FEATURE ARTICLE

The Whale hunters of Victoria Island

By Reuben Abati  (EMAIL) Friday, August 24, 2001

omething really interesting is going on at the Lagos Bar Beach in Victoria Island. Close to two weeks ago, a baby whale was washed ashore by the tides. It rested by the beach, looking dead. Someone saw it. Word went round. And a big commotion followed. Lagos residents trooped to the beach. Motorists changed direction and went towards the beach. Passers-by stopped. Journalists began to make a story out of it. Many of these persons have probably never seen a whale in their lives. Which is understandable. The whale is the biggest fish in the ocean. The blue whale, in particular, is about the size of two elephants combined in one, its heart alone is equivalent to the weight of a Mercedes Benz 200. It is a rare animal. According to experts, it is endangered. I mean, it is not the kind of fish that would be washed ashore, and you'd look the other way. This novelty, in part, explains the drama that is being built around the sudden appearance of a baby whale on the coast of Lagos. In some other countries, let's say Britain, the event would have attracted the attention of government and other relevant authorities. Scientists, marine biologists, oceanographers and so on would have been drafted to the beach to take a look at the fish: to determine its nature and antecedents, why it is ashore, and whether its presence has any direct connection with certain movements within the ocean, and the surrounding environment and the implications of all this, for human life and society. At the end of the investigation, if the animal is still alive, it could be returned to the ocean, or it could be taken to a research institute. If it is dead, of course, it would be disposed off after the due process of scientific inquiry would have been concluded. That would have been the case in a society that is genuinely curious about the world around and about us; in a society that is, where science means something important, where animals have rights, and the level of desperation is not yet nasty and brutish. But faced with a similar situation, what has happened in our own case? What are our scientists saying about the dead whale on the shores of Lagos? Has anybody done its post-mortem? Is government showing interest in the matter? The obvious answer is in the negative. And this, comical as it may seem, says a lot about our society and our circumstances as human beings, living in a country called Nigeria. What has happened and is still happening, is now fairly common knowledge. Immediately the drama began, some area boys cordoned off the area leading to the spot where the baby whale is. They then erected toll gates at which they collected money from persons who wanted to see the fish, and possibly have a bit of it. You pay the toll; you are allowed access. In other words, those area boys had immediately seen the death of the whale and the novelty of it, as an opportunity to make quick money. Which is the way it is in this country. Nigerians do not joke with any kind of opportunity once it can bring in some cheap lucre. Did people pay the tolls? Of course, they did. For, between the area boys and the spectators, for whom the spectacle of a dead whale at the Bar Beach has become another football match, there isn't much difference. Three days later, posters and calendars showing the dead whale and the crowd of scavengers feeding on it were already on sale at the Oshodi fly over and in parts of Victoria Island. I am not making this up. I actually saw the calendar and posters. In fact, that was how I managed to realise the seriousness of the big show at the Bar Beach. The Guardian on Sunday story on it (August 19), especially the accompanying photograph conveys the full import of it all. A student of Animal Husbandry was interested in seeing what a whale looks like. But she belonged in a minority group. Majority of the persons who went to see the animal, and managed to get close, were armed with cutlasses, axes, swords, matchetes, blades - just about anything that could cut a portion of the fish. These whale meat hunters were not bothered that the animal was dead. It is possible that the whale had been poisoned by some other hunters elsewhere, and it found itself in Nigeria by accident. We have heard how some animals carry some deadly diseases. It is possible that this particular whale at the Lagos Bar Beach is carrying the virus of a yet unknown disease that is worse than HIV/AIDS. Obviously, the meat hunters did not consider that possibility. They just went after the fish. Hack! Whack! Hack!, they sliced it apart. Each person who managed to cut off a bit showed off his portion to the crowd - the prize of his curiosity and labour - and the crowd hailed. Television crews eventually went to the Bar Beach, and filmed the show. That didn't discourage the crowd. An old man and a younger man ended up quarrelling over a piece of the meat. In due course, flies rested on the dead whale. Still, the ceremony continued. One young man sliced off a fresh part of the whale and swallowed it. Another particularly histrionic young man was said to have showed up the following day, at the scene, munching something. To whoever cared to listen to him, the young man reportedly declared that he was eating the dead whale's meat. By Monday, this week, the whale hunters were still at work. Who knows, they may still be there, even as you read this piece. We cannot stop a dead whale from showing up at the Lagos Bar Beach. But it is curious that the madness over the baby whale has been going on without any statement from government, or the relevant authorities. The Federal College of Fisheries and Marine Technology, and the Institute of Oceanography are only a few minutes away from the Bar Beach - both institutions are yet to say anything official about the dangers of eating an unknown dead whale by the beach. The entire incident reminds me, invariably of the stress that had been generated in Europe by the "foot and mouth disease" and "the mad cow disease". I recall writing at the time that the animals that were slaughtered in Europe to prevent the spread of those diseases should have been sent to Africa. For us here, at least in this country, meat is meat. The dead whale at the Lagos Bar Beach proves this point, quite strongly. The matter is so serious. If a dead crocodile, or elephant, or hippopotamus shows up tomorrow by the Atlantic, Lagosians will feast on it. They will turn the meat into suya or use it to prepare fresh peppersoup. They would even quarrel over it as they are now doing over the dead whale. The first man to see the animal will claim it as his personal property. One of the present whale hunters, when reminded that he was eating dead, flies-infested meat had declared that it didn't matter: "Na iced fish. What is the difference between this and iced fish. Even if na Mammy Water send am, we go chop am." Reminded that the fish may have foot and mouth disease, the man laughed. "Even if na head and tail disease sef, I go chop am". Well? By the way, I had really wanted to go to the scene to take part in this Bar Beach show. It is not what you think. I wasn't going there to take my own pound of whale flesh. But to see the whale hunters, eating whale meat, cutting it, and actually enjoying it. I would have loved to interview the whale hunters to find out how the meat tastes. Is it a special kind of fish truly? But when I learnt that I'd have to pay toll fees to some area boys who were now exercising ownership rights over the whale, I abandoned the idea. What is the matter with those area boys, anyway? The whale, to push a point, is in Federal territory. Okay, Lagos is a littoral state, and the indigenes are claiming the Bar Beach. In any case, I didn't go again. But the matter of the dead whale soon became important to me. Now and then, I travel down to Victoria Island from this part of the city, to eat fish pepper soup at a particular joint. A friend of mine insists on inviting me for that purpose on a fairly regular basis. And so, the other day, he had phoned to say that we should meet at the same venue to eat fish pepper soup. I am so sorry, I had to decline. I had to cook up an excuse. I don't consider it a good idea to go around Victoria Island at this period, eating fish pepper soup. You could end up eating dead whale meat. Who knows where and how all the flesh of the dead whale at the Beach ended up? I mean, I don't want anybody to set me up. In fact, I dare say that some of those whale hunters that we saw on television looked like peppersoup sellers looking for cheap fish. But the short of it all is about the poverty in our land. Life has become so cheap that Nigerians would eat anything: dead dog, dead cat, dead ram, dead cow... You and I sit in our comfortable offices, drink tea, wear ties and assume that that is the way the whole world goes. But No. Our compatriots are at the beach eating the dead meat of a dead whale. They probably know that there are risks involved. But they have since passed the point of caring -simply because they do not really have much choice in this land where hunger is the only reality in many homes. The whale at the beach is a short-hand metaphor for the tragedy in the lives of our compatriots. When life loses value, the people are bound to race to the precipice with clear and open eyes. Pity.