ELECTRIFYING THE ROAD TO 2015

I am tired of life as it is. For three days now, there has been total blackout, an absolute abstinence of electricity from this vicinity, except for the lousy generators which produced a couple of voltage in exchange for our sanity. when put on, they announced their presence in the same manner an industrial grinding machine does, the annoying part is that they never stopped their screaming and whenever the owner, who by the way is fortunate enough to afford such a nuisance, decides to put the generator off, a sudden calm envelopes your being and sanity begins to possess again where it once dwelt.

In spite of the forthcoming elections, ordinary power supply is still elusive. Unlike previous years when such amenities are afforded us as bribes in exchange for our votes which by the way has never mattered in deciding election outcomes. This evening, the darkness had lost its allure and the blackouts which I once relished now haunts my indifferent heart.

I decide to switch on the Generator, for no other reason than to lighten up my dampened mood. As was the norm, I had switched off all the heavy appliances but forgot the Television, so in spite of my irritation, immediately my Generator powered the light bulbs in the house, the television came alive too and to my utter dismay and annoyance, a certain Otueke man was spitting profusely into an unfortunate microphone, while frantically waving a tri-coloured umbrella in the air. I stood there mortified, he seemed to take a cue from me as he abruptly stopped his ranting, carefully extricated a handkerchief from his trouser pockets and wiped his mouth. To me, he just wiped off all the promises he just made to the gullible mammoth crowd that constituted his audience.

In that fleeting moment, I angrily heaved the television and smashed it on the floor, it flickered and the last thing I heard was ‘PEEDEEPEE’ before it blacked out. I had made it a rule, I cannot stand watching while the source of all my woes stood smiling and waving at the masses whom crispy naira notes had induced their sudden, one-day long amnesia. For the next four years, they would remember and curse that one day of amnesia, but by then power would have been restored to the…‘PEEDEEPEE, someone screamed in the background. I wallow in rage.