₦airaland Forum

The tackle didn’t break his spirit. He did grasp a nearby car to regain his balance then he continued to flee, cautious of hands that stretched from the corners of the road to catch him. I was among the crowd that surged to catch him.

We passed the boy who nearly took him to a halt with his tackle, exhausted where he sat and rubbed the pain off one of his legs – he used to challenge Ikem – the boy on the chase. He managed to keep a few distance from us because most people who joined the chase, came from the side-streets ahead of him perhaps he stare backwards to glimpse the distance he kept. His legs had a wavering speed told by the cloth he wore – flay brown shorts below a faint yellow oversized shirt; they were dancing backwards to us, as he ran.


Yet, I have seen boys who ran more than he did and they bear silently what awaits them, if they are finally caught. The woman he stole her purse from, was somewhere at the Junction where the chase began, crying foul and refusing consolation with her fluent pidgin ,”dem tell me say thief for Onitsha dey start from belle learn,” She said.
Ikem rounded the bend that lead to Bida Street off Moore Road. He was headed to the tunnel that connects the two, a culvert we used to shortcut our Journey from School when we were juniors at Mark’s college until we became seniors and Ikem, a class ahead was made the games prefect. We moved out of Bida Street after Aunty Dorcas, Papa’s elder sister saw the huts and termites ridden cabins built around our unfenced face to face bungalow, during her first short visit. She suggested,” It was no place to raise a child.”

The boy who finally knocks down Ikem ran out of nowhere, lean and anchored but he could manage the fit for he threw himself from his side. We are a few paces to the water course then; Ikem rose when they had surrounded him and his haven of escape. His shoulders and chest were moving back and forth as he gasped for air.
Left hand clutched to a purse he removed a pistol sunk deep in his waist with the right and directed it to his escape route but first at anyone that came closer so they would back off. It did shake the crowd who were conductors, barrow-pushers, dawdlers and touts. They await such a race to break daily so that they would desert what they were doing for a more adventurous affair. I avoided the betrayal’s eye in the crowd though I ran with a clear intent – to know if they can catch him. Suddenly, Ikem shot the first bullet alfresco. Once again, it startled the crowd more but they held ground, each of them clutched to a club, stone or a billet while their sweat borne from the chase trickle down their lucent faces.

A boy in torn green shirts caught the purse he threw at them for he feared they might not leave him with it. Then a stone flew and landed on his skull. And it made him totter but worst forced him to shoot at one of the boys before a man seized him from behind. The man wore no shirt, was hairy and breasted and was twice brim enough than his assailant.


Ole escaped their mouth when they saw what happened, more loudly than when they ran and had avoided to shout for it will drain their energy. It wore the shout of a long struggle that paid off and it made them move closer to hit and slap him as their reward for the long chase while some attended to the boy who was ill-fated to take the shot. His sweat had muddled with his crimson bruised face when I managed to squeeze through to the front. The man who seized him also did with an unrepentant drag that would fetch him a thunderous slap whenever he slacked behind to follow them, it was the type that was heard so loud in a close deserted room and would make the ear hear angry buzzing bees afterwards.

They dragged him along the street pass stalls and people gladly curse him as Ikem pleaded,” Bikonu, It was the devil.” His plea fanned their livid cinders and the mid-day sun kept them sparkling red-hot for each of the boys strived and pushed so hard to find a space to hit him, sometimes they stopped to separate them and it kept them at an argument stance.

I sent this story to my friend and he said Its a typical Onitsha story. I was so sad because I felt I did Justice to it. be kind enough to point out mistakes such as tense,verb,aspect and grammatical errors as well as word agreement then you are my Paddy.

My friend wrote : A typical onitsha story. ....at argument stance. Is that
where the story ends? If it is,that means you stil left your story at the point of climax which is risky for the introductory suspense you raised. You have to sail the story to a harbour. Make it tragic or shock the reader with ikem escape

Its an excerpt though but your comments will make me come back and finish it.

[url][/url]www.caineprize.com/news_2013_shortlist.php

The shortlist for the 2013 Caine Prize for African
Writing has been announced today (Wednesday 15
May) – and among the five stories chosen are an
unprecedented four Nigerian entries.

The Chair of judges, art historian and broadcaster,
Gus Casely-Hayford said, “The shortlist was selected
from 96 entries from 16 African countries. They are
all outstanding African stories that were drawn
from an extraordinary body of high quality
submissions.” Gus described the shortlist saying, “The five
contrasting titles interrogate aspects of things that
we might feel we know of Africa – violence,
religion, corruption, family, community – but these
are subjects that are deconstructed and beautifully
remade.

These are challenging, arresting, provocative stories of a continent and its
descendants captured at a time of burgeoning
change.” The winner of the £10,000 prize is to be
announced at a celebratory dinner at the Bodleian
Library, Oxford, on Monday 8 July. The 2013 shortlist comprises:

Elnathan John (Nigeria) ‘Bayan Layi’ from Per Contra, Issue 25 (USA, 2012) Read Bayan Layi
Tope Folarin (Nigeria) ‘Miracle’ from Transition, Issue 109 (Bloomington, 2012)
Read Miracle

Pede Hollist (Sierra Leone) ‘Foreign Aid’ from Journal of Progressive Human Services, Vol. 23.3 (Philadelphia, 2012)
Read Foreign Aid

Abubakar Adam Ibrahim (Nigeria) ‘The Whispering
Trees’ from The Whispering Trees, published by Parrésia Publishers (Lagos, 2012) Read The Whispering Tree

Chinelo Okparanta (Nigeria) ‘America’ from Granta, Issue 118 (London, 2012) Read America As always the stories will be available to read online
on our website www.caineprize.com and will be
published with the 2013 workshop stories in our
forthcoming anthology A Memory This Size in July
2013 by New Internationalist and seven co-
publishers in Africa.

Alongside Gus on the panel of judges this year are
award-winning Nigerian-born artist, Sokari
Douglas Camp; author, columnist and Lord
Northcliffe Emeritus Professor at UCL, John
Sutherland; Assistant Professor at Georgetown
University, Nathan Hensley and the winner of the Caine Prize in its inaugural year, Leila Aboulela.


Once again, the winner of the £10,000 Caine Prize
will be given the opportunity of taking up a
month’s residence at Georgetown University, as a
Writer-in-Residence at the Lannan Center for Poetics
and Social Practice.


The award will cover all travel and living expenses. The winner will also be invited
to take part in the Open Book Festival in Cape Town
in September 2013. Last year the Caine Prize was won by Nigerian
writer Rotimi Babatunde. He has subsequently co-
authored a play ‘Feast’ for the Young Vic and the
Royal Court theatres in London.