INJUSTICE FOR MOHBAD

I desperately wanted to join a cult, any cult, in part one. 

 

I’ve had my share of unfairness and injustice but nobody or nothing else made me want to join a cult group as much as the woman who gave birth to me. I wanted to see her get the same treatment she meted out to me. I wanted her to be warned, I wanted her to stop.

 

She bullied me so much in any way you can think of and I thought that if I got into the university, I would be regarded as a “big girl” and the beating would stop at least.

 

Not only didn’t it stop, I had the worst beating of my life during the Christmas holiday for part one. She beat me so much I was on Felvin for days, she beat me so much she wanted to tear my clothes right there on the streets, she beat me so much the orógùn broke and it was then that after escaping to my grandma’s, I called her over the phone and calmly told her the next time she touched me, I would kill her.

 

She probably sensed that finality in my voice, as if I was a wounded animal cornered and willing to fight back with all she’s got, and she never touched me again. Albeit, the psychological abuse intensified. She was intent on making me believe I was nothing. If beating me into submission wasn’t possible anymore, she was gonna mess my mind up through other means.

 

But that is in retrospect, back then I didn’t know if she would stop the physical abuse or not.

 

And so I desperately sought protection from someone, anyone. I needed someone to make her stop. I needed someone to protect me, and to give her a taste of her own medicine. Because the whole society watched on as she kept bullying me, both physically and mentally. As long as she’s “family”, I’d automatically and unwillingly been in a cult with its own rules and top-down control, and nobody could save me. 

 

If I’d reported to the police, it would be regarded as a “family matter”, just like it’s done in the brotherhood and the sisterhood. That’s if I’m not even “disciplined” by the police themselves for “disrespecting” my mother.

 

I got most desperate when I resumed school after the holiday and hunger showed me pepper. She refused to give me anything to take to school, even after everyone begged her and my aunt followed me to her place to beg. It broke me in ways I cannot describe that I had to beg for food from my enemy, from someone that heaped shame upon shame on my head, from someone that kept disgracing me everywhere.

 

I think that has shaped me in a way, nobody can punish me into submission ever again. You should read about the submission patriarchy constantly preaches to women, it’s not a fancy word at all. It is dangerous.

 

I was hungry, I was angry and I desperately sought for a cult group to join.

 

I wanted to leave a cult-like arrangement to join a crazier cult, more like from frying pan to fire.

 

I needed to eat, and I wanted revenge.

 

Well, I never found any cult group to join and I’m glad I didn’t. I’d most probably be dead by now, because I was too angry and I don’t do well with being controlled. Mi o gbọ control rárá.

 

Thankfully, it was at that exact moment I met someone who became my family and I never sought after joining anything ’til date.

 

I am not in any cult group whatsoever.

 

Not many people are this lucky and yes, a lot of people have joined cult groups for protection from whatever it is they need protection from.

 

If we have a progressive society, nobody would be resorting to this. And because some people profit from this arrangement, talking about being bullied especially by your family is a taboo. They say to have money first at least before you talk about it, they say to move on, anything to shut you up. If we all talk about it, then there’ll be mostly no need to run to cults anymore.

 

On a larger scale, you cannot “blow” and amount to anything tangible without entering something. You have to belong.

 

The society is arranged in a way that the youth’s choices have been reduced to either breaking, selling your soul, your voice, your essence, that thing that makes you feel fulfilled, your self-transcendence and sense of belonging OR refusing to break while you’re very constantly sabotaged and frustrated on all fronts. You cannot “make it” unless you’re allowing for you to be put on a leash. This is why cultism is easily marketed on our streets today. 

 

I am very sure this resonates a lot with an average Nigerian youth.

 

I suppose people just keep quiet about these things so they won’t be labelled as “mad” and discarded.

 

My own mother, after series of abuse, was the first one to label me as mad so I really won’t flinch if I’m labelled as mad. Oppressors quickly resort to that to discard you, and this same thing was done to Mohbad, the one who inspires this post.

 

I am a very smart person, I am very brilliant, I know my onions, I am consistent and passionate and with each “Sisí, you shouldn’t be where you are”, I laugh.

