Efemona: The Morons, Dunces, Fools, Pigs and Imbeciles of Africa

By O.O. Kandison

This book is about an African woman coming to America and soon becoming Americanized, only to go back to Africa, her own country of Nigeria, and teach by example what she’d learned in America. By teaching with examples, she’d had all other African countries also in her heart. Then she quickly grasps the idea that in the turn of the twenty-first century of civilization, all African countries should, by now, be striving and buoyant since they gain their independence from the Europeans. The leaders of Nigeria—if they were not morons, dunces, pigs, and imbeciles—should be leading the way to take Nkrumah and Patrice Emery Lumumba’s message to new heights to unite African countries.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Page Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: Jan 3, 2022
• ISBN: 9781646285983

O.O. Kandison

He is a Nigeria born and has lived in the State of Nevada since 1985 after his graduation from the University of Nevada, Reno, In the United States. He majored in journalism and has written other books to his name. He is also a photojournalist.

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Efemona

The Morons, Dunces, Fools, Pigs and Imbeciles of Africa

O. O. Kandison

Copyright © 2021 O. O. Kandison

All rights reserved

First Edition

PAGE PUBLISHING, INC.

Conneaut Lake, PA

First originally published by Page Publishing 2021

ISBN 978-1-64628-597-6 (pbk)

ISBN 978-1-64628-598-3 (digital)

Printed in the United States of America

Table of Contents

CHAPTER 1

CHAPTER 2

CHAPTER 3

CHAPTER 4

CHAPTER 5

CHAPTER 6

CHAPTER 7

CHAPTER 8

CHAPTER 9

CHAPTER 10

CHAPTER 11

CHAPTER 12

CHAPTER 13

PART 1

ESEMUEDE

THE DEVIL CANNOT

HOLD UP THE DAY—

CARPE DIEM—

SEIZE THE DAY

WHAT MAKES O. O. KANDISON UNIQUE IN HIS FICTIONARY SCENES IS THAT HE USED EVENTS AND CHARACTERS FROM HIS LIFE—AND LATER FROM HISTORY—AS THE BASIS FOR HIS FICTION. HE WROTE OF CURRENT POLITICAL EVENTS, OF MURDER, OF CORRUPTION, OF CARNAL LUST FOR WOMEN… YOU’LL NOT BE DISAPPOINTED FROM THE BEGINNING TO THE END.

—Dr. Lantis Osemwengie

O. O. KANDISON SURELY TOUCHES DOWN IN SOME OF AFRICA’S MOST NOTORIOUS DICTATORS AND LEADERS OF AFRICAN COUNTRIES.

—Late Dr. Samuel I. Esemuede

O. O. KANDISON… HAS FOREVER GIVEN CORRUPTION A BAD NAME… HE IS A NEW WRITER ON THE BLOCK WHOSE CAREER WILL SURPASS THE MOVIEMAKERS OF GHANA, WHO WROTE A SCRIPT TO PRODUCE THE MOVIE OF THE YEAR IN AFRICA—BEYONCÉ: THE PRESIDENTS DAUGHTER.

—Dr. Charles Usigbe

President, Edo Cultural Association of Las Vegas

O. O. KANDISON KNOWS HOW TO USE HUMOR AND WITS. HIS CHARACTERS ARE ALWAYS VERY BOLD JUST AS EFEMONA HERSELF. A POLITICAL THRILLER INDEED TO KEEP YOU TURNING THE PAGES.

—Peter Umoh

President, Nigerian Association of Las Vegas

ABSOLUTELY POWERFUL! I’LL REPEAT IT! KANDISON KNOWS WHAT HELD BACK THE DARK CONTINENT FOR CENTURIES—AFRICA.

—Jordan A. Randolph

Bartender, California Hotel and Casino, Las Vegas

A HECK OF A POLITICAL THRILLER AND ANIMOSITY AGAINST AFRICAN LEADERS… O. O. KANDISON IS A MASTER. THIS IS ANOTHER NARRATIVE THAT WILL HOLD ONE SPELLBOUND AS THEY KEEP THE PAGE TURNING UNTIL IT ROARS TOWARDS THE FINAL SHOWDOWN…BEFORE YAWNING.

—Prof. Howard Michell

Social Psychologist, University of Nevada, Reno

AUTHOR’S NOTE

This is a work of fiction. While some names are fictitious, some names used are names of African leaders in all the African countries, on the African continent, who were ruthless and had crumbled their countries’ economy. If I have offended those African leaders, know that it is a sickness of the mind sitting down over the years to think about it—starting from my own country, Nigeria. And therefore, I offered to do so, so that if there is reincarnation, you all will change your ways. And also, if I have offended the Muslims and Christians, know that I did so not because I hate you folks, but it is because I hate religion that made all of us hate one another. Or to put it very nicely, it is because you are not putting one and two together, and more so, religion brought division to us. It made man hate one another. In other words, I am not mad at you. I am mad at God Himself for creating the world to make man go after their own brothers for their prey.

*If you purchase this book without a cover, you should be aware that this book may have been stolen property and reported as unsold or destroyed to the writer and to the publisher. In such case, neither the author nor the publisher has received any payment for this stripped book.

NOTE TO THE READER

The art of telling a story or a joke for others to listen to, read, laugh, or chant about is absolutely a wonderful gift from the gods. Therefore, I affectionately dedicate this book to my father, who had that gift to share his stories with men and women and their children of my village, who congregated in my fathers’ house in the days until he passed. He told them his stories with humor and wits—and I miss you, Dad.

