May 25, 2016
It was like a jigsaw puzzle and the pieces have not quite fallen into their places.
When I came out of my house as early as 8:00 a.m. in the morning to load my luggage into my car and start the long drive from Katsina to Gombe, a distance of about 550 kilometers, you won't believe what I saw.
A girl was squatting just by the door side...yes, a girl...a girl with a bag and a handbag just by her side, as if she was waiting to go with me. She was tall, light, and well dressed. She was in her mid-twenties and wearing a yellow lace wrapper, a blouse and a head tie of the same material with a matching orange transparent veil.
I thought she came to see my wife, so I told her to go and sit in the sitting room and wait while I drop my bags into the car. I went back into my house and told my wife she had a visitor. My wife came and looked at her enquiringly. She then began to narrate her story.
She claimed that she came from Azare, Bauchi state, to visit her elder sister, who recently got married and joined her husband in Katsina. That she arrived Katsina the previous day and was unable to locate the house because her brother-in-law's phone could not be reached. To compound matters, her phone had fallen and the screen shattered, so even though she couldn't call, she could be called. And so, she had to spend the night at the motor park, sitting on a bench provided by a sympathetic old security guard. She said when she started the journey, she had been in constant touch with the brother-in-law up to the time she reached Kano.
Several things went through my mind as I listened to her story: could this be a hoax? 419? Could she be a Boko Haram suicide bomber? I again looked at her earnest and innocent looking worried face. I then looked at her bag, wondering whether it was holding a bomb. I wanted to help, but I was slightly apprehensive and sceptical. I decided to probe further, but we gave her food to eat first. I asked so many questions and her story began to take shape.
She claimed to have been born and raised in Makkah, Saudi Arabia, where she completed her primary and secondary education. That she came to Nigeria for the first time three years ago to stay with her father and try to further her education. Her mother, a Somalian, who is no longer married to her father was still living in Saudi Arabia. Her father, according to her is a Nigerien, but lives and works in Azare, as an agricultural worker. But she didn't know whether he was a federal or state worker. How he managed to secure a government work in Nigeria even though he was a Niger nationale, she couldn't say. That her sister that she came to visit in Katsina didn't have a phone even though she was a Bayero University (BUK), Kano graduate. According to her, by tradition, her parents did not allow their daughter to go to her husband's house with a phone, that if the husband wanted his wife to have a phone he should buy one for her. And she couldn't say whether her brother-in-law was a public or private worker. She didn't even know his second name, either.
After listening to her story, I wanted to help, but I didn't want to leave her with my family, in case she was up to no good. And I was in a hurry to start my long journey. So I asked her how she wanted us to help her.
She said since she couldn't trace the house she wanted to go back to Azare but she had no money. She would be grateful if I gave her enough money to take her back home. I again looked at her and wondered if it was a ruse to get money out of me and then go and swindle another person.
Such things happen these days. She could even be from another part of Katsina for all I know. But her peculiar Hausa accent didn't suggest that.
So I told her that if she really was going back to Azare she had to pass through Kano. And as I was going to Gombe through Kano, I could drop her in Kano and give her transport fare to Azare, and she agreed. My wife looked at her and said, "And don't try any tricks to harm my husband!" My wife then called my daughters and told them to snap her picture, just in case.
As we came out to enter the car, she attempted to seat at the back seat, probably in an attempt not to offend my wife. But I told her to seat in the front where I could see her every move. My wife looked at me, but didn't say anything.
That was how I drove to Kano, very alert. My wife kept on calling me and asking me to pray. Luckily I dropped her in Kano without any incidence.
That is the story and you can draw your own conclusion.