Sagiru Muhammed, in his 50s, hops around the streets of Warri on a wheelchair. It’s a luxury having a wheelchair to rely on for easy mobility. This is because many of his colleagues aren’t that lucky. Some crawl on their bare knees around to beg for alms.
Sagiru’s story isn’t pleasant. He lost his right leg, from the thigh, to a seeming minor accident involving wheelbarrows. That’s what he related to our correspondent. According to him, though minor, his leg was crushed and due to poverty, he could not have access to good medical care, hence his current situation of surviving with the left leg.
With a countenance that betrayed sorrow, but in a total submission to fate, Sagiru, who was accosted at night, could barely speak pidgin intelligibly. But with much effort and the help of an interpreter, Saturday Tribune was able to be let into his world.
“My name is Sagiru. I’m happy you came to me. I’m from Zamfara, Maru Local Government Area. I have one wife and six children. They’re in Zamfara.
“I came to make ends meet in Warri. I’ve been here for five years now. Life has not been easy; but we have to accept whatever Allah brings to us,” he noted.
Sagiru said though alms begging offered no dignity with it, himself and family have had to rely on it absolutely for survival amid successive political and religious leaders in the north who care less about those with his kind of predicament.
“I survive through alms begging daily. It’s stressful, distressing and demeaning. But I must survive. My kids must survive. While they remain in Zamfara, I have to hustle hard down here to send something to them on a weekly basis.
“I send at least N2,000 to them weekly depending on how business goes. They’re the ones I live for. If I can no longer make anything good out of my life, I should be able out of theirs,” he averred.
Speaking further on his predicament, he disclosed that “ a wheelbarrow rammed my right leg in Zamfara. I could not treat it on time so they had to cut it off for me to live.
“If we’ve had empathetic and caring leaders, both political and religious, up north, I wouldn’t have ended up this way. My leg would not have been amputated,” he lamented.
Sagiru has, no doubt resigned to fate. He’s focussed and ready to sacrifice all for his children. So, where he puts up after the days alms-begging trade is of no significance to him.
“You may not believe it; but I sleep in one of the market stalls. I don’t have money to rent a room and by the way, how much do I make per day that I’ll afford such luxury?
“So, I allow the stall owners to evacuate in the evening before taking shelter in one of the stalls,” he disclosed.
According to him, the stall owners, though aware they take shelter in their stalls, they’re nice fellows who have the milk of love for their fellow flowing in them.
“Though we regularly long to return home if things were better, we have no problem in Warri. They do not worry us. They are kind people. They give us alms and that’s why many of us are based in Warri here.
“I’m happy I’m in Warri. They’re good people. Don’t mind what they said about Warri outside Warri. They describe the place as an abode of criminals. It’s a lie. These people are nice and kind. I couldn’t have been in a better place.
“If my people in the north are this nice, what would we be doing in another man’s land, thousands of kilometres away from our homes. That speaks volumes: the people here are good people,” he reiterated.
Taking a swipe at leaders in government from the past till now, he opined: “you think these people in government care about us? Their ears are always blocked against the cries and pains of the poor. They beg for our support, give us some money and hand-outs, but when they get there, it’s a different ball game.
“We the poor live for them to live. They live on us. They suck us dry. The country’s resources are meant for their well-being alone. I listened to the news of the billions voted for a luxury car for each National Assembly member in Abuja. Does that show we have good, people-driven leaders?
“Imagine, with the hunger orchestrated by inflation in the country, some set of people we asked to manage the economy now feathering their nests with more luxury at our detriment? What really did Baba Buhari offered the very poor like us before he left office? What’s Tinubu doing differently today after coming into power? Has our suffering not escalated beyond measure?” Sagiru asked rhetorically.
He advised leaders in the country to focus on making life easy for the poor like him at all costs, insisting that was the reason they are there as leaders and not to add more burdens to the poor.
“All we’re asking for is to have food to eat, send our kids to school and live a good life at least minimally. We’re not asking for luxury. Just food, clothing and shelter. Shouldn’t people like us have some good life before we’re shipped out of this world,” he further noted, waxing philosophical.
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