By Kunle Ojeleye
It was a Saturday morning in the early 1980s. We were to travel to Lagos.
Baba had told the driver, Dominic, that we would be journeying in the Mercedes Benz 230. Consequently, Dominic moved the Toyota Cressida out of the garage, got the Merc out and re-parked the Toyota. He then went ahead to clean the vehicle and run it in readiness for the journey.
An hour after Dominic had finished preparing the Merc and loaded it with our items, we got in to set off.
The car refused to start. There was no cranking of the starter motor, no engine whining, just cold dead. With the turning of the ignition key, all lights on the dashboard would come up full, but not a tiny sound from the engine.
We got out, and Baba asked Dominic to go and get the mechanic. The mechanic came, laboured for more than 30 minutes and got no result.
The mechanic then told us that he had some unpleasant news – someone had supernaturally locked the car’s engine (ti ni agadagodo). Unless we identify the person and beg them to unlock it, we are going nowhere with the vehicle, and it will never work again until the person releases their supernatural hold.
We, the younger ones, were perplexed. I had heard stories of vehicle engines being supernaturally locked. I considered them ‘fabus’ (fables), but this was my first time witnessing any such scenario. We naively told Baba we could push the Merc back into the garage and travel with the Toyota. The old man shook his head and told us to go and play and leave the car where it was. He then went back inside his residence.
Twenty minutes later, out of curiosity, I decided to go and check on Baba in his room. I met him in his singlet and Sokoto when I stepped into his sitting room. His Agbada and Buba were off. Deep in prayers mixed with tongues, he was soaked in his sweat. I quickly stepped back out of the room without him seeing me.
About twenty minutes after I visited his sitting room, Baba came out fully dressed again. I thought he had decided that we would be travelling in the Toyota.
Baba called and instructed us to get inside the Merc. Dominic and the other chap we were travelling with were wondering what was happening, but I did not. I was the only one who saw him in his room deep in prayers, and after years of being around him as a prophet, I knew something must have occurred.
We got in the car, closed the doors, and Baba instructed Dominic to start the engine.
At the turn of the ignition key, all lights on the dashboard came up full, and the Merc engine roared into life.
We journeyed into Lagos, spent two weeks going about and returned home without any splutter from the vehicle, to talk less of a breakdown.
I dared to ask Baba what had happened when we got to Lagos, and he gave me a profound insight.
I have written here before that we all have two sides to our existence – the physical and the spiritual. My brother Isaac Austin Tobi recently wrote a post in this regard which was more in line of travelling in time in a dream and experiencing events in the future before they occur.
My personal experiences have reiterated to me that our understanding of life and the way we approach it are dictated by how much we understand our duality and the extent to which we accord some attention to our spiritual self.
My eyes have seen. This is the first time I will be sharing this personal experience. I never breathed a word to my parents despite their closeness to Baba.
“Oun oju ri l’aye, ẹnu, ko gbọdọ sọ, ẹnu, ko gbọdọ sọ, ẹnu, ko gbọdọ sọ.” – Chief Ebenezer Obey.
*Dr Kunle Ojeleye is a writer and public affairs analyst