To many Nigerians, the other side of life is death, not just the title of an ill-fated movie. It is also not just in dying but also in meeting an agonising watery grave.
Such was the lot of popular Nollywood actor, Junior Pope, when he died alongside three others in the River Niger on their way back from a film location in Anambra State last week.
I did not know much about Junior Pope but I knew him to be loud, which was not unusual for people in his field. My major interest in him remains his very beautiful family, his young wife and those three adorable boys.
Now these boys are to grow up not knowing their father because of a ragtag follywood where every passerby artiste wants to be a producer. And that is because the trade has become so porous, lacking in structure and standards. Almost like what has befallen the pen profession where every chaka chaka writer has become a journalist until they nailed the Fourth Estate of the Realm in sticky mud.
For goodness sake, what kind of film did the so-called AmakaLuke want to produce on the River Niger? Is she a mermaid or a worshipper of the water goddess, looking for blood for appeasement? How come she alone wore a life jacket to save her own hide but left others unprotected?
Couldn’t the movie location be accessed by land? Even if it must be by water, how much was life jacket? How come an enlightened Junior Pope allowed himself to be talked into that suicidal mission; was the money worth his life? Couldn’t he have insisted on a life jacket or bought or hired one for himself?
Where was Nollywood, and its minders? I won’t be surprise if there is nothing like life insurance cover for practitioners.
Of course, while blaming the producer and the industry for this avoidable tragedy, one must not fail to blame Junior Pope for plunging his young family into grief. I’m not one to pamper the dead with undeserved juicy tribute. I am not one to pray for the dead to rest in peace because it is a waste of time. Whether a person would rest in peace or pieces after death is determined by the person on ‘this side of life’. There is no time to regain a lost opportunity in the grave. Many we eulogise as having gone to glory may be gnashing their teeth in agony in hell.
Oh, I digressed; pardon me.
Nollywood must set standards for its members. This brings me to another aspect of ‘entertainment’, a sick joke called skit making. Every straggler now wants to make a skit. They are insensitive and senseless. All they care about is to draw traffic to their blog. Is that not a form of yahoo yahoo; obtaining by trick? What kind of fame is that?
That is even one more thing that I find annoying and disgusting. They become ‘celebrities’ and ignorant people hail them.
I thought that a celebrity was noble, not notorious for infamy. Nigeria has a queer version of everything.
What hat is there to celebrate in a woman that has shamelessly made herself available for every roving rod to poke into her toxic tank? What is worth celebrating in an immoral living where a man scams the public, posing to a woman and all obnoxious LGBT… The world has gone mad indeed.
Back to Junior Pope, is it not shameful that much precious time was wasted in appeasing the gods of the river instead of giving him CPR? Where was that deity? Was he waiting for the accident to happen so that he could be appeased? Whoever took the actor to the native doctor should be arrested; even the juju priest that should have directed them to a hospital. Nonsense!
It is also more shameful that there was no hospital in the entire Asaba with oxygen. What a COWntry!
It is also agonising how some unscrupulous Nigerians make capital out of the misfortunes of others. People are already taking advantage of this tragedy to make money via morbid skits or creating confusion over his death.
What is baffling in the case of JP is that at his level, he ought to know better. He seemed to even have a premonition of the lurking danger, considering the jokes he was cracking on the water prior to the accident. He was saying he had three kids and was the one to train them. How ironic. If that was his mindset, he ought to have taken precaution and not put his life at risk.
In fact, a video of Peter Obi also surfaced where he took a ride in a canoe without a life jacket. That shows flippancy in the highest places, which ought not to be.
Beyond all this, water transportation must be properly regulated in this country. It is unacceptable for anybody to put anyhow rickety boat on the waters in order o make money without regard for human life, and government does nothing about it.
Reports of people drowning in avoidable accidents have almost become a daily occurrence
In May 2021, 70 persons perished and over 150 went missing when a boat broke apart between Kebbi and Niger states. In October 2022, in Ogbaru LGA, Anambra State, a boat capsized and 76 of its 85 passengers, who were fleeing to safety after floods sacked their community, drowned. In October 2023, more than 70 people went missing after a boat capsized in Taraba State’s Ardo-Kola district.
In January this year eight passengers were confirmed dead and an estimated 100 were missing after their boat, conveying passengers from Niger State’s Borgu district to a market in the neighbouring Kebbi State capsised. Also, in the same month, at least 20 people were feared dead in an accident involving two passenger boats travelling from Andoni to Bonny Island in Rivers State.
In fact, between June and September of 2023, according to Vanguard, about 300 precious lives were lost in three boat accidents. The biggest tragedy struck on June 12 in the Pategi precinct of the River Niger, where 144 passengers were confirmed dead and dozens more were declared missing. It added that 108 people died after another boat disaster in Gbajibo, near Mokwa, Niger State, also on the River Niger apart from yet another tragedy in Adamawa State, where at least 28 lives were lost.
Just last week, the lagos State police spokesman disclosed that a total number of seven persons lost their lives to accidental drowning in different parts f the state in one week.
Sadly, despite these grim statistics, it seems that the government is not doing much to tackle the avoidable river menace across Nigeria’s 10,000-kilometre ungoverned waterways.
The National Inland Waterways Agency, NIWA, is supposedly responsible for administering and regulating the country’s inland waterway system. However, judging by what is happening in the sector, it is obvious that the NIWA is also suffering from the same ineptitude and corruption that has stultified the growth of this behemoth of a country. The boat operators claim to be paying ₦1000 each to the marine police on a weekly basis. Of course, this is not accounted for; it has no purpose either.
I don’t see why it is difficult for NIWA to stop operations of boats that fail to comply with safety standards. I don’t also know why they cannot undertake regular sensitisation and awareness campaigns to educate both the passengers and the operators. Is it also too much subject the boats to regular checks and rid the waters of rickety contraptions? How about making sure that the boats are not overloaded? Perhaps, after collecting their egunje, which is their major interest, the marine police look the other way.
The country is angry and sad because of the personality of the latest tragedy. If it was not JP, maybe, this would not attract the kind of attention. However, even if for the memory of JP, NIWA and every other levels of authority that is saddled with responsibility should sanitise the water transportation sector by enforcing and ensuring safety standards. We have no business with the other side of life when we neither understand this side we are on nor appreciate its gift.
For JP, it’s a goodnight.
