“Each time I cook in the kitchen, the pain I get from the
hot pot reminds me of what my son went through.
I would say to myself, if I can feel this little heat from the pot this way, I wonder what my son would have passed through. At that moment, I would start crying… So,
it brings to me the memory of my son’s torture”
Saturday Sun made efforts to speak to parents of the victims, but there was a brick wall. Only one, Mrs. Mike, could talk. She is Toku Lloyd Mike’s mother. She agreed to talk on condition that the interview would not touch issues already in court. Here’s her agonizing existence since the death of her son.
Excerpts:
How life has been without her son, Lloyd
I want to thank God because if it had not been the grace of God upon my life and the rest of my family members, I don’t think we would have made it up till today. For that, I give thanks to God. You know, I have two boys now. My first son (Lloyd) was 11 years older than my second son. My second son is about eight now, while the other one is five. Occasionally, they would talk about their brother as if he travelled. And, when they do that, they just laugh. Sometimes, they listen to his music and begin to practise rap the way their late brother rapped. In all these, the mental torture alone is something else.
Memory of the manner of his death
Apart from that, when I sleep, as soon as it is 3:00am, I find it difficult to sleep again. The memory of the way they bashed his head and he fell, got up and they hit him again with objects, he went down again, you know… The memory of his torture is something I don’t know how to explain. Especially, each time I want to cook in the kitchen, the pain I usually get from the hot pot reminds me of what they went through. I would say to myself, if I can feel this little heat from the pot this way, I wonder what my son would have passed through. At that moment, I would start crying. The thought is killing. So, now I find it very difficult to go close to fire, because it brings to me the memory of my son’s torture. Honestly, it has not been easy.
My son was like a husband and friend to me
You now, this was a boy, when I had him, there were ups and downs. You know what it means in the life of some couples. He was the only support I had. It was like, when I looked at him, I’d say, he was worth being in this marriage. We saw him grew up; it was not as if he repeated JAMB examination; he gained admission with excellent result. Just when I thought I had another husband or friend – because people did not believe he was my son – they killed him. They did not believe that I had got a grown up son like him. He made me proud and I made much noise about him.
My husband wanted the best for him, only for somebody to kill him, because they said he stole a laptop. In fact, the IG said he investigated it and there was nothing to prove that he stole that. I give glory to God for that. There are armed robbers that are caught with arms, yet they were not killed. They are in prison; they are not dead, waiting to be taken to court. If they had just caught these boys and taken them to the police, they wouldn’t have been dead.
Today, I am suffering. I cannot sleep anymore. It’s just too much for me. When my son was alive, at times, he would tease me, saying: ‘mummy, you used to be agile, what is happening to you now? The way he would talk to me, I would say, so I have got a son who could advise us. He had this instinct in him, which was wanting to be the best in life. That was why he struggled to succeed. He wanted the best for his younger ones, too. The way he talked, you would know he had good plans for them. I dreamt and hoped that one day he would be somebody. Just when I thought he was getting there, he was murdered.
His last encounter
His last word was one of the things that made me strong today. We went to church, and when we came back, he gave me a book, entitled How Faith Works. I looked at the book and laughed. I asked him, “O’boy, have you started buying books? He urged me to read the book, that when he returned, we would discuss it. After saying that, I had joy in my heart because I had not seen him do that before. So, the last thing he said to me was giving me that book and telling me to read it to know how faith works.
I usually call him on phone, to find out how he was faring in school. When I don’t call him, he would be worried and calls me to find out the cause. But his father was always communicating with him. The last time his father spoke with him was on Thursday, October 4, 2012, his (father’s) birthday. My husband told me that Lloyd called to wish him happy birthday and said he would come home on Friday. And, I felt worried that I had not been calling him.
How she received the news of her son’s death
That fateful Friday morning, I was about taking my bath when I received a phone call. He said they were going to kill him. I screamed, because I wondered what he had done. There was never a time I heard that Lloyd did something that would warrant somebody to be angry with him. No time! Never! I now said to myself, may be, he fought. But there was never a time he did something grievous that made someone think of killing him. I just prayed and handed my son over to God, and my husband and I rushed out of the house, shaking and trembling. Any time I remember him, I remember that book.
My solace is in God and I hope that one day their death (Lloyd and three others) would give people hope. I believe something would come out of their death that would be of benefit to members of the public; something good for the youths and the underprivileged, by the special grace of God.
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