Time is

Too slow for those who wait,

Too swift for those who fear,

Too long for those who grieve,

Too short for those who rejoice,

But for those who love,

Time is not.

—Henry Van Dyke

When the missionaries arrived, the Africans had the land and the missionaries had the Bible. They taught us to pray with our eyes closed. When we opened them, they had the land and we had the Bible.

—Kenyatta

The only way in which a human being can make some approach to knowing the whole of a subject is by learning what can be said about it by persons of every variety of opinion and studying all modes in which it can be looked at by every character of mind. No wise man ever acquired his wisdom in any mode but this.

—John Stuart Mill

The day I met a dunce, a moron, the stupid(s), the donkeys of Africa, and the bastards.

—Efemona

CHAPTER 1

It was almost noontime when Efemona and Victoria woke up. Everywhere on the floor beside them, there were empty bottles, and the overfilled ashtrays were stinking, and she could not believe she’d smoked a lot of cigars.

There was nothing left from the euphoria of the previous night party. Efemona in particular felt frustrated and lonelier than ever. Everything seemed to her as so meaningless! But after the events, everything that’d happened the previous day had seemed as a dream to her in the sense that a poor girl like her was able to bring down the dictatorship of the president in her country—Nigeria.

The events had passed. Efemona was in her signature fancy beret hat and gold chains, the hard-earned paycheck of mine she spent as if there was no tomorrow, walked with Victoria to Ikoyi Blindness Road to lay a wreath at where Fela Kuti was laid in wake and then secretly opened up a museum of Fela recorded music since Fela first recorded with the group Koola Lobitos and from when he first returned to the Nigerian capital in 1963 to years after Nigerian independence. Then she signed and approved everything memorable soon after Fela began playing high life and jazz and when he’d fronted a band with other musicians who had come back from England to civilize the music scene with young generations of the time.

And then Efemona did not stop there. She requested to speak with Fela’s manager at the time, who’d managed Fela throughout the years. And then requested that Fela’s uniforms he designed, which had made Fela, wearing such uniforms, a symbol of a genius of an artist to be displayed especially those he wore when he sang Zombie for the African military men all over Africa.

Efemona also requested from the manager that she would be delighted to paste the photographs of one Sandra Isodore, beside Fela, who was a close friend to the Black Panthers, who’d introduced Fela to the philosophy and writings of Malcom X, Eldridge Cleaver and other black activists and great thinkers of Africa, such as Kwame Nkrumah—the Ghanaian head of state, who’d negotiated independence first on African soil countries with the British before other African countries followed suit. That done, Efemona then opened a nearby huge marque in memory of all those who met their untimely death in the hands of a brutal dictator, General Bad Dudu Abacha, but she was not the first member of a being-to to pay such respect to Fela Anikulapo Kuti and Saro-Wiwa.

As Efemona laid the wreath, she began to think deeply. First, she reflected on the dream that suddenly woke her up. She’d dreamed about the notoriety of Alabon Close and Aso-Rock (both Nigerian jails), South Africa’s Robbin Island, and Ghana’s Kazabowea, north of Togo, that Eyedema created for his opponents, were all one and the same where men and women who question authority were left to rot, if they were not killed by bullets.

Efemona had dreamed that she had visited Alabon Close and Aso-Rock. But what made her dream about the place and how she’d managed to get there was a mystery. While she was in there, she began to imagine the notoriety which she’d heard so much about. In there, from the stories during all the leaders of Nigeria’s terror government, the mere mention of Aso-Rock was enough to crack the bones of even the strongest headed citizens in Nigeria or Africa.

It was rumored, but Efemona knew it as truth as she was dreaming, that thousands of men and women who voice their concern about the country they loved so dearly were apprehended and crammed into tiny cells and that abuse, torture, hanging, and executions were of daily occurrences. The regime of Bad Dudu for instance, through Buckingham Palace recognition and support, had ordered hemlock tea, cyanide-laced burgers, ricin soups, and you name it carcinogens that could not be traced in the blood of the deceased if Amnesty International was to question how such people had died.

Suddenly Efemona woke up, rubbed her eyes, and fell asleep again. In another few seconds, she was dreaming again: thousands of students and well-known politicians who entered the doors of the ugly places mentioned were never to be seen or heard from again. It was assumed that unmarked graves existed around the country, notably at Eleme, Burutu, and more places, where the crude oil that generate quick billions for the northern rulers were situated. Moreover, nobody dared to hunt out the final resting places of the victims who had fallen prey for the guards of the dictator, who ordered them shot by their Igodomegodo gods who are men with the bullet which the oil money had generated to buy the bullets in the first place.

And suddenly somebody was saying to a journalist, Why is everybody always coming to me to ask where is so-and-so who disappeared?

Efemona had remembered how that famous quote came about in another African country. It was President Eyedema who’d made a lot of men disappear in Togo. And Efemona woke up and then was afraid to go back to sleep.

Efemona and Victoria did not even know what time it was when they’d dashed out from Doddan Army Barracks. All Efemona knew and remembered was that she’d disarmed the president of all presidents in Africa who was wicked as a brutal dictator.¹ And from that moment on, whatever action the president took upon himself, it’s all for the betterment of the people of Nigeria.

And so, as soon as Efemona and Victoria had dashed out from the president’s office, Efemona began to rejoice and think on her next move. In Efemona’s mind was the feeling: Jesus Christ had his preparation time. Moses, too, had his preparation time. And even one of Jesus Christ’s disciple, Paul, had his preparation time, and so my preparation would start from my country—Nigeria—against the leaders who’d ruled and are yet to rule after Bad Dudu. And from there on, other African leaders past and present would be brought to the limelight to face persecution for corruption.

