Today in this blog post, I would be greeting you Good Morning as this blog post is being written under the forceful urge of conscience in the early hours of the morning.
I would also be greeting you Good Morning because I really want to respect you. Who knows? You might want to help me with the money for the Premium account that Spotify charged from my account this morning that is making me stream tears. Like I don’t have a job and yet they are charging me?!
Anyways, the reason why I am here today is because I wanted to gist you something about some Oga Police.
Now, Police Brutality isn’t some new happening in Nigeria. Everyone knows EndSars. It was well.. what it is. It is not also common with them. Federal Road Safety Commission (FRSC) Corps have their issues. Traffic Compliance and Enforcement Corps of Ogun State (TRACE) are the meanest anywhere. There’s also that of the military too. There’s that of Agbero taskforce that are set up in different states in the name of Vigilante watch and Traffic Control.
Resuming Second Semester was in a private chauffeured car. The Driver had a lot of items in his car that he was transporting to the East. Relax, they were household items. Because he wouldn’t let himself get caught in the Police drama, he prepared money in smaller denominations like N100 to ‘settle’ these officers.
Roughly en route from Lagos to Onitsha, there are about 70 Checkpoints, You’d be wondering what in the world and yet people complain about insecurity. It was like these checkpoints are set up to make money from Drivers. If you don’t cooperate, you would be delayed unnecessarily.
I remember when my dad drove us to the village for the Christmas holidays. My Dad took his time to prepare his papers and documents but en route on our journey? We were stopped and delayed for close to an hour. They didn’t let us go until my Dad had settled them with N10,000.
So for the driver who took me to Onitsha, N7000 was what he needed for no disturbance. Ask me how much I paid? N5000.
At this junction, I began to feel pity for him because there wasn’t profit for him. He just needed me in his car to raise money to pay these officers. These are some of the reasons why the transport industry seems expensive. Imagine a driver with a wife and four kids hustling like this with a Sienna of 7 people capacity. It’s not so easy with the increase in prices in the country, especially fuel.
Even with the bribe in place, there were still some who would after receiving the money delay us briefly though. One thing about Nigerians is that we are able to find fun and laugh while facing these issues. Immediately that was done, My driver started jamming to Oga Police by Psquare
Tell me
Na wetin you go do for this life
Wey police no go come harass you
Well, the classic-ness of it, all right?
Did you know that the Bible has something to say about Bribery?
Proverbs 21:14 (NIV) A gift given in secret soothes anger, and a bribe concealed in the cloak pacifies great wrath.
Now don’t go making interpretations for this passage. It is what it is. The Book of Proverbs were not entirely written in context so you can’t borrow the context card.
The song coming into my mind is You I live for by Moses Bliss. Actually, that’s the only way forward. To live above the systems of the world. Just stay grounded in God’s word. Trusting and relying on it with your everything!
If I may just do free ad for my ‘oppressor’, you can stream those songs on Spotify.
Bye Bye!
BTW, If you want to send me money, send me a Deeehhheeeeemmmm!
Young vibe
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