Trouble barged into our lives the moment Uncle Asrifi ran over to our house that Saturday evening after the six o’clock news on GBC radio, and reported that Uncle Mensah has been arrested amidst the coup d’état, and that he has been taken to Sunyani Barracks. This caused a great stir in the house. Then Grandma literally collapsed on me Ma, and they had to pour a bucketload of water on her in attempt to resuscitate her.

It was only afterwards that she stared blankly and asked, “What happened?”

Uncle Mensah was the beacon of beacons of light in our family and the entire village. He was a former village boy who being abundantly endowed by the Almighty in all kinds of learning rose from a life of ignorance to become a Major General in the army and the body guard of the democratically elected president. These things rarely happened to us village folks; the despised, the underdogs and the spat upon whose lives are consigned variously to places far flung as Agyemangkrom, Badukrom, Antwirifo, Sromani and Kofiasua all in Bonoland. We never did eat the good of the land, survived with our wits about us and found joy in simplicities such as when the crops taken to Ahenkro sold, and the money could be used on a pound of beef, new panga and new sandals fashioned out of used lorry tires.

Upon entering our house, his picture was the first thing any visitor would see in the living room. His exercise books from the local primary school could still be seen as it is today. He had done so well that the headteacher at that time had personally driven him to Ahenkro, the district capital, for the common entrance exam at which he excelled. From thence, he joined the army and rose rapidly to be a Major General at the young age of 35. But he wasn’t puffed with false pride. He would always come home during breaks in his training to help grandma on the farm. Such humility. The villagers would say. Of its kind, it’s unknown. `There’s a young man with a head on his shoulders. Look at those biceps in upheaval on his mother’s farm. There’s a young man who has seen it all with the shakers and movers of the nation, but hasn’t forgotten his roots. Yes, he was a source of pride.

But, to others he was just an upstart who’s had his life lined up for him by the benevolence of the gods. What misfortune has he suffered in his life? None. When children died of typhoid of a kind that had never been known in the land, didn’t he survive? When the famine of ’83 claimed people, wasn’t it his father alone who was consumed? They whispered in hushed tones on the way to the farm, on the way to the stream. That family has had it too rosy. They should just wait. Till today, I still don’t understand that kind of hatred.

Then after his training when he graduated top of his class, he was hand picked by the president to be his bodyguard. That was a source of celebration in the village. There was food and drinks. Many came to our homestead to share in our joy. Others also came with a glint of jealousy in their eyes to sneer. This good fortune will never last. You just watch. They’d say. From then on, his visits to the village became infrequent. Working with the president doesn’t give one the luxury of family life. He told me one day. You are always planning, travelling all the world. He would send pictures of places he’d been to in a box to us. There was once a picture of him standing right beside the American president in the Whitehouse. Somehow, I identified with his reason of refusing to come to the village. If one has been around the gates of heaven, there’s no need playing party to the devils in hell. Here is one who has eaten angel’s food. But, in our part of the land, good things never last. It was as if we were all hemmed in, fattened for a while like chickens only for the day of slaughter. Somehow, at the back of our minds, we had expected his downward spiral, but not as quickly as it unraveled.

The coup that toppled uncle’s government happened on a Saturday. I remember. On that day, Mama sent me to Aunt Akua, the fufu seller that there was a sack load of cassava wouldn’t she be interested? As it was towards evening, the men had returned from the farms and were around a bottle of akpeteshie and herbs in Aunt Akua’s courtyard. As soon as they saw me, they stopped briefly, glasses in hand, looked at me and spoke in hushed tones. Isn’t he his little nephew? Has anyone broken the news to them yet? Imagine what it would do to that old woman. Then one of them beckoned to me. It was Duku in his gravel voice which always pierced like needles.

“Hey kid. Akua isn’t in. Run along home now.” He said.

I stood watching him.

“I said go home now.”

 “Why?”

 Then they all burst into derisive laughter.

“Isn’t he the bastard? Where is his father? And now that the carpet has been flung from under their feet, we will see in the village.” Ansuh croaked this time.

They sneered and went on drinking. They were no hopers, men of dubious characters and deeds who wouldn’t attend to their cornfields, but sat all day long to eat bush meat, drink alcohol, and later to do evil things with loose women in the dark. They were of that kind who would sell their fingers for a drop of akpeteshie. Mother used to say of those men. It was better she never got entangled with any of them. Although I never knew my father, I wouldn’t want any of those hopeless bunch to lay claim on me.

