These Groundnut Hawkers Are Wicked O

By Cami Ezenwa
I am yet to come to terms why groundnut Hawkers in Lagos are unleashing this unusual dose of wickedness on us patrons of their trade.

From a distance, you would think they just rose from a clannish meeting which sole agenda is: wickedness, and more wickedness, unleash it on the consumers, your customers.

The way you see them rush out and begin to surge forward, fanning out to different directions, torn between running and a hastened walk, just hints off that.

The groundnut hawkers are plainly wicked.  Trying to figure out which one of them is coming with a little generous merchandise is a typical case of the more you look, the less you see, because the whole bunch of roasted groundnuts in their shinny nylon wrapping as staked professionally on trays, can be attractive yet nothing but a scam.

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A worse fraud still, is with those of them who peddle the cooked unshelled groundnut. Where on earth do they source those slim transparent nylons in which they drop one or two groundnuts and sell to us from?

Imagine, and we will be the ones ashamed for them as they hang about our loading buses, seeking to sell those miserable near empty nylons to us.

With the roasted corn seller, there is a level of transparency, not so with groundnut seller whose trade antics can tapper on outright exploitation

I say ashamed for them – or is it intimidated – cos i have never heard anyone reprove them for such brazen exploitation. For, even without touching the nylon, you could almost count the unshelled groundnuts per wrap.
O God, what is this! And I would exchange my hard-earned N200 for it! What a shame!

What I have found is that, no matter how many times you grimace at them, they keep hanging about.

That was how, after you had taken your seat in the korope mini bus that would be taking you downtown the other day, a certain-to-be-challenging journey the way your tommy was already growling, one of them just presented herself.

However she knew she knew of the hunger pang in your stomach, but, she just pinned herself by the window
Somehow, you decided to give a try, and as you pick from her tray, it just dawned on you you had been scammed yet again. At this point, you could not but blurt out, cursing.
There can’t be a worse scam than this! my Maths must have gone worse, if I counted up to 10 shells of groundnut.
Do these people have human feelings at all. How could anybody, even if he were a demon from hell, have the conscience to carry such about, much less, present it for people to buy, Haba!

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We know things are difficult. The naira has taken a tumble for the worst; and those who are supposed to shore it up by policy are as morose as possible and it has become a free for all, but not even this justifies the wickedness of these groundnut sellers.

I have seen those who sell Asala: those who deal on corn, or even roasted yam, you can still get some value from what they put up for sale, but groundnut sellers, let wickedness land them in hell.

Look at those of them that line the driveways: Before you have the time to examine their ware as they push it by your window, they have already left if off for you, effectively plucking your money off your hands, leaving you to your chargrin again.

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My God, what’s that they say they are selling?
By way of a reiteration, I am yet to encounter a category of hawkers in present-day Lagos as wicked and mean as this clan of unshelled groundnut hawkers. How on earth are they still in business!

In fact, did they mention our names at the juju man’s stead, that we cannot perennially boycott them for their lack of human kindness, for their consistent meanness hawking near-empty nylons.

Anytime I now sight some fellow picking from the trays of these shylocks of groundnut hawkers, you know what I am left to conclude: poor brother, their juju has caught him; how could anyone in their senses say they are patronising unshelled groundnut hawkers in Lagos.

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You should rather stroll down to the Ogba bus stop, to the slim, tall Mama with her selling point eeking opposite the Nigerian Institute of Journalism You are certain to get a full bottle of fried groundnut at N3,000 or a little less.

At least, you would have value than settling for something that would end up scratching your throat and aggravating your taste, after you had already parted with your money. There is God O!