Twist A Story of a Motorcyclist Chukwuemerie Udekwe   © Copyright 2023 by Chukwuemerie Udekwe

Photo of the author.

I am a man with a wife and three kids. I was married for three years. And though being a man has never been easy, I have always sought the best for both my wife and children with whatever I have been able to squeeze out of my motorcycle business. We are a happy family. We eat three square meals a day. We enjoy reasonable shelter and clothing too. Because I have been in this business for five years, I have come to harbour a special affinity for my Carter motorcycle. Following the principle of negritude, which otherwise suggests only feelings for Africa, I have sometimes wondered if I would be able to abandon my Carter motorcycle for a better job, if any ever comes. But I shrugged off that thought immediately. I do not want to believe it was my fate and birthright to be a motorcyclist forever. I, too, should love growth. I, too, should love luxury.

When I began this business five years ago, it was like a bogeyman had taken all the vicissitudes of life and smeared them on my face. No, my very soul. But from the start, I had always known it would not be an easy job. Moreover, I had always tried to convince myself that I was going to find a better job the next month—for five years now.

In my tertiary days at Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Awka, I always tried to avoid the bad guys. I had heard that most cultists never graduate, so I did all I could to alienate myself from them. These and many more were things I did so I could make it in life. I studied so hard. And I know that it was the fault of one particular lecturer that I did not make it to a first-class result. He was so wicked that no matter what you wrote, he would never give you an A, and your GPA would roll down. He demanded that I lobby him with some money. I refused. So he gave me D. It was a course consisting of three credits.

Yet, when I look back at all my efforts—the clubs I refused to go to, the mid-night candles I spent, and many more—I feel some sense of pride. The pride of a man who knows his purpose in the world and is determined to achieve it. But now, I really do not know the terms with which to differentiate myself from those cult guys who tried to make things harder for me. It is my fifth year out of school, and I am still a motorcyclist. To me, it is the feat of an average cult boy. Only my conscious mind still believes I was never a member. How else could I prove it?

I have made all possible efforts to manage things and get the most out of my situation. Yes, I have to praise myself now. Or how else was I able to marry, beget children, enrol them in school, and still take good care of them?

This is a feat I should, at least, take pride in. But now my tears have drenched my clothes. For the past week, I have refused to speak to my wife. My children think Daddy has changed. But how do I break the news that I am expected to cease my motorcycle business on the 1st of June? There are barely three days left. The very business with which I have taken care of them and given them the best I could afford for more than two years now. With no prospects of a better job, nay, any one at all. All because of the recent activities of the very cult boys whom I tried never to associate with during my tertiary days.

I still have my reservations—I have always had—about the hundred naira they take from us every day in the name of the association levy. I mean the heads of our commercial motorcyclists association. I have always doubted if that money ever reached the government. What would the rich government need our hundred naira notes for? Tax? They know where to get it. Now, the money never reaches the government. So what have the heads of our association been doing with all our hard-earned contributions? They have never done anything for us, neither alleviating our plights nor improving our wellbeing. And now, they have allowed the cult boys to destroy our business. Our only means of livelihood. God. Someone is finished. These cult boys have killed me. God.

Should I blame the government? I doubt if I could. It had wanted to ban commercial motorcycling five years ago. That was two weeks after I bought my first motorcycle. I almost killed myself. I had bought the motorcycle with borrowed money. I got frustrated. And nearly fell into depression until the authorities thought better of the idea. You see? The government is kind. They felt for us.

But those are the ideas of an average man, an illiterate who knows nothing about critical thinking. About going back to the root. Who else should I blame but my government? After all, if it had been efficient, there would have been very few boys who grew up in the streets and became cult boys. Then, there would have been enough and sufficient security to inhibit the activities of whomever thought it was his special destiny to form a cult or join one. And now, what plans does it have for us? A fresh start? Frustration? Mass return to the village?

My government has killed me. No matter how it wants to place it. No matter how the authorities want me to see it. The constant is that my government has killed me.

You see, Achebe is right. The problem with my country is simply and squarely a failure of leadership.

I am a motorcyclist. And I am dead. Hard work is my sin. Unemployment is the price. June 1, the guillotine.