SCENE 1:
(May 15, 2000. Dorti Road, off Spur Road. A quarter past five in the morning. Kabbah comes out to make a call for prayers- Azan. He sees two silhouettes coming his way. Closely, he recognizes one of them as fugitive RUF rebel leader Foday Saybana Sankoh. He chuckles in panic.
(Sankoh had been in hiding since May 8, 2000, following a civilian demonstration at his Spur Road residence which turned out deadly. And the Government of Sierra Leone had put aside Le10m for the person that would capture the rebel leader cum Minister of Strategic Resources alive)
SANKOH: Hey young man, do you know me?
KABBAH: (Panicky) Yes, I know you, sir!
SANKOH: Fine. Are Sheikh’s people still over there? (He points to a red-painted house about a stone’s throw from the back of Kabbah’s house. Sheikh Nabie is a former secretary to Sankoh.)
KABBAH: No. They moved out after the incident on May 8.
SANKOH: Are the security guards still in my house?
KABBAH: No, sir!
SANKOH: Do you know the Nigerian Embassy?
KABBAH: No sir. But I’ll help you to your house. You’ll wait there so I can find a vehicle to take you to the American embassy.
SANKOH: Fine, that’s a great idea.
(Kabbah escorts the two men to Sankoh’s abandoned residence, off Spur Road).
SCENE II
(Kabbah hurries down to Scorpion’s house at Adja Town- a small community of corrugated-sheet shelters about 100 yards down the road from Sankoh’s residence.
Mustapha Kamara (aka Scorpion) is snoring profusely on a table in his small veranda. Kabbah wakes up the ex-SLA fighter and narrates his encounter with Sankoh. Reluctantly Scorpion picks up his AK47 rifle and follows Kabbah.
(On their way up the road, they are joined by four civilians. They’re Police, Franco, Body, and Sembu. Reaching Sankoh’s compound Scorpion, the four civilians hide behind a row of fresh flowers to allow Kabbah to lead Sankoh and Co into the open. Sankoh stands as Kabbah approaches).
SANKOH: Where’s the vehicle?
KABBAH: It’s parked down the drive; vehicles don’t come up here anymore. The road has been blocked following-
SANKOH: Well done; (turns to his companion). Let’s go.
(They reach the row of flowers and Scorpion emerges from the dark.
SCORPION: Halt! Hands up! If anyone moves, I’ll shoot!
KABBAH: (Turns to Sankoh in dramatic tears) Oh Papay, you’ve landed me in big trouble!
SANKOH: (Walking towards Scorpion) Don’t worry, you’ll not die…
SCORPION: (Fires a warning shot to the ground, inches from Sankoh). Halt! Stay where you are (Turns to Kabbah) You, move aside!
SANKOH: Why won’t you fire me instead?
(Sankoh’s companion, carrying a silver pistol wrapped in white cloth, tries to play smart. Suddenly a loud cry of pain; bullets from Scorpion’s rifle had hit the man’s right foot shin. Simultaneously, Sankoh yells as a bullet pierces through his right calf).
SCORPION: (Orders Kabbah) Disarm the pistol from the bast***d!
KABBAH: (Scary) I can’t… I can’t…
(Hesitantly, he kneels and the man surrenders his silver pistol while writhing in pain from a shattered shin).
INTERMISSION
SCENE III
(Scorpion and the others grab Sankoh and head down Dorty Road, Babadorie, leaving the man with the shattered shin at Sankoh’s compound.
(“We’ve caught him! We’ve caught Foday Sankoh! Come out everybody!” the men shout as they gallop down the road.
(It’s after six in the morning now. Immediately, almost everybody at Dorty Road is out. The crowd continues to swell behind Sankoh and his captors, hungry for vengeance. By the time they reach Lumley Police Station Sankoh is already naked.
(Contrary to what Sankoh may have been expecting, the crowd trots past the police station and he falls hopelessly).
SANKOH: ‘Wa yoo me! Una de Kill me oh!’
(But he’s now surrounded by soldiers who want to bundle him into a waiting van. Despite the efforts of the soldiers, the crowd can lend Sankoh some slaps, kicks, and blows. However, the soldiers succeed in boarding Sankoh into the van and they drive roughly away; the crowd pursuing them vigilantly.
(Meanwhile, a group of youth gather on the spot where Sankoh had fallen. One of them writes ‘Wa yoo me!’ with an iron stone just as the traffic police will do on the spot where an accident has occurred.
(Another group troops down Wilkinson Road, displaying Sankoh’s tattered clothes jubilantly in the air.
(The sound of drums is heard backstage as the people of Dorty Road come out dancing with their two heroes- Scorpion and Kabah- both of them waving to the crowd from the shoulders of two strong men…
(The sound of jeeps replaces the sound of drums. The dancing stops as the visitors disembark from their jeeps. They are white journalists from CNN, BBC, VOA, and RFI, plus a few UNAMSIL personnel.
(The visitors are introduced to Scorpion and Kabbah and a war of interviews begins…)
1st WOMAN: Dorty Road is making headlines these days oh!
2nd WOMAN: Maybe this will prompt the government to repair our dilapidated road this time.
(A sarcastic laughter echoes backstage and the curtain drops).
SCENE IV:
(Sankoh’s compound, Spur Road. The man with the shattered shin lies in a pool of his own blood. A journalist leans over him asking questions).
JOURNALIST: Who’re you?
MAN: Protocol Officer to Sankoh.
JOURNALIST: I mean your name?
MAN: I don’t remember my name.
JOURNALIST: I see. What useful information can you give us to save the people of this nation from further RUF horror?
MAN: Everything is messed up… We spent about nine days in the hills without food. We fed on plums. I had to convince the Papay (Sankoh) to come out and surrender. The Papay suggested the Nigerian Embassy, but we hope to find UNAMSIL security at our Spur Road residence. We left the hills immediately it was curfew time and every step of the way was a nail to my coffin. But the Papay reassured me.
JOURNALIST: I see, what about the others? I mean your fighters who escaped with you?
MAN: They decided to go further into the jungle.
JOURNALIST: What about the Papays’s briefcase?
MAN: The fighters went with it.
JOURNALIST: Don’t you think the Papay forgot something important here in this house that he came back to collect?
MAN: I don’t think so… I’m dying man… Please take me to the hospital.
JOURNALIST: (Takes out a camera and… Click! Click!)
(A military van screeches to a halt and the soldiers board the man like a bag of garbage).
The END.
NOTE: This work of fiction was inspired by actual events but is otherwise a product of the writer’s imagination.