 

Of course I know I’m a global material but I’m stuck because I’m refusing for any leash to be put on my neck.

 

I’m not any different from anyone else who has done it the system way to survive, I’ve really tried too. I genuinely just can’t.

 

And so, I’ve chosen my battle and I’m willing to fight to the death.

 

While I don’t necessarily approve of these actions (who am I to approve or disapprove anyway, because people do what’s necessary for them), I’m saying that I genuinely do understand anybody who goes against our faux morality and joins cult groups, starts yahoo business, enters politics to become a professional thief and ruins millions of lives just for their own survival.

 

I have beaten round the bush like this so we can first of all, humanise Mohbad. 

 

He is you, he is me, he is trying to survive in a society that’s structured to crush a youth’s dream, unless he/she can be controlled.

 

A society that is constantly threatening to swallow you up instead of protecting you.

 

A society that becomes dangerous to you if you refuse to let go of who you think you are. If you insist on clearing your own path and following it. If you refuse to be a sheep.

 

A society that is arranged in a way that you either let go of who you are before you become anything (that you are not) and before you get anything or you’re consistently harassed, sabotaged, frustrated and even murdered, either literally or figuratively.

 

And oh, you can be labelled as paranoid or mad while they are at it.

 

A society that has held us in a grid lock, that wouldn’t let us move and progress just so a few could be sickeningly rich and powerful and satisfy their shallow self-esteem. You either do it the society’s way or you’re squashed. And it is not easy constantly trying to escape those boots trying to squash you, really.

 

Mohbad was relatable.

 

Mohbad was not mad or crazy or anything out of the ordinary. Naira Marley lied when he claimed Mohbad was just “high”.

 

He wasn’t high.

 

His life was in danger and he cried for help, and this same person has connived with Mohbad’s dad to look for a scapegoat to put the whole blame on. Of course, it’s always a woman’s fault. Women are just automatically to be blamed for everything.

 

Even in an open and close case like Mohbad’s, we’re here uselessly asking for Wunmi to get a DNA test done. How is a DNA test connected to Mohbad being murdered?

 

You are not perusing all the evidences on ground that showed Naira Marley and Sam Larry constantly bullying that guy, but you’d rather quickly just scapegoat a woman?

 

The society failed Mohbad, in life and death. Once the DNA test misogynistic trope was introduced into the conversation, #JusticeForMohbad became injustice for Mohbad.

 

And that is very pathetic because is this the kind of society we want? The kind of society we want to live in? The kind of society you want to birth into? It all ends in emptily claiming to be the “giant of Africa.” Empty barrel makes the loudest noise.

 

Because what sort of a society allows for bullies to go scot free and even become bold enough to make songs to mock the victim’s partner on the social media?

 

There are evidences showing Mohbad was bullied, and the most painful one for me was when that idiotic looking Sam Larry brandished cutlass in broad daylight and chased Mohbad like a fkn animal. Sam Larry is just pure brawn and no brain and it’s evident in how cretinous-looking he is. Àgbààyà játijàti ni.

 

But somehow, it’s Wunmi everybody keeps harassing when there’s remotely no evidence that she has a hand in Mohbad’s death. We are stuck in the age of blaming women for the deaths of their husbands. 

 

I don’t know of or have any evidence that Mohbad’s childhood was rough with his dad, but anybody with half a brain can tie it that Mohbad’s dad is a very useless person as evidenced by everything the dad has been doing on the social media after his son’s death.

 

Cash deposits into his account.

 

Taking Mohbad to beg Naira Marley while Mohbad was still alive, and defending the bullies after Mohbad died, saying he was just being corrected. Does this ring a bell in the way the family institution/cult operates? 

 

Trying to bury Mohbad at night and not showing any remorse or sadness for the manner in which Mohbad was buried, as he didn’t have the decency to buy the right size of a casket.

 

Dancing and singing in a studio with Mohbad’s clothes and using “Mohbad’s dad” as his stage name.