 I ran home. That was when I met Uncle Asrifi in the courtyard, gleefully trumpeting the news of our demise. Then Grandma couldn’t take it and she slumped to the floor. And Mama wailed for the enemy could now celebrate. Had it not been for my uncle, this coup wouldn’t have had a mention in the village where men had serious business to think of, say, the palm wine going stale than to worry about trigger happy soldiers. But, as fate would have it, we were caught up in it, and trouble, with its deep-rooted tentacles, had its permanent stay in our lives. First, soldiers came down from Accra in their armoured vehicles and interrogated us. It was a traumatic experience for Grandma especially. All she could do was cry and beat her breast harshly. Ah! Jesus have mercy. The commander, a dark lanky fellow with a perpetual scar running from under his left eye to the upper lip, which conferred on him a malignant look, kept his loaded pistol in front of us and said it would be a travesty if those bullets were to go unused. Satisfied with his intimidation, he proceeded to tell us how saboteurs of which my uncle was one, together with their families were the worst kind of humans. And that, they should all be summarily shot. At this, Grandma gave out a wail. Isn’t it so in the Maker’s laws? When Adam in his stupidity sabotaged the Elohim, what happened to mankind? What about Achan? Did he not plunge his entire family into the abyss? It is so. Then we should expect the same. Nothing more, nothing less.

The next time we; Mama and, I saw Uncle Mensah was a week after the coup d’état. 

The road from the village to Ahenkro meets the river in the valley where there is a wooden bridge. I have stopped many times on my way to school to gaze upon the river running swiftly to the place unknown and to receive delight in the beauty of the songs of the birds in the woods and the sweet perfume of the sunflower roundabout. These flowers sway idly in the sun until you climb the hill towards Kofiasua and descend again towards Jericho where the cemetery straddles behind and beyond the town. There is always a sense of foreboding here. I hate the cemetery. From here, you can see the bright lights of Ahenkro.

The week after the coup, Mama and I walked this same road to Ahenkro. The river flew swiftly still, and the birds and flowers added to the spectacle even as it was in Eden. But we did not stop to enjoy these simple blessings nature has bestowed on us. Our hearts were troubled and the road seemed long. At Ahenkro, we picked the early morning bus to Sunyani Barracks where he was been kept. We had food and woven kente blankets, grandma’s prized dowry which she had kept all these years for Uncle’s to be wife, for him.

A guard stood impassive at the entrance as if he was chiseled out of marble. There was a long queue of people who had come that early morning to visit incarcerated loved ones. There was a hush in the crowd. Everybody knew the implications for loved ones being kept in the barracks. When it got to our turn, the guard took the Ghana must go from Mama and turned its contents inside out on the ground. Then he seized the blankets and rebuked us sharply. Didn’t we know Uncle was an enemy of the state, and that there’s no comfort for such people, the lowest of the low? Were we being sympathetic to Uncle’s cause? We should be careful lest we swing together with him. Then he took us along a dark corridor into a foyer with its unmistakable sense of foreboding where lorries with green tarpaulins stood parked, and soldiers performed the most astonishing drills. Two men, clad in green army t-shirts, with bulgy biceps, were rolling a thick log down a slope. A column of 12 young soldiers were marching behind their leader, and the sound of their boots against the granules and their voices charging hey! hey! aie! aie! conspired to make the atmosphere tense. Civilians may not cry or laugh in this barracks. It is a dishonor to the army and the land it protects. These men and women lay their lives for the land without fear even as the land is afraid.

 A tall elderly warden bid us sit on a bench under a tree. He seemed kind, and thinking about it now, I know why, because no one kept in that section of the barracks ever lived to tell their story especially for those in cage D7 where Uncle Mensah was kept. It was a death sentence before a judge pronounced it. The sky was cloudy and the weather cold. Yet the rains never came. Then they brought him in chains. He sat across the bench to us while two security guards with guns flung across their shoulders watched on forlornly. I watched him closely. It has been two years since I saw him. He, who had been too tall, too strong, looked like a gaunt mass of bone. As for Mama, she couldn’t contain her tears so Uncle Mensah spoke to me. He asked after Grandma and the farm. Look how strong I have grown, and I’m on my way to becoming a man now and I should do well with my books and in spite of everything, there’s hope for the future. And that anytime there is an upheaval in the land, there is the need for sacrifice. And he was happy he’d been chosen to appease the land. And after it has drunk its fill of the sacrificial lamb, there’d be aplenty of good tidings for the remnants. It seemed he had accepted his fate, and he was happy about it. A man’s life is complete when he’s had a purposeful death. Then, he asked me to protect the women. That is the duty of any man.

