BusinessDay 15 April 2018

Sunday 15 April 2018 C002D5556
BDSUNDAY 39
Book Review
Book title: Deep Secrets
Author: Nnamdi Agbakoba
Imprint: Lagos, Lampstand Books, 2015
Reviewer: Chuks Oluigbo
Nnamdi Agbakoba’s ‘Deep
Secrets’ is an outright discouragement
of social vices
among youths. It specifically
tackles the twin evils
of student cultism and examination
malpractices that have almost become
a norm in Nigerian higher institutions
and even secondary schools. These twin
evils have had adverse impact on mostly
vulnerable youths who are involved in
antisocial behaviour.
‘Deep Secrets’ is the story of Okechukwu
Obiefuna, a freshman Law student in
a Nigerian university, who is lured into
cultism by Justin Agorum Ike, an older
student in the same department whom
he had come to love and trust.
Okechukwu’s life begins to fall apart
after a cult clash that claims Justin’s life.
Unable to get a hold on himself, he opts for
suicide. Not even the preaching, counselling
and exhortation from his godfather,
George Obanye, can change his mind.
Narrated from the first person point of
view and embellished with a high dose of
irony and suspense, the book opens with
George Obanye, Chief Accountant for the
Bank of Commerce and Industry, closing
early from the office and pondering on
the internal memo he had just received
requesting him to “kindly see the managing
director for an urgent meeting”.
While struggling through the excruciating
Lagos traffic, his phone rings and it is
his godson Okechukwu announcing that
he is in trouble.
It is at this point that we get a hint into
Okechukwu’s personality and lifestyle.
On hearing the destabilising news that
Okechukwu is at Ikeja Police Station, arrested
alongside over 40 other students
after a riot in school, George says, “Okey
was a godson I wish I never had. All he had
to offer was trouble of all sorts and exams
he had to re-take again and again before
passing. He was a thorn in everybody’s
flesh.”
We also learn from George that it is
not the “first, second or third time” that
Okechukwu has been arrested as he has
become “a regular customer at numerous
police stations” owing to his violent and
unruly behaviour, despite his father being
a high-ranking police commissioner.
George succeeds in getting Okechukwu
out of the police cell and takes
him home. Okechukwu, who feels his
life has been shattered, contemplates
suicide. However, through a combination
of persuasion, threats, counseling,
exhortation and preaching laced with
elaborate quotes from the Holy Books,
George is able to calm him down and get
him to confess to all his iniquities.
“Uncle, this whole thing started two
days after I arrived on campus,” Okechukwu
begins and goes ahead to give
a blow-by-blow account of how he was
initiated into the world of student cultism
at a midnight party that was held “in a
very awkward place, deep in a thick forest
somewhere quite close to the campus”,
how he drank raw human blood, how he
was beaten and tortured by older members
of the cult to test his bravery, how he
became stone-hearted after undergoing
that process, and how the cult killed 14
people.
Hearing this sordid tale, George does
not mince words in administering the
repercussions of cultism. He tells Okechukwu,
“You see this cult thing is like
a boomerang. Whatever evil you and
your co-cult members have inflicted on
mankind will eventually come back to
haunt you.”
When Okechukwu tries to absolve
himself of the killing of 14 innocent people
by his cult, George tells him point-blank,
“No, you are a part of the killings and that
is why the blood of the people you have
killed is coming back to haunt you and now
you want to kill yourself. It is a boomerang
syndrome. Evil begets evil. Whatever a
man sows that will he reap.”
George further tells him that so long as
he and his co-cult members have drunk
each other’s blood and made vows and
oaths to each other, they have bound
themselves to each other in the spiritual
realm.
“Therefore, whatever evil your co-cult
members may have committed, you are
also guilty of the same evil,” he says.
George also succeeds in unravelling
to Okechukwu the reason behind his
academic problems in the university –
“You are a so-called Law student but you
cheated to pass English Literature, English
Language and History. I have all the facts.
So, why are you surprised that you are
having problems in passing any of your
university tests and exams?”
On the need for hard work as against
looking for a shortcut to success, George
admonishes, “Nothing in life is easy... Life
is not a bed of roses; you must work hard
to attain success.”
