Heavy Knocks For Your Money!

PHILLIPS Langbodo was such a wicked man that everybody feared him despite the fact that he was very wealthy. He was the devil incarnate. He was a multimillionaire and legal icon. He was amazingly rich that he spent millions of Naira on daily basis. But that is not the end of the story.

Phillips always employed drivers almost on monthly basis because they couldn’t cope with his weird, wicked and inhuman behaviour and attitude towards them. Once he started showing them his true colours they always ran away instantly. Some would abscond without even taken their accrued salary. He had a strange habit of given his drivers heavy and painful knocks on their heads if they didn’t drive his car to his satisfaction. He often found faults with the way they drive. No driver could satisfy him on wheels. For one whole year he had changed close to 30 drivers. 

So, instead of correcting them by word of mouth he would descend heavily from behind ( the owner’s corner) and give them knocks that sounded like earthquake, thunder or atomic bomb! He was such a big, fat, tall and dark-skinned man. He had an imposing, huge and gigantic stature. He was in his early 50s but he looked fresh and younger than his age because
of the wealth factor.

That very month of October, Phillips had just employed another driver by name Sanjo Oluwanishola, who was in his early 30s.  Sanjo came from a very humble background as he was an orphan who lost his parents at an early age. So, he had endured poverty and penury for many years. If being poor had a title Sanjo should be crowned king of all poor people. The very day Sanjo started work with Barrister Phillips Langbodo he received ten heavy knocks on his head. The young man cried and wept like a baby when persistent headache hit him as he got home. His amiable wife asked him what exactly was the matter but he couldn’t disclose it. His two children wept along with their poor dad as he lamented his gloomy and sad fate.

That was the agonizing story and heart-breaking experience of Sanjo Oluwanishola. He had to endure such pain, such injustice and inhumanity for three years since there was nothing he could do because he was poor and couldn’t find another job. Most times when he received his meagre income he would go to a nearby pharmacy shop and buy drugs that would heal him of persistent headache and excruciating migraine. He was a thin and gaunt-looking man with a frail stature.

One day he cried, “When would this hardship and pain end Almighty God? I’ll commit suicide very soon because I just can’t bear it any more…” He was shedding sorrowful tears as he lamented his unfortunate plight in the presence of his immediate family. Sanjo continued to endure the pain and sadness for a couple of years with no solution or end in sight. The third year, still working with him, Barrister Phillips ordered Sanjo to drive him to Victoria Island, Lagos for a crucial business meeting. It was exactly the month of July and the rains came in high torrents. The heartless Barrister lived in Ikeja GRA where the rich resides in their splendour and opulence. After the all-important meeting, the heavens opened and thus came a torrential downpour. Sincerely, it was a heavy and thundery rainfall.

They were moving on the long, 3rd Mainland Bridge amidst the heavy rainfall when the demonic Barrister suddenly gave Sanjo five heavy knocks in quick succession! The knocks came just like lightning. “Don’t change your lane you son-of-a-bitch!” growled the despotic barrister. Sanjo was shocked, perplexed and utterly confused as he felt he had done nothing wrong to deserve such an inhuman treatment.

“Oh God Almighty, not again…” he groaned in pains. He instantly applied the brakes and stopped motion on the bridge. He packed the highly expensive jeep beside the bridge and gently handed the keys to his ungodly and bohemian boss.

“Sir, I have had enough…let me go and die at home…these are your keys…thank you sir…” he said in tears. He opened the door and got down inside the heavy downpour. He was crying like a three-weeks old baby. He started walking all alone to his house. And he had nothing in his pocket, not even five naira. He was as broke as a freed prisoner who had served 30 years jail term. The rains continued in intensity. The evil-minded Barrister, took his umbrella, got down and quickly entered the front seat of his sophisticated Navigator Jeep and drove himself home. That particular day when he trekked home, Sanjo would never forget the experience in a hurry. It was a long, torturous day filled with pains and agony.

Sanjo had made up his mind that he wouldn’t work with his wicked boss again against all odds and impending problems. He  started eking out a living as a labourer in a block-making factory. Exactly ten years later Barrister Phillips Langbodo’s fortune had dwindled drastically. His legal business wasn’t booming as before. He had fallen from grace to grass. To be precise, he had become very poor. This had further affected his health and he now suffered a debilitating stroke that wanted to claim his life. He was really at the point of death and everything about him was terrible and moribund.

That very Monday morning Barrister Phillips was rushed to All Saints Modern Hospital, Lagos Island when he was gasping for breath and was about dying. A rickety and old Keke Maruwa or Tricycle was used to rush the dying barrister to the highly-equipped hospital. It was the greatest surprise when it was discovered that Sanjo Oluwanishola was the owner of the ultramodern hospital! Barrister Phillips was shocked when he discovered this fact and he instantly suffered another stroke attack on his left leg. He was dumbfounded!

The fact was that Sanjo had risen to wealth and fame after toiling day and night in the uncertain world of business for some years. He had now become a business magnate with many block-making factories and he owned a couple of thriving bakeries in the country. He owned many other successful companies too. He had become a baron in the world of business. He was the Chairman of All Saints Modern Hospital.

With tears in his eyes, and prostrating, Barrister Phillips Langbodo begged for mercy and forgiveness from his former driver.

“I’m sorry for my past misdeeds and cruelty…just didn’t know what hooked me then…” he begged with tears streaming down his eyes.

“I’ve forgiven you God-willing, ” Sanjo said, that fateful day, “don’t take any money from him for treatment,” he gestured to his doctors.

Despite Sanjo’s magnanimity and kindness to the evil-minded barrister, he died in chronic pains on the hospital bed that eventful night. God has a way of meting out judgment to evil-doers and oppressors. There is always a Judgment Day for people who hurts fellow human beings.