​From West to East

By: Moshood Muhammed 

BEFORE JANUARY 24…

I remember waiting to be mobilized for NYSC and it never came until January. That was Stream II, 2016 Batch B. While waiting, many jokes were made of our situation. Many tauntingly referred to the stream as “the longest stream in the world”. Lol.

After waiting for weeks since deployment of the Stream I PCMs in November 2016, the waiting eventually came to an end. I was deployed to the eastern part of Nigeria. At last, it finally came. The once anxious Otondos were relieved and preparation began in earnest. 

As an ardent information seeker, I randomly  dropped my mobile number on Facebook groups, with a view to getting added to other information channels – mainly WhatsApp, asides NYSC sources. I clicked on few Whatsapp links as well. While I was invited to some, others did not go through. All the numbers I dropped were on request by some unknown individuals, who were either representative of a group in camp, fellow PCM or interested serving Corps members.
 

In one of the groups I belonged, having clarified my state of deployment, a participant, presumably a female serving youth corps shared a tormenting post. In that arrow she threw, according to her highly powerful source,  majority of the Stream II corps members would be posted to village because the town had already been occupied by the Stream 1 corps and the Batch A guys.

Curiously, many participants threw barrage of questions at the sender, she assured everyone never to be worried, provided they were ready to cooperate. If a certain amount is paid, she would help us secure good postings. I felt jittery. How would I pay for good posting? 

All these were a few days to my resumption to the Awgu orientation camp.
 

So, I chose to talk to the link in person. I slid into her DM, and I was assured again of good posting, provided I was ready to pay the good sum within a specific time. I was dazed. 

Membership of platforms like that is not entirely bad. There are genuine and reasonable fellows. Even though I couldn’t make friends on those platforms, due to some reasons best known to me, I participated in discussions when it was necessary and I must say, I was ‘info-tained’. I got enough dose of information and entertainment. Impatience and ethnic issues were some of the the reasons for many disagreements. 

On leaving camp on the 13th of February, I was not only posted to town, but, got a reasonably fair PPA. All at no cost. Yet, most of those who parted with their hard earned nairas had grief fill their hearts. For them, fetching water inside a basket is not as wasteful as their kidnapped sum. 

More to come… 

If you’re reading for the first time, read other accounts from #WestToEast on this blog. 

#CoalKopa #CoalCity #NYSC #Enugu