Come to think about what Efemona was thinking deeply, as I alone knew what she was thinking at that particular time, even when my eyes were still glued to RadioShack toy gadget on which I followed Efemona on what she was doing and all that in Nigeria, I knew this was the first time Efemona had actually had compared herself to biblical figures, but not the first time she’d judged past and present leaders of Africa including those of Nigeria.

The thing you will know from this time on is that Efemona is all now about bringing an end to the widespread corruption in Nigeria and in all African countries as a whole. Having lived in America for more than ten years as you may have known and had since been civilized in American tradition: you must work hard for your money, no cooking the books—to use President Yakilian the Texan, a product of the CIA of the Oval Office, aka President Let’s Bring Saddam Hussein to His Knees’s own words, no free lunch creed, no bribery, and so on, Efemona was ready to spread her message on African soil. And the thing is, everything that Efemona was thinking about through His doing, or maybe through her grandmother’s spirit always come true for her.

From the tip of my ballpoint, you’d think you know Efemona so to speak. But if your answer ends with her unruly manners, brief marriage to O. O. Kandison, the author of Efemona: The African Woman with Balls, and then the woman to redeem African leaders to start to think in the philosophy of Kwame Nkrumah, then you’re on the right track to read and enjoy yourself with the Efemona here.

Anyway, Efemona and Victoria did not want to be caught. A ransom had been put on both women’s heads by the new administration to bring Efemona in particular to justice in Nigeria before the military junta tribunal to pay dearly for what she made Bad Dudu go through in his office before the man could not take it any longer to end up in the canal of death of a Thai damsel.

So Efemona spotted an empty canoe that was anchored at the Doddan Barracks, and she grabbed Victoria by the arm and ran with her. Victoria almost lost her balance while she tried to maintain her footsteps as they ran together. Both women jumped into the canoe and began to paddle themselves as fast as they could down the Julius Berger Canal that Dudu, in his famous press conference insisted that he’d financed with a billion dollars. This canal they are sailing on was known to be coasted around Lagos Island and down to Burutu, Eleme, Jos, Sokoto, Mina, Abeokuta, and even to Mr. I Had Lunch with a Vegetarian, so Let’s MEAT Again and Sort Out Our Differences and See Who Shall Win the Battle… Man, the MEAT Would Be So Delicious in My Imagination’s own village in Ghana—the movie producer who wrote his famous script for the movie Beyoncé: The President’s Daughter, from the book Efemona: The African Woman with Balls, without compensation and even threaten the author that he would send people from HBO headquarters to go to Las Vegas to kill him. That’s another story.

While both women canoed down the canal, Efemona realized that this was her first experience of what she’d call the continent of real wilderness.

I need not dispute with Efemona, here, that to the uninitiated eye, the fertile expanse of lands at the heart of all African soil especially those of Nigeria, looks almost lifeless, almost featureless too. To Efemona and Victoria and even to Efemona’s AWAM (African Women Against Marriage Movement) movement supporters, these fertile lands should offer good shades and even rainfall throughout the year. What is grown by the farmers who are mostly peasants yields good returns for their hard labor. And yet no support from their governments. African leaders are not doing the right thing for their countries, Efemona noted.

As I said before, this famous canal ran through Lagos Island and through rough hills to the northernmost part of Nigeria and as far as to Ghana, Zimbabwe, South Africa, and more towns and cities and villages in Africa. But Efemona had thought that it had only coasted around Lagos Island.

Throughout the day and for seven days and seven nights, both women paddled alone in the rough water of the canal, sometimes caught in thunder and lightning storms that swept up the water of the canal that, at some point Efemona thought that she would drown with Victoria. But Victoria, on the other hand, was very calm.

It took Efemona and Victoria roughly twenty-one days to canoe themselves to the more than one thousand and more miles before they realized that they’d come back to civilization again. For all the while they’d not only canoed the rough canal but also witnessed vast expanses of forestation and beautiful savannahs that could be cleared with Nigerian oil money, paid to laborers of Mr. I Had Lunch with a Vegetarian who are wrought in poverty for agricultural purposes. What Efemona was thinking in her innermost soul was mechanized farming. But on this expanse of lands, nothing of the sort is encouraged. Only that the Fulani herdsmen are armed tooth and nail with machetes and machine guns to kill innocent people in a country she was born and raised by a village headmaster. Damn, she echoed.

Efemona gnawed her teeth. But again, one thing shocked her. Efemona saw a lot of cattle, goats, hens, and herons once again, all wandering about on Nigerian Highways and on streets when they should all be in the ranch. This made Efemona angry as ever and vengeful once again.

And then as Efemona and Victoria began to canoe back to point A, where their journey had begun, Efemona began to daydream. She suddenly realized that she’d had this dark, deep dream. She was naked, chained to a huge trunk of an iroko tree in a dungeon. And that’s not all. What was most funny to her was that it was with bondage whip of a cowhide, that one bad African head of state had reserved in her name. She could not see the face of the African head of state who then had stood over her head, peeing and stooling on her face. He has a huge penis too, and wearing shorts made from zebra skin, with a huge voodoo charm amulet on his neck. And while stooling on her face, he was also whipping her with gusto while Efemona begged for mercy.

And then again, his voice was harsh. At some point, he’d roared louder at her saying, Who is the boss in this country? You or me? Answer me. You bitch. You went to America to learn not to respect your elders—but that mechanical jargon of slang talking of motherfucker and sucker out there. I am the boss of this country, bitch, he roared at her again. But the nepotism of Bad Dudu was too much.

