of Aromolaran, Old Ife Road area of Ibadan did
not believe that armed robbers could swoop on
the area at 4.00a.m. and still had a field day as
they did on Thursday, 13th September, 2012;
attacking two buildings.
In the first building attacked, close to a popular
bakery in the area, one of the residents, a shoe-
mender cum Okada operator was macheted all
over his body. The man, in his late 40s, who was
lucky to have survived the attack, had machete
cuts on his head, arm, thighs and legs.
The cobbler, who pleaded that his name and
photograph should not be published, said he did
not know who was after him. According to him,
his ordeal started a few months back when
armed robbers stormed his former residence
and made away with his Okada (motorcycle).
Members of his ACOMORAN Unit rallied round
and got him a fairly used one in replacement,
which had been developing one mechanical fault
or the other.
He disposed of the okada for a paltry sum of
N9, 000, he said, and was thinking of how to get
another one when his wife, who was pregnant
with their fourth child went into labour and died
after giving birth to a baby girl. The baby also
died 40 days after birth.
Thinking that the problems were too many for
him and heeding the advice of friends, the
cobbler decided to change his residence. That
was after one of his friends had introduced him
to someone who gave him a new Okada and to
whom he paid a thousand naira daily. After five
or six months of regular payment, the Okada
would become his.
That was the arrangement. He, was, however
barely two weeks old in his new one-room
apartment when armed robbers struck again.
On that fateful morning, "I was hearing some
strange voices in our passage when some men
banged on my door and asked me to open my
door or else they would make life miserable for
me if they had to force the door open. I was in
the room with my three children. I quickly
opened the door and welcomed them.
"They were four in number, males, who couldn't
have been more than in their early 20s. Two of
them were fully dressed up, in pants and tops
while the other two had no tops on. But only two
of them came into my room. They asked if I
could recognise them and I quickly knelt down
and dropped my head on the floor asking my
children to do the same. After ransacking the
house, the only useful thing they found was my
okada key, I parked the okada in the passage
beside my door. They took the okada key and
bolted my room's door from outside.
"I overheard one of them asking another to
collect the okada's document from me.
So they came inside my room again and asked
for the papers. I told them that the papers were
not with me as I was paying instalmentally and
that until I finished paying, the original
document would not be released to me. I did not
also have the photocopy of the document with
me when the robbers came, so it was a
herculean task convincing them that I did not
have the papers.
"They turned the whole house upside down and
threatened to kill one of my children if I did not
release the papers. I cursed and cursed and
cursed myself and the day of my birth over and
over again before they left us in the room and
went back to the passage.
"As soon as they locked us in again, I opened
my room's window and jumped out with the aim
of alerting some night guards nearby. Our house
has a boys' quarter besides the main building,
so, as I jumped down into the passage of the
boys' quarter, my neighbour, an elderly woman
shouted that someone had jumped out and I told
her that it was me. But the deed had been done,
as the two robbers guarding the entrance ran
after me.
I ran with my strength shouting thieves, thieves
and scaled a fence but somehow, I fell and the
robbers met me there. They dealt four machete
cuts on my head alone, followed by my thighs
and legs. "Sensing that I could be killed if the
matcheting did not stop, I feigned death. But the
men of the underworld were not convinced that
I was dead, so, they dealt another terrible cut
on my arm and even lifted my hand to confirm
that I was dead.
I did not know how many minutes had elapsed
after the attack, but after what seemed a long
time, the breeze blew on me and I moved my
body to confirm that I was not really dead. I
could not walk but I slowly crawled home,"
narrated the cobbler.
Taking up the narration, a neighbour of his, who
did not also want his name in print, said the
cobbler was rushed to a hospital in the vicinity
with his hospital bills totalling N15, 000 after
being on admission for three days. The
landlords and tenants association of the area
was able to raise a donation of N5, 000 and a
loan of N3, 000 for the victim.
"I don't know where to start from. Thank God I
took the risk of jumping out and shouting, those
guys would have made away with my okada. It
was the desperation of not wanting to get into
more debts that made me did what I did. It is
not as if I wanted to die.
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