MIRACLE AT KWOI

It was a journey that was to last barely seven (7) hours. It promised to be less because I travelled in the company of friends. It was a journey to end in celebration because it was the wedding of friends and family. I was excited to drive to a new town and register another location in my conquest of touring Nigerian states.

We took off two hours behind schedule and began the longest journey I have experienced in that year. We had a smooth ride until somewhere between two small villages around Kwoi, the minivan that was in the lead parked by the roadside. This wasn’t a strange thing because the minivan had stopped consistently to grant the occupants within the opportunity to purchase one of two items for the family they were.

This parking however didn’t look alright to me as I pulled up just ahead to find out what the matter was. Being that the van was in the lead meant to a large extent that we were in a convoy of two cars and more specifically, I didn’t know my way to the town so I had to tag along. I got out of my car and the driver of the minivan did the same. I looked at him and asked why he had parked so close to the bush and the expression on his face lent information to me as we both went around the car to see the cause of the parking. The tire and wheel at the front passenger’s side was gone! Worse still, all the five (5) screws holding the wheel were broken in halves. All five of them!

It was with shock that we spoke the next sentence. How could a 17inch rimmed tire and alloy wheel roll of a moving van just like that and the van didn’t flip over. Everyone disembarked from the vehicles and we hurdled together in amazement. I hear this in testimonies but I have never been in the on-going show before. We, the men, proceeded into the bush to try and locate the tire and only then did it dawn on us that we were in a virgin land somewhere in the Southern part of Kaduna. A cool stream was flowing metres away and we could see alligators making a run for cover. We didn’t proceed beyond our courage and well, we didn’t find the tire, neither did the wheel show forth.

Just then, a young man alighted from his bike and asked what happened and we explained. He helped search for the tire and wheel but we couldn’t locate it. We begged him to help lead us to the nearest town and he obliged us. We got into my car and went looking for a mechanic. As I drove he told me how notorious that area was for accidents and that we were lucky it wasn’t worse that it is.

We located a mechanic who was busy and we waited. As we did, I noticed an oil leakage from beneath my car hood and I asked the mechanic to please come take a look. He spread his carpet and crept under my car. As he resurfaced, he asked me a question that annoyed me. “You wan knock your engine?”, he blurted. I asked him what he meant and he said my engine had leaked almost all the engine oil. I gasped.

We had to leave my car in his shed and drive his own car back to meet our friends who were already scared that I had been kidnapped. I had been away for about two hours and no one knew the identity of the man that had left with me and there was no telecommunication Network in the area to make calls. They had prayed about three times committing me into Gods hands before we reappeared with the mechanic and his toolset. He got the broken screws out and we had to return to town to buy replacements. We returned to fix the spare tire and drove to meet the other mechanic working on my car. This was four hours after we were forced to stop by the road side having lost a spinning wheel and tire.

For these four hours, this unknown young man had been by our side. Directing me to different mechanics and calming our fears. We knew no one around and here he was forgetting his mission for the day and dedicated himself to seeing that we found succor and solution. I stretched out my hand to thank him and give him a token amount and he refused. I urged him to please accept it not as payment but as proof that he was an angel and not human because his refusal would make him human to us. We all laughed and he accepted it. He was on his way to town to purchase toothpaste for an elderly man when he saw us and stopped. It was not just a timely intervention but a godly experience. We kept asking ourselves if such Nigerians still existed. We arrived Jos that day by past midnight with the spare tire of the minivan torn to shreds. We were happy we made it in complete flesh. Talk about miracles, I experienced one to many.