I wanted to ask him about the case, but the siren drowned my words. Then I saw the two guards shoving, shackling, then he was bundled into his cage.

In the evening, the leader of the coup addressed the nation on national radio. He spoke of probity and accountability. Big words which sounded hollow to me. The president has misappropriated funds meant for roads and hospitals. He was again accused of nepotism. How many of his cronies occupied top positions in the government? 150. If the nation cared to know. We cannot run a nation like this. And he must pay for that. Parliament has been dismissed. Those government officials would be tried in a court of competent jurisdiction, and by God, if they were ever found guilty of fleecing Ghanaians of a pesewa, then their punishment will answer to their deed. God bless our homeland Ghana. He ended his address. Then the national anthem was belted for a while.

Men said the leader was the messiah sent to rid the nation of her filth. Wasn’t he a man of the people? Just the other day, he was in the news for carrying a sack load of cocoa on his back. Was he not seen digging trenches? Such a selfless leader. As for the president and his officials, well, the courts will decide their fate.

We never heard from Uncle Mensah again until a month later. That period was the most despondent in my young life. I couldn’t eat or sleep. My sleep was always punctuated with nightmares, and I always woke up with a start in the night with my heart thumping in my chest wildly. There was no joy in eating. The food tasted like sand in my mouth. And for this, I grew lean. Rumor was rife. Some said he had been killed already, and it was the most excruciating of deaths for he was tied to a helicopter in a sack and dropped into the middle of the ocean. I have never seen the sea except to read about it in the geography book Wonders of the World. Even then I thought it was shallow. But they said it was a bottomless pit filled with terrible man-eating monsters. Uncle Mensah wouldn’t last a second in it. Others also said the coup plotters had dug a pond, filled with saber toothed crocodiles, and that all the accused have been fed as lunch to these reptiles. Alone in the dark, I would wonder the crimes Uncle Mensah had committed to be met with such fate. If what he’s been accused of were all true, then stealing from a nation must be heinous.

Then after one month, we heard on the radio that the investigations have concluded and that, all the five government officials including uncle would appear before the honourable judge in the fast-track high court set up especially for a case of such magnitude. It was a solemn event. As usual, Grandma’s arthritis was so severe she was unable to attend the proceedings.

Tell him, God will be with him. Was all she could say.

 Mama and I travelled the long distance to the city, where we lodged with a woman mama knew back in her school days.

This time, all the accused were neatly dressed. Uncle Mensah seemed happy as if he had prior knowledge of his acquittal. Their lawyer who later we were told had taken the case for God, was a thin bearded man who spoke in a billy goat-like voice. He spoke of miscarriage of justice, of using iron fists on a fly. The prosecutors presented sheets upon sheets of damning evidence against the accused, of monies stashed in secret bank accounts, of contracts being awarded to family and friends without going through proper procurement procedure. Arguments and counter arguments went back and forth. Even then, I didn’t know black people could speak English like that. Then at the end of three days, judgement was passed. Death sentence by firing squad to all the accused. There was a hush in the courtroom. Uncle Mensah turned towards us with the same little smile on his face and bowed his head once. Then they were shepherded out in handcuffs into a dark van which sped away. Mama looked jaded. The lawyer came towards us to offer his sympathy. He did all he could, but the odds were too great against all the accused.

The next day was the execution. I looked longingly into the sky, for it was sad to look upon. The clouds had gathered and were chasing one another overhead, casting darkness over the land. Soon, the sun would rise, and swiftly drive the clouds away beyond the mountains, and towards evening, the rain would come. I was sure of this.  Mama couldn’t bring herself to go to the woods behind the barracks. I went alone because the law demanded a family member present.

They were tied to the poles with their heads in sacks which were removed as soon as the executioners were satisfied with the preparations. Then five soldiers faced each of the accused about ten meters away. Uncle Mensah was calm, too calm for my liking. He wasn’t scared of this specter of death. I cried. I cried for the future and not for what was about to happen to my uncle.

