The Lekki Headmaster Chapter One
                                                     Dusk…
SOMETHING seemed unusual in the way the principal walked to the podium from the back of the assembly. He moved his tall frame rather ponderously.

He was not as smart as he used to be. The trademark morning smile was not forthcoming. He took the microphone from Angel, the chapel prefect, and held it, saying nothing.

This was despite the fact that the morning’s pep talk was over, and everyone was excited. All waited for the principal to speak. But the man looked blankly above the students’ heads, instead of compellingly into their eyes, the way he used to. He attempted to talk, yet words refused to come.

His head dropped over his broad shoulders as he began to stare at the colourful tiles on the floor.

There was a heavy silence. Again, the principal – Mr Bepo Adewale – attempted to speak. Tears! Everyone saw them. Tears trickled down his face.

He made yet another move to produce words. This time, the microphone dropped on the floor, sending a vexatious clatter out of the twin sound boxes at
the assembly.

More tears streamed from both eyes, competitively rolling down his sunken cheeks. Dozens of perplexed eyes – students and staff – fixed on him. There was nowhere to hide from the puzzled looks.

Then, he hid in the only available space. He brought his palms together, like a supplicant, and shielded his face.
The first person to find a voice was the Vice Principal, Mrs Grace Apeh.
“What is the matter, principal?” she asked, moving to his side. Four other staff members joined her. But the principal said nothing. Instead, he sobbed freely.

The school nurse, Mrs Titi Israel, fondly called Nurse Titi, fetched a handkerchief and offered it to him. “Please, conclude the assembly and let the students go into their classes immediately,” the VP instructed the Chemistry teacher, Mr Justus Anab, one of the tutors who always insisted students address them with their full names. Mrs Apeh, the nurse, and Mr Oyelana, the CRK teacher, started walking the principal back to his office, his face still buried in his palms, sobbing, even more agitatedly.

“Sir, what is the matter?” Nurse Titi asked as they helped Bepo to his chair
in the office. “Is anything the matter?” she asked again. Bepo did not utter a
word. The tears did not stop flowing either. At 8:05 a.m., more teachers arrived to console the sobbing principal or possibly lend a helping hand. But the VP advised them to go to their classes, except for the guidance counsellor, Mrs Beke Egbin.

Questions and consolation resumed. For over 30 minutes, they petted Bepo. All the while, he sobbed. Occasionally, he would shake his head. He would look
at the ceiling and at the faces before him, as though he had just returned from a
dreamy wonderland. Then he would plunge further into tears. Meanwhile, the
VP’s phone had been ringing.

Information had already reached some parents. They were anxious to know what had happened to the beloved principal. One  parent ‘learnt’ he was weeping uncontrollably and rolling on the floor. Another parent ‘heard’ that he kept muttering in Yoruba, Olúwa gbà mí o! Save me, O God! At this point, Mrs Apeh realised the best she could do was to call the Managing Director, Mrs Ibidun Gloss, popularly called MD, who – but for a function she had to attend that morning – ought to have been in school.

But the morning assembly had not begun on a tearful note. Since Stardom
Schools’ Management came up with a shrewd incentive of lowering its
boarding fees, the headache it used to have, trying to tame lateness, had
reduced significantly. From N250,000 per session, the fee climbed down to
N165,000. The result was instant: more than 80 per cent of the parents moved
their children to the boarding house, which was a haven of modest comfort
enjoyed by elite students. Almost all the learners began to turn up at 7:45 a.m.
for the assembly.

