AFFRAY AT THE NATIONAL STADIUM.
Not being so much of a soccer fan, deciding to go to the stadium to see the Bafana Bafana v. Super Eagles match was somewhat a novel experience. The first time I entered the National edifice was in February 2008 during the Oil and Gas Industry games when we were commissioned to go and cheer our very own NNPC team to victory. However the two experiences are incomparable.
Having made all human effort to get a vip invite from a friend on the NFA technical committee and failing, He opted to arrange for me to go to the games chaperoned ‘like some teenager going for Her prom’. I almost chickened out when I beheld the mob of fans trying to get in at the gate, being very irritable I choked on my breadth when about 500 people rushed into my front while quietly taking my turn on the queue with my chaperon tailing behind me…gosh! Naija people, they would never change. I decided to change my attitude and observe keenly all the goings on around me and alas I actually began to enjoy all of it.
The ticket vendors had decided to make about 300% gain and were selling the regular ticket of N300 for as much as N1000 amidst curses and mumbling from the frustrated fans, some smartly paid their way in by making peace offerings to the police officers manning the gate ‘and trust me they made better bargains’ imagine gaining entry in exchange for a bottle of la casera.
I would definitely have shot myself in the leg had I sat at the vip section only to miss all the fun and excitement of sitting amongst the masses: the first rancor I experienced was between Man U and Chelsea supporters whilst we all strolled into the stadium after successfully passing the last security point shouts of ‘up chelsea’ ‘up blues’ ‘up man u’ filled the air so much so that you would have doubted that we were all going to watch a Nations Cup Qualifier. Before I could say jack robinson two hefty guys were upon each other beating, cursing and at the same time conversing ‘after all we don beat una two cups in one season’ response ‘u dey craze no be penalty una take win’ you would have thought they were share holders in those clubs – Naija.
About 30 minutes into the match whilst I busied myself with getting snapshots from the pitch, a young guy came in selling viju milk. O boy, I tripped at the speed with which all his merchandise finished, He returned later with a bag full and in less than 10 minutes he was handing out the last one, to some guy who was sitting very far up His who in my opinion needed the drink very desperately opened the bottle to take a very long gulp, whilst He was at it He received a very deadly blow on his neck. I had to begin to pray that the blow would not cut into his jugular vein. The victim being a tenacious Nigerian recovered quickly enough to retaliate until the duo were separated by good spirited Nigerians.
A few minutes into the second half I noticed that my dear Naija brovas too reluctant to walk back to their seats decided to watch the last match from the aisles, causing great obstruction to the teeming audience ‘including myself’ though I took this in my stride one of the Naija ninjas in my front almost threw one of this obstructionists across the rail straight into the field of play ‘hope I wont catch you laughing cos it was not funny’ the guy was screaming ye! ye! until onlookers came to his rescue. It seemed that the spirit of affray matched majestically into our midst at that point because at different points people formed teams of fours and fives to beat up people from the aisles……..alas then came the Naija Police who baptized all of us with holy water oh! Sorry holy tear gas and that was how we all ended up watching the rest of the match teary eyed
WATCH OUT FOR PART 11
