PH Beggars Or Desperador?

You might have observed that the number of beggars on the streets of Port Harcourt is on an alarming increase. As you walk out of your home, they assail you. Whichever direction you turn to, they are on your path staring at you with great expectation. Whenever you find a beggar, you are likely to find a row of many more.

 At bus-stops, before church buildings, on bridges and even in buses, they go about appealing for help  with all the skills they can muster, while at the same time emitting nauseating halitosis. They have become part of our social value with all their nuisance value.

In order to attract sympathy and help, beggars expose unhealthy parts of their bodies, the reason for which they seek help. They tell their stories in the same rhyme. Some of them infuse talent and make beautiful melody with their plea for mercy.

But why is the population of beggars on the increase? Where are they coming from? How did they find themselves in begging? The Tide spoke with some of these beggars, but many of them were averse to speaking with strangers preferring money to conversation. While some walked away or turned their faces, others rained vituperations in their languages. However, the serious few among them volunteered information.

Mallam Sule, who claimed to be above 60 years, could only speak through an interpreter, the young  boy leading him. He claimed he never liked  begging. “It is the will of Allah”, he said, explaining that he took to begging when things got so critical for him. Sale, a former bicycle repairer, lost his sight about ten years ago. He could not afford  medical bills, and his wife, who had been a source of support to him, died  mid way in his illness. His children, though adults, could not assist in his upkeep.

Continuing, Sale said, he was too old to seek a job. As a complete blind man, it would not have made much difference if he had a job. According to him, he began begging some years ago in Minna, Niger State, before he boarded a truck that brought him to Port Harcourt, “But what will an old man like me do?” he asked. “Who will employ an old man like me?” Sale does not have  a home but has a spot to  himself at an abandoned couch at the railway station. “That is where we all stay,” he announced.

Sale is not alone in the ordeal. Take, for instance,  Kazeem, who claims he has a permanent position at Harbour  Road. This young man, though looking quite healthy, is an amputee. He says his right arm was chopped off in a motor accident several years ago. “Begging is not my choice. I do not want to beg. But it is the will of God which is why I am in this condition, who will take care of me if I do not fend for myself?”

A woman beggar along Aggrey Road only chuckled and would not offer an answer to any question. She looked  obsese and was surrounded by three  children who played around her. One of the kids, apparently the eldest among them who gave her name as  Amotu, giggled and said: “Oga, give us money,. We wan chop. Hunger dey. “ She  went on touching her mouth to indicate what she meant. Asked whether she would like to be enrolled in school, Amotu quickly nodded in the affirmative. But her mother soon got impatient and  ordered her to keep quiet.

Another woman beggar with a set of twins seemed quite eager to talk, but declined to give her name. She explained that she had to beg for a living to “keep my babies alive”.  She bemoaned her abandonment by everyone. He r husband was jobless and fled the home because of financial problems.  She said her twins were ill, hungry and often crying, and her husband was no where to be found. Survival is very hectic. Many times this nursing mother said she sat up in the middle of the right and shed tears for her twins. In Spite of the suffering, however, the woman expressed determination not to give up her children for adoption. “They will eat whatever they find, and any lady who wants to adopt my babies will adopt me too,” she declared.

Aside from these Nigerians, Arabs from Niger, Chad among others are another set of desperate beggers whose numerical strength leaves one wondering whether Nigeria has a workable border patrol. You often would find an entire family of these foreigners “controlling” an area. The adults would usually sit at a distance and let their children do the begging.  And their kids could be quite persistent. They enter onto one’s arms looking helpless. The girls seem to have had some lessons from their parents about general male weakness, for they often would go for men with coy smiles and words like “You fine,” oga, come give me money. You know say you fine.”

For Henry Godwin, a businessman in Port Harcourt, begging is practiced as a custom among a certain tribe of people and not an act borne out of being handicapped or disadvantaged. This is why there are able-bodied persons begging for alms. “These Arabs feel it is normal for people to beg for a living. The belief is that God lets some people to become rich so that they could give to the poor,” he said. This, perhaps, explains why many physically fit people become lazy, even though they can still work. These ones have trained their minds to accept that it is their destiny to be poor. Else how do we explain situations where disabled people brave all odds to become useful to themselves and society?

Tony Ejigbo attributes the problem to their orientation. They feel begging is the only way they can live as human beings. “I have personally confirmed this. I called some of them to say ‘come, why are you not working? I have job for you,’ once you volunteer to assist these beggars with jobs, they just leave you and go to another person.” If both Godwin and Ejigbo’s positions are correct, a lot of Southerners have started exploiting it with relish.

Realising the danger beggars pose to security, the Rivers State Government had, on several occasions, taken beggars away from the streets of Port Harcourt to isolated sites. Soon after such evacuations, they resurface. It is in the light this that some persons have suggested government’s intervention. Says Cyril Opurum: “I don’t think that the government should pretend to be ignorant of the ugly trend. These beggars are everywhere harassing everyone. People should stop giving alms except in genuine cases. The government has to accommodate destitutes in the state.”

But who is a genuine beggar? Is he the one who goes about begging for alms for a living or the well-dressed beggar who often begs for money for transportation?

Arnold Alalibo