That had been far from the case before the policy change. Many of the
students came from different parts of Lagos, where the fear of heavy traffic was
the beginning of wisdom. Interestingly, not many parents complained when the
school, almost immediately, raised the fee for ‘Excursion and Other Items’ by
N93,000. Some staff gossiped about this, especially Mr Audu, the Fine Arts
teacher, who was a bundle of biting humour. He cleared his throat, pushed a
finger into his mouth, drew it out, and pointed skywards: “In matters of
economics,” he quipped, “I swear, the MD is a witch and a wizard rolled into
one!” Audu and his naughty vibes!
The assembly had commenced early. The A-List school, located in the posh
heart of Lekki, as usual, began the ritual with a short prayer, in the form of a
recitation of the second stanza of Nigeria’s National Anthem: “Oh God of
creation, direct our noble cause…” Stardom did this on Tuesdays and
Thursdays, while Christian and Muslim prayers were said on Mondays,
Wednesdays and Fridays, alongside the National Anthem (first stanza). On
Tuesdays and Thursdays, the assembly adopted the second stanza as a prayer.
It did not bother to recite the first but simply went straight to the school’s
anthem.

Angel announced it was time for the pep talk. The principal had introduced
this seven years earlier. It involved the presentation of a speech by a student. It
was spontaneous, at times. At other times, topics were given ahead of presentation days. Today’s talk was, however, different: the way it occasionally happened. Ikenna Egbu, an SSS 1 student mounted the podium to narrate his experience.

He was part of a group of Stardom students who had just returned
from an excursion to Jos, Plateau State, in the North Central part of the country.
“I saw Nigeria in its acrobatic beauty,” he began, awakening cheers and applause, especially by the sound of the abnormally applied word, ‘acrobatic’.
“My fellow students, if you have not been to Jos…” Ikenna paused and browsed
their excited faces, as though he wanted to be sure they were ready for the
discoveries he was about to log into. He continued: “You might have been to
London; you might have been to New York. But if you have not been to Jos, you
MUST be in that brilliantly beautiful city in YOUR lifetime!” Yells and applause
greeted the narrative.

“One of the most memorable attributes of Jos is its very lovely weather,”
Ikenna said. “Although we are in the dry season, Jos welcomed us with very
cool arms. So chilly is Jos that I felt like sleeping every second of the two days
we spent there. I can also not forget its acrobatic landscape. Not in any negative
sense, but with rocks that sit in artistic layers and, at times, in dramatic postures.

You could see a rock carrying three other rocks on its head. You could find a
small rock confidently backing another, big enough to give birth to it.”
Another round of ovation. Ikenna paused. He continued: “Dearest Stars of
Stardom, some of our hosts said Jos used to be more beautiful than what we
saw, and that some violent crises had affected it. Notwithstanding, I can still
confidently say it remains the leading tourism city in this country. No wonder,
many important white men were said to have lived there during the colonial
period.”
Ikenna named some places the group visited, such as the Lamingo Dam,
the University of Jos, the Shere Hills, Wase Rocks and the Solomon Lar
Amusement Park.

“If I have the opportunity in the future, I would like to settle in Jos, instead
of japa-ing to Toronto or London!” A fun-filled round of clapping and hollering
erupted as Ikenna climbed down and joined his classmates on the line.
The chapel prefect then called for decorum, inviting the principal for his
address and announcement. Although Ikenna was a science student, he was
also a respected poet. His mum, a broadcaster, was an award-winning poet too.

Following the young boy’s captivating account, many students and staff
expected a great comment from the principal, who had been an inspiring pillar at Stardom for 24 years. His impact was so remarkable that his employers,
parents and other stakeholders regarded him as a school builder. He gave the
students his all, with an ever-burning passion to see them grow in all
ramifications.

