TRUE-LIFE STORIES WITH FUNMILOLA SOTUMINU
THE day my husband left for South Africa, our twins, for the first time since their birth, fell ill at the same time. Their body temperature was alarmingly high throughout the night. My mother-in-law and I could not sleep. We took turns to care for them and prayed for the day to break fast so that we could rush them to the hospital.
In the morning, I reached out for my phone to call my husband. I wanted to, first, be sure that he had arrived safely and then tell him about the development at home. I thought that it was quite unusual of him not to have called since he arrived and felt their flight could have been delayed. He had only one mobile line. My mother-in-law also tried to reach him, but she could not.
We took the children to the hospital in the morning. Luckily, the doctor on duty was my husband’s bosom friend and mate at the medical school, so he cared for them like his own. They were, however, admitted for one day. Throughout that day in the hospital, I kept on trying my husband’s line.
The next day, when he was supposed to have resumed at the hospital, I called the office number and was told that he had not resumed as at the time I was calling. I knew that all was not well, and my mother-in-law, too was becoming really afraid. In the car, on our way home, after the children had been discharged, I got a call from my husband’s hospital.
I held my breath and prayed that it was my husband, who was calling with the office line, probably because something had happened to his phone. But when I picked, the voice was that of a white man, who later introduced himself as the Chief Medical Director. When he spoke, he confirmed my worst fear. My husband was not attacked in the xenophobic violence that erupted the day before; he collapsed on arrival at the airport. He did not even get home.
The CMD tried to console me on the phone to no avail. He was still saying something, but I did not hear anything again. I just collapsed. My whole world had shattered right before me. Where would I start? How would I ever be able to live in this world without my caring husband? Why me? These were the questions that ran through my mind in my state of hopelessness.
He was hale and hearty when he was leaving, and he never had a health condition that could lead to sudden death for him.
My mother-in-law almost ran mad. She was inconsolable. Soon, the news spread across the whole town, my husband being a very popular and influential son of the town. The CMD called back the next day, but my phone was not with me. My late husband’s sister was the one taking my calls.
The hospital told her that I had to travel to South Africa within one month to claim my husband’s entitlements because I was his next of kin. He assured the family of my protection against the ongoing attacks in South Africa. But my late husband’s people requested for the corpse of their son to be flown to Zimbabwe since none of them had the required Visa to enable them to enter South Africa.
The hospital, surprisingly, obliged them and flew the corpse in the next day. At that time, I did not even know whether I was alive or dead.
A day before my late husband was to be buried, the head of the family said his corpse must be brought home that night for some rituals that would make him expose his killer. He said their preliminary findings had revealed that his death was not natural and that someone he had blood contact with was responsible.
It was like a movie. I had thought that things like that only happened in Nigeria. Some of the family members started making unguarded remarks, indicating that I could be the culprit.
I was shocked when, late that night, after the rituals, my sister-in-law came to tell me that the findings pointed at the lady who gave birth to my late husband’s first son. She said whenever those people came out with findings, they were always authentic. But I wondered why a lady who had a child for a man would want to kill him. Who would take care of the child?
With these thoughts in mind, I did not really believe what they said, but I was glad that no one accused me of killing my husband.
The shocking thing was that, eight days after
The burial, this lady visited Zimbabwe with her son and asked to pay her last respect to the father of her child. She was taken to the burial ground because my mother-in-law insisted that no one could prove that she killed her son’s father; that, for the sake of the boy, they should be allowed to go there. She, however, added that two adults should go with her in case she had an ulterior motive.
It was at the burial ground that the unbelievable happened. Those who went with her said she started crying immediately she got there, calling on the spirit of my husband to strike dead, anyone who had a hand in his death. But she had hardly said that when she started scratching her body uncontrollably. She then began to confess that she was behind my husband’s sudden death.
She said if she could not have him, no other woman would. She also said that my husband ridiculed her the last time she visited Zimbabwe and made her a laughing stock. I couldn’t believe it! The next day, word went round that she had run mad. Though I was afraid of the efficacy of their charms, I asked my mother-in-law if there was anything they could do to cure her since she had already been disgraced, at least, for the sake of our son.
I thought that, through prayers, the curse could be reversed and she could repent and become closer to God.
I did not know that this was only the Part 1 of the horror movie that began immediately after my husband’s death; and that I would play the lead role in Part 2.
To be continued…
