Bloody Sunday

BY TOYIN AKANNI

I am afraid of the dark. Despite the taint on my masculinity, it is an irrational fear I’ve grappled with since childhood. My mother used to say, “Biodun, you’re a child of God. His light is more powerful than darkness.” I would ruminate on her words, but I still kept the lamp on at night.

On Sunday, the 5th of June 2022, my parents were livid when I decided to stay at home and study for my upcoming exams. As a family, we took our faith seriously and would never miss Sunday mass. My teenage hormones kicked in that day, and I refused to get out of bed. Papa slammed the door, and I heard my mother’s voice echoing my punishment upon their return.

They never returned.

Chaos ensued in our neighbourhood when sounds of gunshots permeated the idyllic atmosphere of Owo. I rushed to the scene just as the crowd started to gather.

“Oh my God! Oh my God!” a woman screamed with both hands on her head. The police had arrived and were asking people to move back from the crime scene. “They used dynamite and guns on innocent churchgoers,” a man lamented.

I went through the back entrance, passing the vestry to the church’s main hall. My heart was racing as I searched through the chasm of anguish in front of me. This was a place of prayer and praise, of love and laughter. But as I walked through the familiar corridor, I wish I could unsee what I saw. Corpses drenched in blood, brains splashed out of skulls, human body parts scattered on the sacred ground.

Suddenly my soul wanted to leap out of my body. I felt cold and warm at the same time, and everything seemed to be in slow motion.  I didn’t even need to see their bodies. I just knew. My family was among the people massacred. My mother, father and little sister killed without reason. I knelt on the floor over them and wept inconsolably. My stomach churned, and my mouth was as bitter as my heart. It didn’t make sense!

These people didn’t commit any crime; they simply went to church. When did going to church become a death sentence?

At that moment, I realised that the dark wasn’t what I should have been afraid of.

I should have been afraid of the darkness of the human heart.

The depth of its wickedness.

Its ravenous appetite for evil.

It is the only thing vile enough to cause the carnage of the bloody Sunday.

Toyin Akanni is a freelance writer with the PSJ UK team of Nigerians in diaspora advocating against the killings and insecurity in Nigeria www.psjuk.org