Help! My phone network’s stalking me! I need a restraining order

I guess there are many indulgees who are reading the title of this piece this very moment and are wondering what the chief indulgee is up to right now. Well, I am not going to sing and ask you to ‘blame it on the rain,’ the way the diminutive musician, Prince, sang some years ago. Neither am I going to begin to ascribe this to being holed up in Abuja since Tuesday, attending the World Economic Forum Africa, where the full impact of ‘a city on lock down’ became present and real!

And I won’t even blame it on the fact that this time, in a locked down Abuja, I got to learn more deeply that there are tens of thousands of people from different parts of Nigeria who chased the gold dust in a gold rush manner to Abuja, who haven’t found the dust, much less the gold bar itself; they are stuck in the city and don’t really know how to go back home with their tails between their legs. You know how they say these things, “the shame that comes with returning the way you left or even worse off, having failed to conquer patch anew!”

I told one of these folks that I met in Abuja, that it happens everywhere, meaning in Europe, America, Australia, and some other places some people might want to consider exotic, dreams fail and people return home; and that there was nothing to be ashamed of, when you try and do not succeed. The man or woman who makes the effort to seek a better life should be given a path on the back for having the brain in the first place to know that their life can be better.

After all, there are many people in position of authority who have our lives in their hands, but who do not seem to know that our lives could be better than what they are presently giving us. It’s the reason why, were we all to be carried from our homes, by way of disappearances, it would take them considerable time to respond; by which time we might as well be bound in chains in some Land Coocoo, a place of possibly no return (God forbid).

Now, coming at you, fellow indulgees, this Sunday with a title containing ‘restraining order,’ I believe some of you might be tempted to think that I am one trouble maker about to unleash big ‘agro’ on you! Perish the thought. My ‘agro’ is not with any of you, even though I find it strange that none of you have protested that we have moved you on from Friday meeting day to Sunday. Apparently, you are the typical quiet Nigerian, who would take things as they come, and even when you can practically take it no more, you still go on taking it. But seeking a restraining order often comes from a worrying state of mind that has been foisted by extreme frustration – frustration brought about by an external party, whom you want to restrain from continuing to frustrate your life. Again, for those of you who have a very high propensity to be curious, let not that curiosity lead you astray!

Yes, I will be the first to hold up my hands, put out my white flag (a la Dido) and admit that I have been watching a lot of programmes on ‘Crime & Investigation’ and ‘Discovery Investigation’ channels. And if you stretch that and say… “Oh, I see. So, this is where all this ‘restraining order’ is coming from,” then you’ll be right on track. But seeking such a restraining order on my phone company is because I have started feeling frustrated by a certain kind of bombardment that will very soon begin to cause me harm, if something is not done quickly.

Here’s what I am talking about. Indulgees who have been on this journey with me since 2008, know that I have a personal phone number with a fantastic 5555568 in it. I have had some problems with the number for a while that forced me to give it a shifting. One of the problems had to do with the disease of persistent deduction of money from my credit, even when I leave the phone idle for days. This has happened for months and months even when I had occasionally changed the phone in which the SIM card is housed. This has always put me on tenterhook. If this happened to me in one of those countries where I could easily walk into a small claims court and sue for cheating, I am sure I could have had some reasonable compensation. But there is now even a much stronger reason to ask for this restraining order that I am asking for.

After my several months of suspicious engagement with my phone network, demonstrated by me dumping the card and choosing to use the other networks, I return to it, because the truth is, that number is my first phone love. And as someone who likes to stay loyal, I decided to go back to it two weeks ago. Since returning to it, however, this network has continued to bombard me minute by minute with all sorts of things, information about subscribing to all manner of services, forgetting that what I asked for from it was for it to just provide me with voice and SMS services. I am really sick and tired of this behaviour and the only thing I can think of is to ask for help from whoever can provide it, to have this network restrained from sending these lousy messages anywhere near my number!

There’s something dark about this and it’s putting my life in danger! Can someone hear my cry for help and do something, please? 

PHILLIP ISAKPA