I know you’re the boss motherfucker, Efemona managed to reply him, still daydreaming.

Good girl, he roared at her, then Efemona watched him take another step or two toward her again, to whip her once more.

You’re right. You’re the dunce, the moron, the stupid, the donkey of Africa, the bastard!

Bingo! There goes the next title for my husband’s next novel, Efemona thought. And Efemona suddenly came back to the present. Then she looked at her surroundings. Vast expanse of land to grow rice, yams, corn, and you name it with all that money generated from Nigerian crude oil!

Finally, Efemona figured the tension in Lagos Doddan Barracks should by now have died down and no one would recognize her. She was right for a while. She hopped down from the canoe and lent a hand to Victoria to get down too. And they started to walk.

Efemona, recollecting the journey they’d just made with the canoe, Efemona thought that all the leaders of Nigeria and, in short, in all African countries, who’d ruled their countries, had not acknowledged the noble soil of Africa in their countries. In fact, these leaders who are morons, stupid idiots, dunces, chain of fools of Africa had not attacked the problems in every possible way: like importing the expatriates from America and the Europeans to teach them what the value of mechanized farming would mean for the people of Nigeria and in all African countries on which they’d paddled their canoe through to see the mother countries fertile lands.

The only thing that occurred to Efemona right there and then was that the federal government had almost wiped out an entire race because the villagers of those villages that lived in Eleme, Burutu, and Port Harcourt had grumbled about the crude oil money that was not distributed for the people of Nigeria.

Efemona yawned loudly. Victoria suddenly saw that Efemona’s eyeballs had transformed into billiard balls. What Efemona had remembered was that no man who came out from a woman’s vagina would ever know how much trillions had lined the pockets of the crooks of leaders of Nigeria, Liberia, Angola, Sierra Leone, Togo, Ghana, New Guinea, and more countries in Africa. But to Efemona’s imagination, she could envision Nigerian and African leaders’ obscenities directed to those who questioned authority: the rivals, the common people, and the journalists.

The whole idea of mismanagement of the countries mineral resources was first drilled into Efemona not only by Hidiamen and Ehimire but mostly by her father, Mr. Irabor, who was a principal, who taught her to remember to help her people when she became somebody and become more civilized. Through her father’s enlightenment, Efemona began to see the country in which she was born to be, a jungle where only the strong survive. The ant, the cockroaches, and the rats must be crushed. If they’re not crushed, they must never be allowed to move up the ladder. They must suffer.

Efemona also learned that when Mr. Life Goes On had ruled the country, or when the senators were not clubbing themselves with mace and boomerangs in parliamentary meetings, her father had seen a country where the farmers were motivated to grow foodstuffs in their gardens and farms.

Efemona yawned and roared out again. This time it was like the roar of a lion. Because she’d remembered that her father taught her early in life, corruption was a disease in a developing country. She remembered how her father would wake up in the morning on weekends and reach for his hoe and cutlass to go to the farms, so he could feed her and her other siblings. And on their way, he would begin to tell her stories relating to the seasons of the month throughout the year. For instance, each month of the year when the farmers have to sweat it out on their farms, he would briefly describe what the months of the year represent. For instance, the month of January to February is mostly raining season. Clearing the bushes with machetes is mostly from mid-December. And by December ending, the farmers had burned their plots of the weeds and thorns they’d cut down. And then planting would begin after the nip of the first rainfall so that by March, sewing season is over for those farmers who are not lazy. Then the harvesting, the fruit of all human labor starts from July to October. And when the harmattan has arrived, the farmers settled down to enjoy the proceeds of their hard labor.

Efemona also remembered one in a particular when her father would be telling her stories and suddenly would point at the rubber plants during November and December months, when the rubber seeds were dried up on the trees, and they would start spitting the seeds on the ground. And today, nobody in the Nigerian agricultural sector could conduct if the seeds are edible. But with all that money siphoned out of Nigeria by the Nigerian senators and former presidents, no one had common sense to put up the money for scientists to find out if the seed could be cooked for human consumption or if it can be processed for cooking oil.

Suddenly Efemona came to the present, and they kept on walking, then Efemona finally looked at Victoria and said, I have a feeling that we’re going to make more history for ourselves with the morons, dunces, stupid and bastard motherfuckers of leaders in all African countries. And if we do, no rupees, no yen, no pesos in our shit please.

Victoria kind of looked at Efemona in her face. She was lost. But she said, Explain it to me sis—Efemona.

Efemona laughed. Then she said, Anyway, I retract my statement. We’d allow rupees, yen, and pesos inside our shit—if the price is right. And what do I mean by that? She smiled at Victoria. We’d fuck all the leaders who offered us big money until they’re broke in our jungle moist rivers. And Victoria high-fived her.

Finally, both women walked in the direction of a huge stone which Efemona had been told was Abuja’s famous stone. When they got to the sight of the huge stone, which was the size of Lake Tahoe, which Hercules of Britain was supposed to blast but was unable to do so, Efemona stood for a moment with Victoria and began to wonder how in the world a huge stone of that nature could be standing in the middle of nowhere in Nigeria. Efemona all these years did not really know how huge the stone was. She’d only heard from the horse’s mouth that it was the size of Lake Tahoe in Reno, Nevada, in the United States. She still could not believe what she was looking at. Maybe it is the voodoo of the royals of Akinzua Palace that has moved the stone to Doddan Army Barracks to reveal something of importance to her. Then without second thoughts, Efemona placed her hand over Victoria’s shoulder, then levitated.