 

Even using his son’s name to raise money so he could get justice for him. What “justice” is he trying to get when he himself said he knows who killed Mohbad? What justice other than opening his mouth and naming the people responsible?

 

All that this useless person of a father, baba ti won fi n she’pe fun’yan, has been concerned about his how Mohbad didn’t take care of him and seizing his properties from Mohbad’s rightful family, which is his wife, kid and his mother. Properties and inheritance have always been the reason why women are blamed for their husbands’ deaths in this part of the world. The extended family always use that as an opportunity to take the properties for themselves, but I didn’t think that would happen in this age of enlightenment.

 

Whatever nonsense interviews Mohbad’s dad has given on how he and Mohbad were close and he took care of him are invalid in the face of the useless way he’s been prancing about all over the internet. It’s almost as if he’s happy Mohbad is dead and he can now have Mohbad’s life.

 

Nobody would be surprised Mohbad didn’t take care of this man while he was alive as evidenced by how wicked this man has been to his own son, even after he died. And in one of the interviews I watched, a man in their community said it that Mohbad was a giver and took care of his father. If anything, I do not believe a word that comes out of this man that claims to be a father. He’s a very useless person and I can’t emphasize that enough. Àgbààyà tí ò to’lé ni.

 

How does the fact that Mohbad’s wife didn’t let Mohbad take care of the dad relate to getting justice for his son?

 

If it was you, would you want to spend a dime on this kind of person, who hasn’t been kind to his own son even in death?

 

I was surprised when I found out Mohbad’s mum claimed he’s even not the father and asked him to go do a DNA test. This man pretended to be deaf and dumb on this matter, and has instead been harassing his son’s wife to go do a DNA test, just so he could inherit his son’s properties.

 

If this man is not the dad, then he wouldn’t have any claim to Mohbad’s properties, you know?

 

Naira Marley and his crew, buoda “Sammy Larry” in conjunction with Mohbad’s dad look more of prime suspects than the two women they’re trying to pin the blame on.

 

Wunmi doesn’t owe anyone any DNA test. Because if we’re not all crazy as a society, e fi ẹ̀tė si’le, e n pa làpálàpá? What has DNA got to do with Naira Marley and Sam Larry consistently bullying Mohbad? So much so that that guy couldn’t freely go to shows anymore and became suicidal?

 

Mohbad never had any issue with his son’s paternity while he was alive and that is supposed to be between him and the person he had a marriage contract with, which is Wunmi. And I suppose this is why the society deems it illegal when you’re not married to someone you love, because then and only then does the society have an automatic say in your affairs, starting from the in-laws and friends to an average idiat on the internet being able to demand DNA test.

 

Lawd knows I will never enter into the marriage institution with anybody. I see everything you do to women who have made this mistake.

 

You say to marry kind (patriarchal) men, Wunmi has done exactly that and that kind patriarchal man cannot protect Wunmi from all of you right now. Marrying a kind patriarchal man hasn’t protected Wùnmi at all. If anything, it has only thrown her to the wolves. Wunmi has played by the books and you all are still harassing her. You say to get married and at least marry kind patriarchal men, but it is on that same premise that you’re bullying her. You don’t reward women for complying with patriarchal constructs at the end of the day.

 

And I see how you treat women who enter relationship contracts and constructs with you; wives, girlfriends, even mistresses.

 

What you’re doing to Mohbad’s wife, you’re doing to Pope’s wife. Somebody drowned but you have to mention it that he was having issues with his wife. Did she drown him? Ha, oloriburuku lẹyin eyan mi o.

 

I’d rather stay outside of the relationship and marriage construct and freely enjoy my relations. You can scream “go and marry” until eternity, you can even die. I will not enter that construct. The people in relationships and marriages aren’t the problem, it’s the constructs and rules governing them that are the problems. When two friends come together, something that’s been sweet before becomes sour immediately they enter the marriage institution, because now the society has a say over how you relate. It’s a given.

 

Mohbad’s mum has also been blamed; okay, how does Mohbad leaving the dad correlate with the FACT that Sam Larry chased Mohbad with a cutlass? What has this got to do with the fact that Mohbad lived in fear for his life, even approached the police and absolutely nothing was done until he was most likely murdered?

