The Campaign Trail

Chapter Two

5 Chapter Two o condition is permanent. At last the decision was reached at the United Nations for Kutuma to become an independent state. Many forces had contributed to this. Amongst them were the traditional rulers and the elite championed by Mr Utum Tar, the mission grade II headmaster. This good news was received with jubilation and became the main topic of discussion in most gatherings. Before the final talks that led to this independence, an invitation was sent to Kutuma for some selected persons to go to the UN. The night before their departure to New York, Utum Tar assembled the members of his delegation for final preparations and narrated to them a vision, which had visited his mind’s eye. In the vision he had gone behind his house and, instead of the usual small coffee and plantain farm, he had seen a vast estate of infinite fertility and beauty. An invisible voice had told him that all of this land was going to be his provided he respected one condition. He was to enjoy abundance of procreation from plant to animal but he would not be allowed to eat a sumptuous meal throughout his lifetime. On the contrary, if he was presented with a rich meal, he should order his cooks to give it to the poor. His meals were to vary between parched corn, the local cassava puddle known as ‘moyondo’, parched ground-nuts or any other low nutrient diet. One day he was tempted to disobey this rule. Hunger had tempted him to go against this fast. His young newly-wedded wife, who did not understand why a man should torture himself with such a fasting as a means of further riches, tempted him with a sumptuous meal on a day when he returned home quite tired and hungry. No sooner had he violated this rule in his dream world, than a strange N 6 being, a horrible looking ogre descended from the sky and devoured everything on that fertile land. Barrenness immediately set in everywhere. His wife had blocked his way to becoming a very rich man. Every household suffered from severe starvation. Little children were all transformed into flat headed ogres, each one prepared to devour the other from lack of food. Only a great diviner could make any sense of this strange dream. Only the first part of it mattered: one day there could be great prosperity. And this moment of independence was to usher in hope to the people of Kutuma who had never bothered about the white man’s folly of tilling deep into their soil for the unknown. With some level of education, a few elite like Utum Tar had come to understand the value of the minerals which the white man was tapping from Kutuma land. Independence would, therefore, mean that a son of Kutuma would take the destiny of their land into his hands and utilise its natural potentials for the development of their country. Independence could stand for the start of the realisation of his dream. This departure meeting was held at the Fon’s conference hall. The Fusejo Palace that hosted such important meetings had a rich history that had brought it to prominence. Kutuma, prior to any colonial arrangements, had its traditional government under its Fons. There were many of these Fondoms spreading into the hilly hinterlands. But the Fon of Fusejo, the capital, wielded particular influence because he was the first to receive the white man and because his dynasty descended from the legendary roots of the deity that founded this land. While the peoples differed slightly because of early migratory sources, they were united by one language, the Kutuma language, which was brought in by the now ruling dynasty. The colonial powers, much to the chagrin of other 7 little chiefdoms, had come and given more powers to the host chief, pronouncing him as the paramount Fon since the mines were in his territory. History tells it that when the first white man came to this land, all the other Fons fled into hiding because they hadn’t the courage to stand the awful sight of a burning man. This to them was not just a human being in the form of fire, but one with double eyes. In the local language this species of a creature was literally known as “the red man”. The courageous person who accepted to...