"As I packed my bags in anticipation of a new sojourn, my mum looked at me with sorrow written all over her face and said, 'Whatever the case may be, please don't talk about your ties to our village
Don't!' At that moment, fear gripped me more than it ever did."
I don't know the exact time when the Ife-Modakeke conflict started. In fact, stories I've been told never really pointed out one worthy reason why a conflict of such magnitude began. However, the aftereffects of the conflict continue to linger, with survivors emotionally scratched and scarred for life. The burnt bridges are yet to be rebuilt; the lost trust is yet to be found.
When the conflict was at its infancy I visited my grandparents during one of the holidays. Signs of the conflict weren't that visible as everyday people from Ife and Modakeke mingled freely without stress. The fight was only restricted to those directly involved and their immediate support. However, night life in the historic town was already struggling.
When it was time to go back to our base, we waited for hours at Lagere just to get a bus. It wasn't until about 10p.m. when we later got a cocoa carrying truck heading our direction. They helped us to our base. We got home around 1:05am the next morning. And the next time I visited about a year after, it was to bury my grandpa.
Within the one year of my visitation and my grandpa's death, the conflict had escalated. At that time, our family house was burnt to the ground while my grandparents barely managed to escape. All their properties were lost to the fire. I wept bitterly when the news broke. I never knew that was the genesis of a conflict that will destroy lives and families.
When we went to bury grandpa, we were flanked by military men who protected us through the proceedings. Afterwards, an uncle was murdered on his way to his farm. It took about a few days to know he was dead. By the time friendlies got to his lifeless body, rigor mortis already set in. The same fate befell several able bodied men who dared to go to their farms during the conflict. Many lives were lost, some killed by people who used to be their friends but now on the other side of the conflict.
When I asked my grandma what actually caused the conflict, she gave me more than one reason: one was political, another was egotistical. However, from her account, the egotistical reason collided with the political one to snowball into a conflict that got so bad that mercenaries were employed to kill. She called them "ajaguntà."
If you know these two towns, you'll know how intertwined they were and still are. Only a street separates Modakeke from Ife-the one at the back of Mayfair. Folks from both sides were married to each other. But when the conflict started, everyone went nuts. Everyone returned to his town. Kids born in those unions became victims with some killed by Ife assailants for being birthed by a Modakeke woman and vice versa, forgetting their father is their kin.
In the end, the conflict fizzled out. The two kings that started the mayhem are already washed away in the sands of time. However, those that live on continue to suffer the consequences. Though relations between the intertwined towns have resumed, it is still with caution. They are still reluctant to marry each other. They are still reluctant to trust each other. About twenty something years after the conflict, people are still cautious. No one wants to be caught unguarded ever again.
