Lagos in the
latter part of 2002. Smallish and whippet-thin with a brush of goatee on a narrow face, the
Amir was respected by his ummah but fiercely avoided by the rest of the student populace
due to his aggressive views on campus gangsterism. Sermon after sermon, he berated the evil
and swore that given the chance he would do everything within his powers to rid the tertiary
institution of the menace. That vehement commitment had compelled him into the student
union, where he was eventually elected President of the Students’ Union Government; thanks
to the massive support of his course mates in Mass Communication –the largest department
on campus- and the Muslim student society. It was then they began to call him Alfa Aluta. He
couldn’t have asked for a better nickname.
Alfa Aluta went after known and suspected cultists with cutthroat ferocity. Many were arrested,
some were dismissed from school while others faced legal prosecution and ended up behind
bars. Many more were forced to publicly denounce their membership. In one semester, the
university was purged. Fellow students cheered him on and the authorities applauded his
quest. He became a hero.
46
Tales from the Other Side