By Nnedi Okorafor
Hunchbacks are very expensive. But, this was not why we killed Bakasi. And what happened to him after his death was part of some darker politics.
You must understand, hunchbacks are not normal people. Even when they die, security has to be stationed at the grave site for at least the first year, to prevent robbers from digging them up. It’s the hump that people want. A
hunchback’s hump is said to be the source of his or her great power.
So you see why the evil man we call Bakasi was so feared yet respected. Not only was he bent over, his twisted spine snaking up into a profound hump, but he had one green eye. Green as the treetops during rainy season. In a place where eyes are always brown, Bakasi’s green eye was a thing of much talk.
Rumor has it that when he was young, he was always at the top of his class. Some say his powerful hump be- stowed this great intelligence upon him. Others believed his teachers gave him the highest scores because they were terrified of him. Whatever the reason, Bakasi went on to study medicine, specializing in midwifery and endocrinology.
I cannot imagine such a man bringing babies into the world and curing skin ailments but apparently he was a different man back then. I have a few friends who were delivered by him, one of them who is even Agwe (the very tribe he’d come to despise so much). People say he was full of love and had excellent bedside manners.
Bakazi even came to be called the Man with the Magic Hands. I don’t know what happened to him along the way but whatever it was made him more crooked than his spine. It must have been the fact that his truest passion was the most crooked business of all: Politics.
He got his chance to pursue his dream when the elections for state secretary came around. He was also a great orator. Wherever he spoke a large crowd would gather. Some came to see his great hump, hoping to glimpse its magic. Many believed that if the sun shined directly on it, you could see green sparks softly popping from it. Others came to hear his deep resonating voice. It was so strong that even with the largest audience, he never needed a microphone.
Others came because he spoke of lifting up the community, bettering the schools and hospitals, instilling methods that would bring more business to the community. His goals sounded so logical and realistic that people would leave his speech glowing as they did after a spirit-filled Sunday mass. He wasn’t scapegoating us Agwes in the beginning. He was elected and promptly began to work toward a better Ndi State.
His work as secretary must have shown him how powerful my people are. Well, not powerful but hardworking, resourceful and organized. There are few of us but we are ambitious and industrious. There is nothing cruel, clannish or greedy in our ways, not more than any other group of people’s. If no one will stick up for us, I will.
When Bakasi decided to run for Ndi’s Head of State, his speeches took on a different flavor, a flavor that reflected what many in the greater community of Ndi State were thinking. Suddenly the Agwe became his reason for All of Ndi State’s problems. We were greedy, miserly, nepotists, the scourge of Ndi State. We were few, so our votes amounted to little. He won by a landslide and that was when the trouble really began.
Bakasi had come to hate us and began to openly say so. And his hate was contagious. To make a long story short, things became very bad for my people.
You will never understand what it’s like to walk in my shoes. You will never be in my shoes.
My father and I often sat up late at night talking about him. Always, in the room at the center of our house is the most secure place, where no one can hear our hushed voices. For if any of the Bakasi Boys or their many spies heard how we spoke of Bakasi, they’d have burned down our house, murdered our loved ones and slandered the names of our ancestors and future children in the newspapers and market.
Bakasi the Hunchback had become a murderer, a worker of black magic, a dictator.
Three days ago, he gave a speech.
We knew he would because there were riots three days prior at one of the state’s biggest markets. It would have looked bad for him to stay quiet. What happened at those riots? Some Agwe were fed up and went crazy. Ten people were killed, even more injured.
It was time.