Alfred Rewane Road was blocked. People on the bridge at the Falomo roundabout had exited their cars and lined up along the kerb, some of them pointing out the smoke rising behind the mansions of Oyinkan Abayomi Drive, others recording with their phones. A lot of them had their hands on their heads; some stood open-mouthed, others talked on their phones, spreading news of the plane crash.
Inspector Ibrahim told Sergeant Bakare to kill the siren. It was making it hard for Ibrahim to think. The signal from central control in Panti ordered every available officer to be mobilised. Every available officer. That meant traffic wardens, desk officers, even detectives on active cases. A plane crash in a residential area was enough of a disaster, but this was not some regular neighbourhood; this was Ikoyi, old Ikoyi, where the old money lived.
The smoke looked as if it was being pumped out by a factory, then all of a sudden, a flash and the smoke turned orange. A split second later the sound of the explosion reached the bridge. A woman shouted to Jesus to save the poor souls but there was no saving anybody down there. The irony, Ibrahim thought. He knew these people – the same people who would make a call and divert state resources to guard their homes; people who could get a senior officer relocated to a post in Boko Haram territory for not understanding that the job of the police was to protect the rich. Too often he had been ‘requested to provide officers’ whose job would be to escort teenage brats to parties with even more brats – police officers who could be doing police work but instead carried shopping baskets behind bleached-skinned mistresses. He knew them like only a high-ranking police officer could. Rich criminals, that’s all they were. They represented the cases quashed, the investigations called off, the murders, the extortions, the thefts. These people didn’t need protecting; ordinary Nigerians needed to be protected from them.
Ibrahim climbed out of the front door of the police van. His officers got out of the back and joined onlookers on the side of the bridge. Next to them, a young boy in dirty jean shorts and a brown singlet was the only person with his back to the unfolding scene. A worn travel bag was wide open between his feet. In it, in protective plastic sheets, the self-help books he had been selling in traffic before the crash. He was telling a group of worried-looking motorists and their passengers what he had witnessed. With his hand he demonstrated the moment of impact.
‘It was facing down like this. It come down, wheeeeeeee, then it explode, bulah!’
More people crowded round the boy and he repeated what he had said, his recollection of the moment of impact becoming more detailed and the explosion more impressive. As he spoke, everybody on the bridge turned and looked up. A grey helicopter flew low and fast over them and crossed the lagoon in seconds. It went over the crash site before circling back, tilting sideways, then it hovered loudly, spreading the smoke beneath it.
‘Navy,’ Ibrahim muttered to himself. Early reports placed the crash at Magbon Close; another report had it at Ilabere Avenue – both close to each other, both home to billionaires living in modern multimillion-dollar mansions on plots that once housed colonial administrators. Most of the properties had stayed in the same families for generations; the dynasties of Lagos. The very type of Nigerians who flew in private jets. How ironic. He turned to the officer beside him – a slim and lanky, dark-skinned man with tribal marks fanning out from the tips of his lips.
‘Hot-Temper, take Moses and Salem and go to Oshodi market. Where is your phone?’
Hot-Temper was dressed in the military-style combat uniform of the special anti-robbery squad, Fire-for-Fire. He brought out his mobile phone, an old grey Nokia with a monochrome screen, the characters worn off the rubber keypad.
‘Save this number. It’s Amaka. She said they are about to lynch somebody there.’
‘For Oshodi market? Wetin she dey do there?’
‘Who knows? You are not going to get there in this traffic. Take okada.’
Hot-Temper saluted his boss and turned around to scan the traffic. A line of motorcycle taxis was parked between stationary cars, their owners close by watching the helicopter hover over the crash site.
‘Be quick,’ Ibrahim said as Hot-Temper walked towards an okada. The three officers were commandeering motorcycles from young owners who did not have driving licences and who knew better than to protest too much with police officers. ‘And follow her wherever she’s going.’
Hot-Temper waited for a boy to pull his okada motorcycle out backwards from between parked cars and turn it round in the cramped space on the bridge. Hot-Temper swung his AK-47 over his back and mounted the vehicle. The boy held on to one handle and Hot-Temper raised his hand as if he was about to slap the boy.
‘Come to Bar Beach Station tomorrow morning to collect your okada,’ Ibrahim shouted to the boy. ‘Hot-Temper, call me when you see her, OK?’
Hot-Temper kicked the machine to life and revved.
The helicopter flew back the way it had come. Everyone on the bridge ducked as it passed overhead, then arched their necks to follow it as it disappeared.
‘We are walking,’ Ibrahim said to the two remaining officers. He tapped on the bonnet of the van. Sergeant Bakare began to open his door to get out but Ibrahim gestured for him to remain. ‘Meet us there,’ he said, and started down the bridge with his officers.