Victoria was surprised to see herself on top of the stone with Efemona. It was like magic to see all the countries of Africa—all still rotted in poverty. Then something began to inform Efemona that if she came down to walk the length and width of the whole of Africa, there should be a hill to which she’d keep on her right for bearings if she was to head either north, west, east, and even to the south.

Looking far and beyond with her eyes wide opened, she stood rooted and nodded to herself. The nod, if I remember what it meant in the royal breed tongue, it symbolized that, there is a sacred hill of direction if a royal born was on top of it. Efemona again put her hand on Victoria’s shoulder and then meditated a few seconds. Both of them came down, and Victoria began to wonder what her friend was up to. Then Efemona closed her eyes as if meditating a second time but began to imagine: past a river, an iroko tree, then several huts like minarets and the hill suddenly would appear to be on one’s left until one reaches another village that doesn’t even know if legal tender in notes were in circulation in Africa!

The route Efemona was imagining in her mind moved on from village to villages. She saw once again an open brush was marked by cattle trails that seemed to disappear whenever a strong gust of wind stirs up the dust from Sokoto to Sudan and then to South Africa.

Damn! Efemona sighed.

On this particular day, a Ghanaian who wandered through the forest to wind up in Nigerian soil who recognized Efemona, the royal breed most talked about in Ghana and in all African countries, had appeared from nowhere to ask Efemona for directions. He was looking for a particular gold mine between the border of Nigeria and Ghana where he could fool the Human Resource Department that he was a Nigerian and needed to work a day job as a laborer.

Efemona looked at him. She’d guessed that he must be the Mr. I Had Lunch with a Vegetarian, the thief from Ghana who now infringes upon the intellectual properties of a Nigerian author, whose parents were also thieves and then during the slave trade, some members of his families had ended up in the sugarcane plantations of Cuba and the cotton fields of South Carolina in the United States.

Efemona sighed again as she looked at the motherfucker on his face—an ugly hungry bastard she imagined him to be. Man! Nigerians are more desperate for jobs than you think you do. So I advised that you follow the same route to where you had come from, Efemona had said with annoyance to his face.

The ugly motherfucker wouldn’t buy that from Efemona. He knelt down before Efemona and Victoria. I’ll do anything. Odd jobs. Anything! And if it involves, eating your pussies for forty-eight hours until my jaw aches, so be it. I wouldn’t mind it. Please!

After a long pause, Efemona yielded. Come with us, she said.

Meanwhile, Efemona suddenly realized that she’d forgotten to take note of more landmarks of the minarets of the villages, she used to keep on her left before walking, on the footpaths also, on which all three were now walking through. So Efemona searched the skies but could not see smoke from a hunter’s hut on the hill she’s once used for navigation when she was growing up in the Royal Palace in Benin when she used to play with the boys. But being a hot afternoon as it was always the case in the tropics, it was difficult to use the sun to figure out her direction. To worsen her situation, the iroko tree with a big trunk had been cut down.

MAN! Efemona roared. And in her ear was that kind of feeling: He’s the young man who wandered the thick forest to Nigeria, looking for the gold mine to work a day job as a laborer who’d blinded me with Ghanaian voodoo, but she kept this to herself.

Finally, the young man, perplexed as Efemona, said, Anything wrong, ma’am?

Yes, Efemona said. I’m trying to get my bearing from the hill that I used to see all the African countries including your country—Ghana, Soweto, Zambia, Togo, and…

All three walked in strides at the same pace. A few more steps along the way, the Ghanaian said to Efemona, You really think you’re still in Lagos! Don’t you? And he laughed out very raucously. Stop here for a minute. Both women stopped, looking at him.

After a few minutes, he looked up in the skies and said, Young women, come with me. Efemona and Victoria followed behind him. Actually, he knew more of Nigeria towns and villages and cities on top of this hill they were walking on, than Efemona thought she known all the years. Efemona thought that she’d seen and registered behind her heart all the little villages in Africa, that the leaders of all African countries don’t even know existed on the continent and behind their backyards. What a continent, Efemona wondered.

The thought that the new administration would catch up with Efemona and Victoria had never erased from both women’s memory. Efemona sensed this along with Victoria.

So Efemona, fearing that Mr. I Had Lunch with a Vegetarian would go to the authorities to turn them in, or that he knew that route Efemona had chosen to evade being caught, she quickly discharged Mr. I Had Lunch with a Vegetarian. And as soon as Mr. I Had Lunch with a Vegetarian turned his back and walked away, she wasted him with the pistol that she’d stolen from President Bad Dudu’s table. Knowing that crime statistics in her country, Nigeria, were high, and it was Mr. I Had Lunch with a Vegetarian’s family tree that was trudging through the forest to commit abominable crimes in Nigeria, Efemona was even more trigger-happy. Then they doubled up on their steps, both walking majestically, while Efemona stuck the nozzle of the pistol in her left breast bra but revealing the butt as she walked like a cowgirl with no problems.

This kind of cowgirl walk that Efemona was calculating with her steps could be interpreted by typical Yankee onlookers if they were in Ikoyi Blindness Road to observe how Efemona was walking. She was walking as if she was dictating to an anonymous lover how she wanted to be screwed on top of a horse. And in fact, I once experienced it with her when she dictated that we do it on Mount Rose riding the horse. To the best of her recollection, it was the best fuck she’d had since she got married, because to her, I’d hit her hard and discovered the G-spot with her, which sugar daddies were unable to discover when she did it on top of motorcycles and bicycles instead of on the horse with them.