 

Is marriage a cult that you can’t ever renounce and leave? 

 

Don’t people with two parents join cult groups and get involved with bad gangs?

 

Ti e ba ki n she oloriburuku ma sh’anfaani, how is Mohbad’s mum leaving that sorry excuse of a man related to the fact that Mohbad was bullied to death? 

 

You leave the men who kept bullying Mohbad and have consistently harassed the women in his life. 

 

This is what is called misogyny.

 

You hate women.

 

And you blame women for everything. 

 

And it’s suspicious, VERY suspicious, that the prime suspects in this guy’s death have unanimously agreed to scapegoat the women instead. Why have they both agreed and consistently worked together this much? Ẹnu wọn ti ko ju. They have been too cohesive and co-operative. This intense cooperation between the ‘father’ of a dead victim of bullying and the people who bullied his son cannot make sense, no matter how you look at it. 

 

The bullying of Mohbad by Sam Larry and Naira Marley is a punishable crime, and we have evidences of the perpetrators. Justice hasn’t been served on this fact alone.

 

We are yet to know whether Mohbad’s death is murder or not and the Nigerian Police have failed us on that, as usual.

 

But another crime is presently going on. It is the cover-up of the crime of bullying that happened before Mohbad’s death. This ongoing crime is being perpetrated by Mohbad’s dad, Sam Larry, Naira Marley and co, because they all have the means, opportunity and motives for the crime.

 

Sam Larry and Naira Marley want to turn attention away from their bullying of Mohbad and so they turn the issue on Wunmi by asking for DNA. Naira Marley even made a song about it. Mohbad’s dad wants Mohbad’s properties so he has a mutual interest with them to take Wunmi out of the way. These are the motives.

 

They have the means to carry it out through the deployment of their social media influencers and PR managers.

 

They have the opportunity to do it because the Nigerian Police is delaying the autopsy results ’til date.

 

So it can be agreed that this whole DNA thing is just a distraction, and the women are just convenient scapegoats. 

 

Mohbad’s dad is insisting for Wunmi to do a DNA and only after then would he reveal who killed Mohad, and if Wunmi complies, it’ll be in our subconscious forever that Wunmi COULD HAVE had a hand in Mohbad’s death, even when there’s no logical evidence for that.

 

I believe if Mohbad’s dad is really only intent on getting justice for his son, and not intentionally turning this whole thing into a circus show so that inevitably, everybody forgets and moves on while subconsciously blaming Wunmi for Mohbad’s death or delaying justice for him, then he would open that his mouth and speak already on who killed him.

 

Any father would want justice for their son, and I’m very sure if he really has anything tangible to say, he would have gone ahead. He’s just putting on a show and wildly riding on sexism. If he talks and fingers point at Wunmi, then necessity would mandate her to do a DNA test if it’s relevant to who murdered Mohbad.

 

Unless this man has nothing to say, and is just harassing Wunmi for nothing. 

 

Because he insists the people who openly bullied his son weren’t the perpetrators while still keeping his mouth shut on the identity of the people who murdered Mohbad, all the while making us all believe that Wunmi and Mohbad’s mum are to blame.

 

This doesn’t add up at all.

 

In fact, I believe Mohbad’s dad should be arrested and interrogated if he’s intentionally keeping away such vital information. He’s intentionally delaying justice.

 

I do not come as a woman or man today. For this article, I am genderless.

 

I come as a person who is very sad, scared and angry at the grave injustice meted out to another person, whose gender I also do not see.

 

This person didn’t get any justice while he was alive, he still hasn’t gotten any after his death, while his bullies gallivant about, make mockery of his memory and his dad bask in his fame, while keeping quiet on who could have killed him.

 

Sexism is being used to delay justice for Mohbad.

 

Mohbad is not extraordinarily unlucky.

 

It could be you, it could be me, it could be anybody.

 

We’ve only got one world.

 

And there’s something very wrong with it.

 

Written by  Sisí Afrika.