We live in a world ruled by fears. We pretend a lot. We see many of our afflictions as taboos: things that must not be talked about in the open. So, we suffer in silence.We fear to talk about rape. I am talking about a girl a child being raped by her father or an uncle. We treat sexual assault, sexuality and mental health conditions with levity.We fear to talk about the fact that we still own slaves in this twitter age. I know we do not call them slaves; we call them house helps or housemaids, but the treatment we give them shows that they are nothing but slavesthey cannot sit on the couch; they cant eat on the dining table; they cant watch television in our presence; and they can easily be identified when we go out with them. Their dressing, their hair, their shoes and all tell them apart.You may wonder why I am sermonising. Please blame it all on Ayodele Olofintuade. She has this amazing novel, which deals with issues we gloss over. She calls it Lakiriboto Chronicles. It has a sub-title A brief history of badly behaved women.Set mainly in Ibadan, it is, in the main, the story of four women and one man. There are some minor characters here and there who all contribute to make the story tick.The story kicks off with the death of Alhaja, Moremis grandmother. This death provides for Olori Ebi, a man of questionable past, the opportunity to steal all of Alhajas properties. Morieba and Moremi are stumbling blocks he must deal with. He thus orchestrates Moremis relocation to Lagos, where she becomes a maid to Tola. Though Tola is a relative, her badly-behaved doctor-husband, Wale, makes Moremi and Kudirat, also his wifes relative, feel like modern-day slaves. To make matters worse, his itchy fingers are always touching inappropriate areas; even his children who he named Jesutomi, Jesuwalaye and Jesulayomi are not free from his satanic touches.Tola, who suffers from Multiple Personality Disorder (MPD), confronts Wale about his abuse of their daughter. He pretends not to know what she is talking about. Tola eventually gets fed up and with Moriebas help, she, her children with Kudirat and Moremi, relocate to Ibadan.Olori Ebis plot to steal Alhajas properties ascends a new pedestal when he gets a girl to become amorous with her and get it captured on photo and video. With the pictures he tries to blackmail her into letting him have all of Alhajas belongings. It is at this stage that Morieba confesses her gay status to Moremi as a way of breaking Olori Ebis back.At a point, the person who helps Olori Ebi to get the photographs and video becomes greedy and wants to extort Morieba; thus paving the way for a high-wired counter-plot, which sees Morieba setting up Olori Ebi and cunningly getting all the vital documents in his hand. It also emerges that Amope, Moremis mother, has been a victim of Olori Ebis plot to own all. For years she battles drug addiction, which she gets enmeshed in because her stepbrother (Olori Ebi) sees her as a stumbling block that must be removed at all cost.Significantly, Tolas abuse as a child by her father, and her mothers handling of it, tell a lot about parenting. Some mothers are not worth the label at all. Instead of crosschecking her daughters words, she simply writes it off and beats the hell out of her. Her attitude throughout portrays her as a good example of a bad mother. She allows the long-held tradition of silence in the Alagbado clan make nonsense of her professed love of God.A major twist in this book is Tola agreeing to return to Lagos with Wale after he traces her to Ibadan. No one suspects her ulterior motive with the sudden change of mind. She becomes submissive in Lagos. And it is at this point that Wales Christian life is further exposed as phony. We find out he likes violent sexual acts. To catch him and punish him, Rita (Tolas other personality) takes over and pretends to become a convert to his weird sexual ways and through this she kills him so neatly that even the police hold her for manslaughter and not for murder.MPD, also known as Dissociative Identity Disorder, is a mental condition where two or more distinct personalities are believed to control the behaviour of a single individual. In Tola, the second personality is known as Rita and she is the daring one.Olofintuades language is seductive. Her narrative skill is good. She tells her story with vigour, with zeal and a presence of mind that leaves out no vital details.This definitely is an important book. It is the second book I have read of recent, which brings Ibadan alive; the other is Abimbola Adelakuns Under Brown Rusted Roofs.This book also has elements of the Yoruba cosmic. From time to time, we see Esu (Not Satan, mind you) playing a role once in a while.Olofintuade gives Lakiriboto, a Yoruba word that is used to describe a woman whose vagina walls are closed for penetration, a metaphoric meaning. It is adapted here because the book is about women who refuse to be controlled by societal norms. These women take charge of their sexuality, their finances and fates.My final take: Leadership should not be about gender. Brilliance has no gender, so should leadership. But, in our mediocre society, men are automatically given leadership roles because of their gender even when they lack the cognitive requirement to deliver. And when women are in positions of authorities, not a few of us attribute it to reasons other than their capabilities.I wish Olofintuade, whose children book Enos Story was shortlisted for the NLNG Prize for Literature in 2011, more blood in her veins to tap the computer keypad for more exciting fictions.
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