 Then the loud voice went up, followed by the reports of the guns. Then it was all over. Just like that. Life is meaningless. Here today, gone tomorrow. The bodies were put into sacks behind the police van not to be seen again. Enemies of the state were buried in unmarked graves.

The village was astir when we returned. The elders immediately demanded a sheep of white hue to pacify Asase Yaa, for uncle’s death was musuo. How could a man in his prime have his life forcibly taken from him like that?

After sometime, life became a lull again. The years were the same only dates changed. The harmattan came. Farmers cleared the land. The rains came, then crops were planted. The people sat down to eat, afterwards they arose to play. The young were married, and were given in marriage. The old and young, they died, and were buried. Uncle Mensah was forgotten. We never get excited or depressed over things for too long in the village.

But his death changed my family forever. Those bullets didn’t hit uncle alone, but us all. Just like Adam in the moral prints, he reeled us all into the abyss. Things were never the same. Exactly a week after uncle’s death, in the late evening, Grandma sat around the pot of corn and chatted with her two friends from the other houses. They reminisced of the past and spoke of days of Anansesem and moving hips under the moonlight. I sat on a stool listening in yet not listening. Grandma even passed a stick of corn to me which I munched with delight. We were hearty. We have overcome the worst of uncle’s death. We were still hearty when the last embers died and darkness overcame us on our beds. The next morning, I went to wake Grandma up. She was cold to the touch. She was dead. I stared hard at her stiff joints. So calm she lay on the sheets with a smile plastered on her face as if she’d seen uncle in the land of the dead. We buried her in her favorite kente and planted wild sunflowers on her grave. She would have wanted it so.

  Mama, before she cut her writs and bled to death, resorted to being chatty and would recount uncle’s death to anyone who would listen even to babies. They tied him to a pole and they shot him. She’d say.  As for me, I could not sleep in the dark after that for the harrowing image of uncle’s dead body in the sack had been tattooed in my memory. Memory is a mocker. It was my companion who followed me everywhere and sat side by side with me. At times, when I thought I have completely rid myself of it, then came the night, and there it was in form of a nightmare with uncle’s bloodied face ever grinning.  Try as I might, I couldn’t erase it.  In secondary school, I struggled a lot during sleeping hours. I would sit on my bed for long hours in the dark staring into nothing. It was during my university days, when I had a room to myself that I could sleep while the lights burnt bright. During the frequent electricity rationing exercise, I always kept a candle stick by my side.

I lost faith in life after that. And I have stayed so small, so quiet that it has become impossible for me to marry. No woman would want to be with a man who couldn’t sleep without the light, I suppose. 

Now, I don’t often speak of the past. It’s a can of worms, and there’s no need to dig up dead things. The stench would assail us.

 I learned from my uncle’s predicament that human nature is extremely fickle. One could be up today and down tomorrow.  One has to stay quiet, and mind one’s business in order to be comfortable. So, I play along, talk when I am supposed to and keep quiet too. I rarely listen to the news or read the newspapers; they are full of re-arranged truths and gossip. I have lived an ordinary life ever since.

The president, who uncle guarded was pardoned on health grounds after a lengthy trial. Those who staged the coup to clean up the mess having exchanged their military fatigues for three-piece suits, have caused more mess than their messy hands could clean. A bag of rice now costs more than a Toyota Prado if one belongs to the right circles. And to cover their tracks, they have barricaded themselves in with democracy, elections and laws. They throw the laws around on TV and radio stations in fine suits and banal tones. According to Article 35; Subsection 16, clause 10, living former heads of state cannot be prosecuted until 20 years after leaving office. They say. But what laws and elections can withstand anger fueled by marginalization and poverty and ignorance?  Can the constitution defend itself against corruption and unbearable living conditions?

There’s trouble across the land again. The multitude, after years of asking in vain, have taken to knocking and seeking on the streets. I fear the continuous jostling and rumbling of the multitude’s feet will awaken the land, and it will cry for another sacrifice. And after the land has been appeased, what happens next?

About the Author:

Johnson Appiah has an MA in English Literature. His stories have appeared in The Kalahari Review, African Writers Magazine, Afritondo, Munyori Magazine and Brittle Paper.

*Feature image David Gabrić on Unsplash