To drive home his points, George
shares some of his poems with Okechukwu
and also reads him a couple of
short stories. But unknown to George,
Okechukwu is not persuaded.
George sleeps off on the sofa while
watching a movie and Okechukwu seizes
the opportunity. He drops a second suicide
note and zooms off, saying in the
note, “I do not want any burial ceremony.
I want to be thrown away or cremated
and my ashes thrown away for I am
worthless.”
When George wakes up and finds the
note, he quickly locates the address that
Okechukwu had left in the note. Sadly, he
is a tad too late as Okechukwu is already
dead – or so he thinks.
In a sudden twist, the tide turns against
George. Before he can report Okechukwu’s
suicide to the police, he is accused
of murdering Okechukwu and is arrested
and thrown into the police cell.
Fate, however, smiles on him as Okechukwu
survives his suicide attempt and
surfaces in court the day George’s case is
to be decided.
Dr. Rufus Ola, who treated Okechukwu
for an overdose of sleeping
pills, explains what happened – “Okechukwu
was never dead, he was only
in a deep coma induced by the sleeping
pills. He was easily revived to full
health by twelve noon on Saturday at
the St. Patrick’s Specialist Hospital by
inducing vomiting and administering
high doses of a medication to reverse
the effects of the tablets he took. He
was admitted one or two hours after he
ingested the pills, but by that time his
loving godfather had been arrested for
alleged murder. Unknowing to family
members, it was not until late on Sunday
that information reached us that his
godfather Uncle George was arrested
for a murder that never existed. Okey
attempted suicide but he was lucky, we
were able to save his life.”
Following this revelation, the presiding
judge strikes out and dismisses the case.
To crown it all, George receives a promotion
letter from his office elevating him to
the position of National Chief Accountant
and Regional Head for West and South
Africa in Johannesburg.
On the same day and in the same court
that George’s case is to be heard, five boys
arrested in connection with Justin’s death
are found guilty and handed different
prison sentences. In delivering her judgment,
the presiding judge makes it clear
that the judgment “is designed to send a
clear message to all cultists lurking in our
institutions of higher learning that the
state is going to leave no stone unturned
to deliver speedy judgment for youths
who participate in terrorist activities in
whatever shape, form or manner”.
On his part, Okechukwu apologises
to his father and promises to “be a good
boy from now”. And in what one may
regard as an epilogue, the author adds,
“Okechukwu made well his promise
to drop all cult activities and resort to
hard work. He cancelled all plans of
defacing his body with all kinds of tattoos
of snakes and scorpions. Violence
became a thing of the past and guzzling
beer and hard drink was stopped also
and he ditched smoking. He put hard
work before him by hitting his books
with a vengeance. He never missed
inspirational gatherings in the church
or mosque when inspirational speakers
were invited. Okey finally graduated
from university with honours and now
works for one of the most prestigious
law firms in the country.”
The message of ‘Deep Secrets’ is clear
– student and youth cultism, examination
malpractice and cheating, police brutality,
terrorism, youth restiveness and violence
are evil and should not be tolerated while
peace, religious tolerance, hard work,
family bonding and efficient judicial system
are good and should be encouraged.
Dedicated to “all victims of terrorism,
cultism, and violence” and “to all those
who have lost loved ones”, the book is
written to serve as a counter-terrorism
and counter-cultism therapy “proposed
to be dispensed and administered through
the academic system”.
To buttress this point, Dr. Mrs. Benedict
Okwudili Ikegulu, director, Book Development
Center, Nigeria Education Research
and Development Council (NERDC),
Abuja, writes in the Foreword that books
like ‘Deep Secrets’ or “similar counterterrorism
or counter-cultism literature”
can be invaluable in checking “the deplorable
activities of university cultists or
terrorists” that “have been a crucial social
cancer not only in Nigeria but worldwide”.
To justify the book’s raison d’etre, the
author rightly says in the Preface that
even though it would appear there is a
reduction in student cultism in Nigeria,
“this is not the time to become complacent,
because if the scourge returns, it
will be seven times as bad as previously
experienced”.
The beauty of the book lies for the most
part in its conversational approach and
accessible language, which makes it easy
to read and assimilate. The downside,
however, is that it is ridden with avoidable
grammatical and spelling errors.
Subsequent issues will benefit from better
editing.