A2 My friend died in my arms

Name: Mike F., Nigeria, 18 years old Reporter: Karina Mauritz

It happened in 2000 in Lagos, Nigeria. I was a student and also a member of a non governmental organisation political group. The name of the group is Odua Peoples Congress. This group is an ethnic group (the Yoruba).
There was as fight between the Haussa from the north and the Yoruba . There was a killing in the north. As a reaction to this, a killing of the Haussa started in Lagos. My group decided for the killing, but I didn’t agree.

At that time I had a funny and painful experience. I was very young and it was the first time that I saw the killing of people with my own eye. It was very painful for me to see the people die. I lost my older brother and a cousin in this civil war.

Now let´s go to the funny part of it. One day there was a fighting in the streets. My friend, who had cigarette shop, was a Haussa. He has lived for a very long time in Lagos, and he was very popular in his neighbourhood. He was hidden by friends because the killing was going on for four month and he couldn’t sell cigarettes. He thought the fights were over so he came out into the street.

In this moment my group and I were patrolling in the streets. One member of my group recognized my friend as a Haussa and attacked him with a machetta (big knife) so that he had serious wounds all over his body. The skull was split so that you could see his brain. I couldn’t stop my group to massacre my friend.

The only thing I could do was to take him into my hands and to see him die in my arms.