Efemona stopped abruptly, shook her head, and sighed again deeply. And Victoria knew that something out of the ordinary was bothering her friend. So she did not hesitate to ask. She looked at Efemona and said, What is it that you’re thinking about now, girlfriend?

What Efemona was thinking about, Victoria could not imagine from the bottom of her stomach. She knew Efemona as the eye of a needle. The thing that bothered Victoria was that Efemona had suddenly snapped her iPhone with madness. All she knew as they were walking was that Efemona had been watching the World Cup Soccer match between Nigeria and Greece. Victoria did not need a rocket scientist to know why Efemona was mad. It was because the World Cup Soccer had just ended in South Africa. And the Nigerian team had lost to Greece 2–1. As Victoria thought, Efemona had a different thought altogether: I can see why Saddam and his sons had a reason to make their players walk on hot iron metal sheets. Nigerians could not even beat the fucking homosexual team which every other country had fucked their asses. Even South Korea beat them too—

Victoria cut her short and said, What country must that be that you’re referring to?

I mean the homosexual Greek team.

Is that why you suddenly snapped your iPhone?

I must not let the sleeping dog lie. You see, gone are the days… Somebody has to talk about it now.

Truly, Efemona read my mind, too, where I sat in the parlor watching the game. I’d use a hammer to destroy my television because of the way the Nigerian team were playing. The goalkeeper, Mr. Oyema, or whatever his name was, would, first of all, hold the ball in his hand, then keep waving his left hand to the Nigerian players in the field to go midfield, before kicking the ball. And again, he was not very confident in himself, which resulted in those easy goals that penetrated the net. The truth is, I am still waiting to travel to Nigeria by the end of the year to confront Oyema and the Nigerian coach to buy me a new television, and if they refuse, they will face ridicule of a lifetime from my pen. Efemona would agree with me that there are young-blood goalkeepers, whose blood are hot, who would ask their coach the question, How high do you want us to jump, you feel me?

Efemona did not know what I was thinking, anyway, about the disappoint of the Nigerian players. But she continued, You see, Victoria, gone are the days when Nigerian players were confident in their playing against any team in the world. Not anymore, Now, and many years to come, they would even lose more confidence in their playing. I am not even sure those players were Nigeria’s best players.

Victoria, who had been silent, finally cut in after swallowing the bile in her throat too. Looking at Efemona, Victoria said, The whole world seemed to get it on what you’re gearing at. Please explain to the moron coach that Nigeria Sports Association hired to coach our team that ‘coast to coast’ soccer playing no longer exists.

Efemona cleared her throat for her friend. See what happened at the international scene! I mean the South Africa World Cup! Nigeria’s players were the best team who were eliminated from the world stage during the soccer matches with their counterparts. They were not self-confident. They could not even dribble their counterparts on the field. Our Nigerian goalkeeper will deliberately fire up the ball to the end of their opponent’s goal. What we call today in modern terminology ‘coast to coast.’ But their opponents, who are confident in their playing, would put the ball down for a goal kick and then keep passing the ball along to the next available player, who could teach the Nigerian players how the ball was supposed to be played. It was a mess with the Nigerian players. The Ghanaians, whom Nigerians once taught how to play the game, were the team in the African continent who redeemed the continent as a whole. When Nigeria’s players were real men, they took their playing to the highest level. The sleeping dogs of Africa, particularly the Cameroonians, went to the field to play as if they were clowns. When I saw them shaking hands with their opponents before the game would resume—with their big wide chest and biceps and dreadlocked hair, I was thrilled. And I had thought they were the ones to redeem Nigerians from the mess. I did not know they were just like women and the biggest clowns of Africa. Thanks to Algeria, Ivory Coast, and Ghana, who were confident in their playing as real men in the game of soccer. If three teams were in the group category the Nigerian team were in, they would have captured the golden cup for the African continent! You know what I mean."

And Victoria knew exactly what Efemona meant.

*****

Efemona dealt a solid fist to her left breast three times to imitate Lebron James and Kevin Garnett when they scored and dunked the ball over the head of their opponent. And a man walking opposite Efemona and Victoria was astonished and had to stop to let them pass him when he saw the butt of a pistol that Efemona stuck in her left breast bra. Truly, Efemona did not even know what she was doing. All she knew was that she’d suddenly remembered the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, and the Oval Office had paid attention and had acted accordingly to make Shell BP pay for the cleaning up.

Again, Victoria knew something was bothering Efemona. She did not hesitate to ask her anyway. And Efemona said, My question is, why are Americans crying over the spill of crude oil in the Gulf of Mexico by Shell BP, when for decades the people of the delta areas of our country—Nigeria had suffered the same types of disasters over and over for the past fifty years? What was most annoying of all is that the Americans, Chevron, and others who spilled crude oil in the delta areas, all turned a blind eye on the cries of the people who lived in those areas. Not only the wildlife in those areas had been wiped out completely the fish that the people of the delta areas had lived on since God created the world had all been killed in the tributaries of their ocean. And those that had not met their untimely death through crude oil contamination, when fished out from water by the fishermen, and sold to poor people, they choke and die. When the people of the delta found out they were dying by the numbers after eating their fish they used to live on for centuries, now turned poison for them, they stopped eating their catches and eventually just stopped fishing on their tributaries. Saro-Wiwa’s cry for help for his people died in vain. He’d cried out through essays in his writings to get the attention of the world and Oval Office who gets 100 percent of Nigerian oil. But the help that he needed did not come. He watched his people dying by the numbers through starvation while Bad Dudu and his sons with uniforms in the army were amassing wealth from BP and American drillers who turned a blind eye on his cries for help. To silence Wiwa for speaking out, Americans and the world who were profiting from the oil trade watched as Bad Dudu hung Wiwa on the sour apple tree of Aso Rock. Today, the disaster in the delta is on a daily basis. The dunce of senators and the president are doing nothing about it because they would rather accept the money to clean it up for deposit in their account overseas while the people who live in those areas suffer. But you know something, my dear? Our government of Nigeria in my research was supposed to receive 60 percent of the revenue generated for the crude oil sale, while Shell BP or any prospectors in the name of oil drilling, received 40 percent. The 60 percent as I learned was to be used for development of Nigerian highways, build new bridges, clean up the spills if there were disasters, or anything like that.

