| ran 24 na watan Septamba Daga Likita Blyth , Zuwa ga Babban Poring Kazing Ina gaisheku ina fatan kuna duk lafiya. Na zo in nemeku saboda Poring ya na bukata ya sake zuwa asibiti mu ba shi magani kuma mu dube shi sosai mu gane ko yana bukata aiki ko babu. Lalle, mun manta mu fada muku cewa dole ne ya dawo asibiti bayan sati biyu. Don haka na zo in sanar da kai cewa muna jiran shi. Mun sani cewa ya riga ya ... |
Unfortunately the town is not as small as driver Magit had thought. We got out and asked someone whether he knew of this boy, Poring Kazing, or his family. I had printed three copies of a letter to Poring’s father and included Poring’s picture on it, so as people started gathering they looked at the picture, read the name, and shook their heads. Magit explained why we were there, trying to allay the suspicions we raised as two strangers arriving in town and looking for someone. |
The crowd started getting too big for comfort … and crowds
make authorities skittish. So we got in the car and headed toward the local government
offices. On the way we passed a sign pointing the way to the local public hospital, so we
detoured there. Maybe they would know the patient, as he probably had been treated there
before coming to Jos. We showed the letter and picture to first one person then another,
but no one knew him (or let on that they knew him). The medical officer did
agree to keep
the letter at the hospital and ask around.
The local government compound was a few kilometers down the road, past the large main mosque and the Emir’s palace. The offices were decrepit and looked abandoned; several broken-down tractors and vehicles were in the yard. We found one worker who didn’t know the Kazing family, but took us to the social services office. On the walkway lay an extension cord and outlet. Two bare metal posts peeked out of the outlet, connected by a wire to the radio playing music in the office. Wow, I wouldn’t want to walk on that thing barefoot! The woman in that office there didn’t know anything either, and her boss the medical officer was traveling. We went off to a third office. Each stop involved a complete explanation in a mixture of English and Hausa. Finally we were led to the local government chairman, who was sitting and talking under a tree in the middle of the compound.
By now there were about a dozen people involved. This manhunt may have been the most exciting thing to happen in Wase for quite a while. Everyone had suggestions. They should send word out to the two clinics in the bush. They should contact the pastors of all the churches. I suggested checking a registry or tax records but was told there wasn’t anything that would show the family. What about a message on the radio? Yes, we could do that, but the radio studio and offices were back in Jos.
Finally someone remembered that there was a man named Kazing in
the education department, on the other side of town. So two officials took us there and we
started over. "Kazing" turned out to be the man’s first name and he knew
nothing about our boy. But again one official passed the letter to the next and everyone
got involved. No one knew such a family, but everyone agreed that the best way to find him
would be through the churches. The education director would meet with the pastors that
very night.
As we pulled away to return to Jos, someone ran from the crowd under the tree and flagged us down. There was someone who knew Poring! He turned out to be a teacher from the same village. At first he seemed reluctant to take us there (still suspicious? busy with his work?) but the boss persuaded him. He went back for his motorcycle ("masheen=machine" in Hausa) then led us off toward the village. "Don’t worry about the road," he called into our window after we had gone several hundred yards on the dirt track covered with mud holes, "it’s all right!"
