Tales from Bojuri: Alejo Ale (Night visitors)

Long ago in the land of Bojuri, a small village not far from Ogbomoso, a land of the mischievous and mysterious, a land of strange happenings. A land where evil is raw, lived Alamu, a cunning and devious man, who would always go down as a legend in the folklores of Bojuri.

Alamu had any character you could tag bad. He was greedy, proud, hot tempered, wicked, and flippant and so on. He was the definition of a bad man. The biggest insult a kid could tell another during that period was to be called ‘an Alamu’, he was that bad. Whenever people saw him coming, they went mute. He was hated but he didn’t care a bit. The woman, Ayanfe, he called his wife was a complement for him. The both activated each other devilish agenda.

Alamu being a cunning man had no farms, he believed his intellect could fetch him lots of money so he proceeded in blackmailing people as an occupation. His ears were sharper than those of the dogs of Bojuri. Nothing happened in Bojuri without Alamu not having knowledge about.

He would leave his house in the morning and walk up and down the land of Bojuri, looking for who to blackmail. He was so good in this social media that he would have made an excellent town crier.

Now Bojuri was a commercial success compared to the surrounding villages and was economically attractive, so the market was booming with foreigners who could not pass the night in Bojuri because of the decree given by Oba Ajara after the ordeal with Ejola. Trading in Bojuri was difficult for foreigners because it wasn’t easy for people to travel every day and traders found ways to spend the night in Bojuri.

This was an avenue for Alamu to earn massively. He always looked for indigenes that accommodated traders to blackmail them.

‘If you don’t give me something, I will report you to the Oba who is my uncle’s sister’s brother’s daughter’s son’ he would threaten and lie. Everyone feared Alamu because he was wicked but Olomola called his bluff and paid for it.

‘You can’t do anything, the king wouldn’t even give a flippant man like you an audience, you think I’m a coward?’ Olomola replied but he would live to regret it. Alamu ran straight to the palace and lied that Olomola had questioned the power of the kingship, calling him a pauper who had ascended the throne when he confronted him for harbouring visitors.

Oba Ajara felt insulted and ordered Olomola’s visitor be executed. Olomola himself was severely beaten and all his lands taken from him. He shortly afterward could be seen as a beggar at the Banjoko market.

After Olomola’s pitiful experience, Alamu’s evil reputation soared and he was feared the more. He claimed to be the uncle’s sister’s brother’s daughter’s son of Oba Ajara. Even though nobody spoke anything to him, he always had a way to get information from the people of Bojuri. The laws of the land were hard to adhere to and Alamu who had mastered it blackmailed people on a regular. He was even paid  every market day.