Victoria coughed and laughed. Then she said, Did you say 60 percent has been received by the Nigerian government?

Yes, Efemona said, then added, "but the 60 percent is either in Britain, USA, Switzerland, and Dubai, through crook leaders of Nigeria who’d ruled and are yet to rule too. But you know, girlfriend, I am glad that the world is finally aware why all the leaders who’d ruled Nigeria had cutthroats to silence whoever spoke out against the spills for cleaning up and the mismanagement of the funds of 60 percent that the Nigerian government was said to receive. What is most annoying to me now is that with the spill of the crude oil in the Gulf of Mexico, Americans are now coming out to claim mental health. Now Grandma, who cannot walk or fuck or have an orgasm, is blaming BP for their mental health. The fishermen who’d not fished for decades because their boats had been broken or were swept away during Katrina are blaming BP for their mental health! A woman who slept with dogs and delivered a baby that barked like a dog is blaming it on BP for the child’s mental health. The young men I saw on the adult channel fucking the chicken’s ass is blaming BP that his dick cannot perform again and claiming mental health.

But in contrast, even though the men and women of the delta areas of Nigeria are not into guys of these abnormal sins and of dubious ways of making money, they have been suffering for the past fifty years because of the spills that had degraded their tributaries, their ocean, and their land. They would like of course to claim mental health now. I hope they would listen to them too. In the name of the Lord Almighty."

Amen, Victoria said.

You rushed to judgment of that ‘Amen,’ my sister, Efemona said, then brought out their usual slim cigarette and lit it up. Inhaling the nicotine flavor, she continued, But American judges—I mean Hickman and McQuaid of Reno—should remember that the crushed testicle of Mr. Ogbebor in Reno is worth no money in Reno courtrooms. I would advise that they become the champion to send the first message to the people of the Gulf for trying to collect millions from BP for mental health. Doing so, they should be able to save BP billions of dollars the Gulf Coast men and women are trying to collect for their mental health. So help me God.

Amen! Amen! Hickman and McQuaid heard you, Victoria said.

Man! Where I sat, still watching my Efemona from another continent through my RadioShack toy, I begin to wonder why Efemona is no longer afraid to air her feelings of those who think they’re mightier than God Himself. I think I might be able to tell you why. The most important things which now made my Efemona to be vocal: first in Reno. A city in Nevada, aka the Biggest Little City in the World, is the key to Efemona—for making her what she’d become. It is Reno that civilized her. And it is the driving force behind her, the power, that pushed this recivilized trained nurse to grasp every opportunity to form her powerful movement which had made her a new name: the African Woman with Polished Brass Balls.

The second is Aghator Oyeghe who was in his prime twenties—a Nigerian from Ukpenu who suddenly began to roam the streets of Uromi, Ukpenu, and Benin City on foot naked and his huge ding-dong, then began to swing along with his body movements on the streets as I once described in the book Efemona: The African Woman with Balls. You might want me to refresh your memory a bit. This is the story: Efemona had invited Oyeghe to Reno. Since notorious women who ran away from their husbands and sugar daddies after they’d been awarded their husbands money through the courts of the United States, then began to enjoy themselves with such loot with their families in Nigeria. As she entrusts her children with the social workers of Reno while enjoying herself, whether the children are sodomized by their social workers of Reno, she couldn’t care less. If her son dressed like a punk and rode on a piece of wood, what they call the madness of skateboarding, she couldn’t care less too. So for her sole judgment forgetting to get the kids from the custody of social workers of Reno, then Nigerian community men and women like Efemona, who then were labeled outcasts, couldn’t care less as long as she was notorious and could discover Oyeghe for his ding-dong for her sexual pleasures and enjoyments.

So these runaway women from their husbands and those like my Efemona who’d been labeled as very notorious also became a statistic herself when we were briefly separated. She then discovered it was nice to trick Oyeghe from Atlanta, Georgia, to Reno, just to have an orgasm with him.

By now, you may have noticed that Oyeghe after he ended up in America by the help of Catholic Missionaries to Atlanta, Georgia, for his treatment of mental illness after he’d smoked the famous Ubaroko grass (marijuana) when he was competing with me in those days which made him throw away his clothes, running naked on the streets, he then became the white woman darling of Georgia and in America in general.

The group of white women of Atlanta who helped Oyeghe to come to America for his treatment of mental illness had wanted to keep Aghator Oyeghe to themselves, sharing him among each other for their enjoyment of sexual pleasures. But Efemona was smart enough to retain him for herself alone after tricking Aghator Oyeghe to Reno to discover that he still had his huge weapon for sodomy of notorious women. And so, after our divorce was final, Efemona was able to retain him for herself alone. And she was ready to bark at any woman who made sexual advances to Oyeghe.