On a day like this, he would be on top of the world. He would regard Ikenna’s outing as evidence of the good education Stardom offered, which, he
believed, every Nigerian child deserved. The students also expected him to
identify some terms Ikenna might not have articulated well. They were eager to
hear something special from the tall, light-skinned principal, nicknamed The
Lekki Headmaster, because he used to imitate characters in the old TV drama,
Village Headmaster, amusingly when he was Headmaster at Stardom Kiddies.
Sometimes, Stardom students called him ‘Principo’, because he never got tired
of saying the pronunciation of ‘principal’ should not end with ‘PA’. “It’s
‘PrinciPL,” Bepo would emphasise. But this morning, he was not on top of the
world: he was under the world of tears.
At her office on the second floor of the Admin Building, the MD aimlessly
removed her glasses and aimlessly dropped them on a tea stool by her right.
She never envisaged the frustration fast beclouding what, ordinarily, should
have been a pleasant morning. She had driven down to school hurriedly after
the VP raised the alarm about the principal’s strange behaviour.
Only the previous day, the school celebrated its over 90 per cent success in
the last West African Senior School Certificate Examination – WASSCE. The
event ought to have been held earlier, but it was postponed because the
management could not immediately decide on the star prizes it wished to give.
The school surprised all its employees with snacks, bottles of wine, and N20,000 each for all SSS 3 teachers. Those who handled subjects where candidates scored
distinctions, however, took home N30,000 each. The only teachers who had questions to answer were Mr Obong Ukaku and Miss Taye Kareem, in whose
subjects – Chemistry and Geography, respectively – two candidates had Ds.
But all the teachers escaped real trouble as no candidate scored F9. At Stardom,
consider yourself sacked if any of the students you presented for WASSCE or
the Senior School Certificate Examination conducted by the National
Examination Council (NECO) recorded F9. The previous year, not even a cousin
of the MD, Mr Funso Daniels, was spared an abrupt exit.

Following her arrival at about 9:30 a.m., the MD had invited Bepo to her
office, asking what the problem was. Thirty-something minutes later, he had
yet to state any reason for his distraught disposition. Instead, he kept muttering:
“Thank you. I will be all right.”
“Mr Bepo, you keep saying you will be all right, but you are not saying
what the problem is. You are aware that given your position in this school and
the excellent performance you have always put up, you are central to
everything that goes on. You are supposed to be the embodiment of sanity, the balm to troubled nerves. In many cases, these are what you have been. But why would you suddenly become the source of our anxiety?”
“Madam, I…” the principal managed to say, then broke down again.
The MD became more agitated. She picked one of the three mobile phones on her table. She made a call, which, three minutes later, produced the Physics
teacher, Mr Ope Wande, who was also a pastor.

“I am here, ma’am,” Wande said as he walked in. He had missed the
morning assembly, and besides the gists gathered from colleagues, he was only
seeing Bepo for the first time that day. “Principal, I hope all is well?” he asked.
“Not really. And that is why I invited you,” the MD said. Wande stooped
beside the principal and began to speak to him in a subdued voice. He asked
what the real matter was and assured him that he would keep secret whatever
information Bepo gave concerning his plight. Just like the MD had done, the
pastor-teacher also reminded Bepo of his cardinal position in the school, and
that news of the issue had already begun swirling, miles away from the premises.
Wande spoke to the upset principal for close to 10 minutes. Realising he
might have been talking to a brick wall, he turned to the MD and said, “Ma’am,
have we called Mr Bepo’s wife? I think we need to. And urgently too.”
Mrs Ibidun Gloss did not object to the advice. She asked the principal for
his wife’s phone number. Mr Bepo wrote it on the back of a card fetched from
the breast pocket of his grey jacket. The MD studied the card, hesitatingly,
before dialling. It was an international number.
“Principal’s wife now lives in London,” Wande affirmed.
“I should know. I wonder if he is not missing her badly,” the MD said. The
comment was supposed to be a joke. However, it elicited no laughter. Yet,
neither of the two lines the MD dialled rang. “Pastor, please, accompany the
principal to his office. I think he has to go home, really,” she said.
“I understand,” Pastor Wande said. “But I think there is a little problem with
that. It might not be a very good idea if he is left to go alone in this
circumstance.”
The MD understood the sentiment of the teacher’s fear. But she felt pressed
to move the drama away from the school as soon as possible. What would the
parents think if they learnt the principal was weeping like a child? The school,
an impatient spirit told her, was not a rehabilitation centre but a place for learning and earning money.
“Please, guide him to his office and arrange to take him home,” she said
emphatically, adding: “I learnt the guidance counsellor was with him earlier.
Perhaps she can go with him. He might also visit the clinic ASAP.”