THE HEART OF A FIGHTER
By Lengdung Tungchamma
You should not be surprised when
you find a gathering of people in Jenta. Children gather to play, fathers
gather to discuss on the last promises uttered by the politicians, mothers
gather to discuss the stubbornness of their children, young boys gather to
discuss their girls, and young girls gather to discuss their recent escapades.
There is a third kind of
gathering, one that brings all of this people together. Beware of such
gathering, most especially if they are all found in standing position. The
standing up of everyone in a gathering is an indication there was a crisis or
there is about to be a crisis. Domestic crisis, I mean.
Other kinds of crisis can be
found too. Like the kind that was present when I visited the Second Transformer
of Jenta Mangoro on Sunday, 27th August, 2017.
You cannot dare to pass such
gathering. The ambience alone would leave you with guilt if you dare to ignore
it. By the way, who resist the sight of wrestling? This is our traditional wrestling.
On getting closer to the scene, I
got a full gist of what was going on. The JED Plc. (Jos Electricity
Distribution Company) workers were there to repair the transformer which had
been down for over 1 week. After checking for some minutes, the workers told
the onlookers that a major compartment of the transformer was stolen and therefore,
there is need for a new one to be purchased. And until then, there shall be no
power.
Within seconds, the youths of
Jenta had trotted out to the scene. The actual story was told, an official of
theirs in Jenta Adamu named Mr. Yusuf, had removed the part purportedly
missing. These youths vowed that the officials present would not exit the scene
until Mr. Yusuf returns with that part of the transformer. Threats began to
pour in, threats of burning the cars, threats of bursting the tires of the car
and so on.
At this point, I heard enough. I already
know the conclusion of the event, I left due to an important meeting I had to
attend. I got back later and discovered that power had been restored. I didn’t
need to know how this was made possible.
Such scenes used to be very
common in Jenta in my growing days. Citizens of Jenta would visit the NEPA
(present JED) office each time there was indefinite power outage. They go in
large number with placards, axes, cutlasses and sticks.
It has been reported that viewing
centers owners would often bribe NEPA officials not to provide power during
special matches in order to garner viewers for these Center owners.
For me, these moments are victory
moments. Maybe I don’t agree with their mode of fighting for their rights but I
learnt how to revolt against injustice, against corruption and against cheating,
and I learnt how to stand up for my right.
Injustice is prevalent in this
world, and so are timid people. People accept the status quo, they accept the
norm saying “We will get used to it”. It is a good thing that I never got used
to anything against the right human conscious. Thanks largely to the Jenta
Life.
Jenta is a spirit, like every
other community. The spirit can be a good, at the same time, it could be very
bad. The corruption of anything good produces something terribly bad.
I am glad some of us were baptized
with the good spirit of Jenta. With the good spirit, we would chase out every bad
spirit.
On this same Jenta, good will
reign.
#ThisJentaLifeSef #OurStory:TheJentaStory
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