#BookReview: “Arrows of Rain” By Okey Ndibe
Emeka Nwakobi
Set in a fictional African country, Madia. “Arrows of Rain” revolves around a journalist Ogugua (otherwise known as Bukuru). He falls in love with a prostitute, Iyese, in the line of duty, but wouldn’t pursue this desire till the end.
Iyese is stabbed in the vagina and raped by Isa Palat Bello, an army officer she befriended when she first entered Langa, on account of her declaring her disinterest in their relationship. Dispossessed of courage, Ogugua swells with cowardice and selfishness. He should speak up about the brutal rape of the woman he cares so much about, and the injustice therein, but he chews his tongue, backs down from the story he was writing about her, on the ground that the story wasn’t news worthy. He abandons her at a time when he should have confirmed to her that he was indeed the man she thought he was.
She would become pregnant, not for the brute who raped her, but from the first and last consummation of love with Ogugua. Abandoned by the man who gave a new meaning to her life, love grows in her, she writes letter after letter, hoping that in the end love will conquer, but hers was a tragic end, fueled by a society where ruthlessness is celebrated. She is murdered by Isa Palat Bello, upon revealing to him the paternity of the baby boy that he so wanted.
On the same day of her murder, Ogugua makes up his mind to visit her in her flat after several months of silence. He discovers her body and the baby lying on her, gripped by fear and cowardice, he abandons her for the second time, making sure to wipe his finger prints off the door knob. It is this memory, living as it is that would so disrupt his mind to the point of madness. His fear and hallucination grows worse. Maladjustment sets in, he abandons his job as a reporter and exiles himself for years.
In the course of his exile, he witnesses several cases of rape perpetrated by the army, he does little or nothing to help these women, hugging tightly his shield; silence. He is implicated in a case of rape that eventually led to the death of the victim, when in fact he was only a witness. He is forced to break his silence, shed the skin of his cowardice and tells the shameful story of his failings. Indeed, a story that must be told never forgives silence.
The search for his origin would bring his son Femi (named Ogugua by his mother Iyese before she died and he was adopted from the Langa orphanage), to his doorstep in prison and the haunting question, “could you be my father?” asked a man who has failed everyone who believed in him, even himself, would leave him the shroud garment of suicide.
Okey Ndibe is the master of dialogue. He makes dialogue flow, as one would a poem or a beautiful prose. We are led through each phase, until we become ourselves part of this painful story of love, politics, betrayal, shame, dictatorship, inhumanity, and are eventually able to feel the stabs of Ogugua’s silence and the pain inflicted on a woman, on a people, by the brutes that were meant to protect them.