SOME THINGS AREN’T FAIR IN LOVE AND WAR
A Review of Wale Okediran’s Madagali
By
About a century and half ago, John
Lyly wrote, “All is Fair in Love and War.” A keen reader would refute that
statement upon engaging with the first page of Madagali.
Set in the North
East of contemporary Nigeria, Madagali pays a fundamental attention to the
pathetic nature of Nigeria’s prolonged fight against Boko Haram, and it follows
a complex dilemma of love. This makes the story of the protagonist, Lance
Corporal Bukar Salisu, one that should not be missed.
Away from the buzzing of shellfire,
the whizzing of bullets, the spattering of blood and mud, and the tearing down
of bodies, the 24-year-old Bukar Salisu, a Nigerian-Liberian is caught between
two young damsels. The first is Safiya, the crafty daughter of a ‘repentant’ Boko
Haram leader. She works with one of the Non Governmental Organizations offering
palliatives to Internally Displaced Persons. The second is the curly haired Liberian
Nurse-in-Training, Jewel, whom Bukar meets in Monrovia while there to spend his
sick leave with his maternal family. Both will come to find out that Bukar is a
rafto ─an impotent man, due to an injury he sustained from a .45 Caliber (4).
Before this
crossroad, a top ranking military officer, Lt. Col. Bala Humus, frames up Bukar.
In a hasty tribunal, the young Lance Corporal is sentenced to death for wanting
to supply lethal military hardware to the Boko Haram insurgents ─the initial
plan of Lt. Col. Bala. Bukar’s predicament juxtaposed with the in-house killing
of Colonel Yusuf, a battle savvy officer who was successfully leading a Tank campaign
against the insurgents (50), suggests some horrible things about the architecture
of the insurgency.
Since the onset
of the Boko Haram insurgency, more than thirty thousand civilian lives have
been lost. Many more have been bludgeoned into disillusionment and hopelessness
because the likes of Lt. Col. Bala Humus continue to adulterate the Nigerian
military. Numerous scandals involving the military have put a great strain on
the Nation’s potential to conquer the insurgency. Thus, the fight has become a lucrative
investment.
In this light, the
book lays bare a fetid military system where bosses sit on the meagre allowances
and morals of soldiers; where soldiers who should ordinarily protect IDPs harass
and intimidate them; where there are suspicious withdrawals of military presence
just before terrorist attacks (51), and so on. There are macabre depictions of gallant
soldiers fighting with mostly worn-out weapons and rationed ammunitions,
dropping like flies in the heat of enemy firepower. A private is forced to
write in protest to the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces: “Your Excellency,
we are treated like animals. Most of us are afraid to talk because of the
consequences of voicing out our grievances (93).” The author does not spare shifty
humanitarian organizations at the periphery of things. He dices into the
narrative their bad behaviours.
The vivid imagery
of the book is reminiscent of Ernest Hemingway’s World War I novel, Farewell to
Arms, especially in its fecund recreation of the immense cataclysm the fight
between the Federal troops and the insurgents has manifested. Hence, the author
captures the most precise conditions of people rarely heard about: those
smacked directly by the insurgency. We visit their camp at Kaya. It is crammed
with, “lost children crying for their parents… wailing and disheveled women,
wounded men covered with dried blood and filthy dressings (72)”. We feel their
pain, hunger, and hopelessness.
One remarkable edge of the book is its
poignant and accessible language, often flavoured with a reliable tone of knowledge.
Another is its exploration of the friendship, stoicism, and solidarity between
soldiers braving rugged times.
Now, back to love or something like that. While
the devoted Jewel is keeping her fingers crossed in Liberia, the seductive Safiya
links Bukar with an almost immediate trado-medical cure for his impotency. And
just when his penis is resurrected, Safiya puts in a grave demand: Bukar, a
disciplined soldier, must leak classified information for a ‘purely
humanitarian operation’ that will see to the welfare of starving Boko Haram insurgents
or else it’s goodbye to his erection (240).
One of the most daring works in the
history of contemporary African writing, Madagali is poised to throw punches
wherever truth on the fight against Boko Haram is marginalized.
─ Tega Oghenechovwen
has an MA in Literary Studies from the University of Jos, Nigeria. He is interested in psycho-trauma,
human liberty and the battle between innocence and experience. He has published
work with the Rumpus Magazine, LitroMagazine, Black Sun Lit, Aké Review,
AFREADA and elsewhere. He tweets @tega_chovwen
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