But as is sometimes the case with married couples who have been married for a long time, Efemona and Oyeghe also had begun to look more and more alike. For instance, Efemona and I had only lived together for a period of five years. But with Oyeghe, they are still today together all because of his huge and long penis so that while Efemona was the bread, he became the salami provider of satisfaction in bed. Second, he was never tired. Whenever she needed to be dicked, he must provide her with the salami. And because he provided her with the salami, which I could not provide her every night in bed. Their resemblance was then increasingly noticeable. And then on careful observation, one could see that both have moon eyes, thick lips, broad nose with round face, and then two deep dimples on both of their cheeks that was highly defined on their faces which accentuated with two minor deep lines on both of their faces as well. And then again, with these minor deep lines that they had developed together all these years secretly doing their thing behind my back while boldly denying me sex, which was an obligation for a married man to fulfill with his wife, one could see that it then pulled their faces down with enough gravity that their noses became more noticeable as a typical Ukpenu and Benin couples, rather than an Ishan and Benin couples. But the fact is, they’re still very different in some ways, that is, when they were in AWAM rallies together when Efemona had something of importance to convey to the social workers of Reno, and in general America courtrooms, Efemona’s white new set of bleached teeth could be seen well parted before her audience while that of Oyeghe was always the opposite. Never laugh. Efemona was eloquent, but he is not. She cares more for the dollar madness, but he did not. However, he is rather shy. But the one thing they both really loved is dick and carnal knowledge satisfaction from each other. They can have it ten times a day. And now you know why I once said I’d once raised my hat for Oyeghe when he’d boasted before me that he had laid ten women in one night, which made him the only man in the luster of men who’d defeated me in competition laying ugly and beautiful women. And I’ll even bet with anyone that Aghator Oyeghe beat my buddy too on the count of ten women in one night which Chukuma Achucko had never achieved before he went back finally to Nigeria. So I am still waiting for Chukuma to come back to America or I go back to Nigeria to join him where we could start all over again to see if we could beat the count of laying ten women in one night.

Anyways, with Efemona, she now believed that as Nigerian men (or African men) can have mistresses all around them, she, too, can have a bevy of male friends, and still have her natural first husband on the side, which is why she must keep me—and Oyeghe must not grumble about it. And if he does decide to grumble and confront Efemona, she would throw him out the window for good and replace him.

One more thing that now really made Efemona well known to hit it straight home is now her participation and her political knowledge not only of her country but of Africa as a whole. Some of the vast issues confronting Nigeria and African countries are now enough for her to detonate a bomb to wipe out all the African invaders. Her AWAM which the powers that be in Reno allowed her to form through social welfare and the National Association of Women (NAW) soon paved the way for her with her AWAM movement, the real Efemona and later a tomboy in my Efemona was born.

One would not believe that today, Efemona is now a well-known feminist. This is why she’d decided to keep her father’s name too. Once we were at the dinner table, and I recall my Efemona saying, I believe women are the strongest sex! This was way back in the days when she’d had our first daughter, who is now grown and decided that she would follow in her mother’s footsteps. And then I also remembered that I’d asked her to explain to me what she meant by that! This is what my Efemona said: I believe all women are very sensitive and delicate even though we women might prove to be romantic in bed.

To me, that seemed about true if one had the time to trace the Bible to ancient times. I can clearly see why. The reason is in my fingertips, which is that Efemona now also has special affinity—not only of the AWAM movement but of the arts. The arts that I chose to remember here is, of course, that of the ójéké dance of the royals, which she’d since imported to the white folks in Reno and its community. And also, she can play the flute. And the flute of the royals mainly for dancing ójéké. The second is the flute of men that resembles the pistol in between men’s thighs. And of course, she could fire the pistol too—legacy of the American society to teach foreigners how to shoot to kill.

With all these qualities of Efemona, Aghator Oyeghe is proud of her as she is proud of him too. With his unconditional support, she now fully agreed and believed she was important not only for him but for the African continent and not just Nigeria anymore.

Another good point I’d like one to understand before I close the chapter on how Efemona is now well known internationally is the fact that, on one occasion, I’d just got out of the shower, and I turned on my telescreen gadget. And as soon as the picture came to clarity, I saw my Efemona being interviewed by a famous Nigerian journalist on the NPR, through BBC affiliate in Lagos, Efemona had just dashed out of the Doddan Army Barracks with Victoria and they were walking hastily out of the vicinity she’d committed a heinous crime with Victoria. But the one thing that she did not realize was that Uki-Dan-bisikun still recognized her as the famous Efemona who’d pretended not to be the Efemona who came to see the president of her country to accept or refuse a job offer for the post of matron general in her country. But she’d refuse the post from the president.

The way Efemona began to respond to Uki-Dan-bisikun’s question this time around as a true feminist tells Uki-Dan-bisikun that Efemona was an American and has truly been Americanized as a cowgirl. He also noted that Efemona did not feel any single emotion for the president whom she’d just disarmed in his office that had been exposed in the airwaves. The only words that were coming out of Efemona’s mouth were the usual mantra of no comment, no comment, as she walked faster and faster with Victoria like a man. And then from time to time as Uki-Dan-bisikun would try to catch up with her, she would cup her chin as men do and scratch her temple.

Throughout the long walk that Uki-Dan-bisikun tried to keep the pace, Efemona never did answer any single question posed by Uki-Dan-bisikun. She was not prepared to answer any of his questions because she was a member of Bad Dudu paid special journalists who like to write that Dudu was not corrupt with his junta’s regime. As a woman who now fully believes that every state in Nigeria should have a share of the oil revenue, Efemona does not agree with off his questions; she was more than offended