RANSOM OF THE SOUL- BY YUSHAB A.A.

“Ah… I hope you know we are talking about the Grand Chief Imam of this community?”

I said it slowly, my voice trembling, like someone begging people to remember a name that once meant something.

Every eye in the mosque turned to me.

Their answer came cold and flat:

“Yes. What do you expect us to do again?”

And in that moment, I felt something die...

not just hope,

but the idea that leadership, sacrifice, and years of prayer still meant anything in the hearts of men.

Two months earlier, our Grand Chief Imam was not a statistic.

He was a voice that led us to Allah.

He was the man who stood on the mimbar every Friday and reminded us that this world is temporary.

Today, he is the proof of how temporary human loyalty is.

It has been exactly two months since he was kidnapped on his way back from Kwara State after burying his first wife.

A woman who died slowly.

A woman whose sickness drained the family until they had no choice but to take her back home.

Her burial was done quietly without announcement.

Her pain was carried in silence.

The Imam did not want the world to know.

Only his closest family, a few Alfas, and some students in his Madrasah were aware.

He travelled with only the children of the wife he had just laid to rest,

leaving other wives and children behind in Lagos.

After the burial, he told those children to remain in Kwara State.

He said he needed to rush back to Lagos to rest ahead of Jumat prayer.

That Jumat prayer…

that sacred responsibility…

was what placed him on that road.

And on that road, bandits found him.

That Thursday night, the call came from the bandits.

₦100,000,000 was demanded for ransom.

The women wailed.

Not because the amount was high alone,

but because it revealed something cruel:

We were poor in a world where kidnappers price lives like property.

Friday came.

The mosque felt empty even though it was full.

Another Alfa led the prayer.

The announcement was made.

Donation boxes were passed for fisabilillah.

People gave what they could.

Some dropped cash.

Some dropped alerts.

Some dropped only prayers.

By evening, we counted.

₦235,470.

Out of ₦100,000,000.

I stared at the figures and felt shame burn my chest.

This was the value of our Imam’s life

not in Allah’s eyes,

but in ours.

We kept announcing the donations at every salat.

We begged gently.

We begged openly.

After one week, ₦506,050 was raised.

Hope was thinning.

I suggested we go online

maybe someone out there would help.

Maybe one good Samaritan would see our pain.

They agreed…

but not without suspicion.

“Whose account will we use?”

The question was not innocent.

It was bait.

I refused my own name.

Thank God, I did.

The Imam’s last wife’s account was chosen by the family members.

People donated; Muslims, Christians, strangers who only understood humanity.

Money began to grow.

One month later, the bandits called again.

They were angry when we told them we had only raised ₦15 million so far.

They laughed at us and gave us 10 days to complete the balance.

That was the first time I truly understood what poverty feels like when time is running and money is not listening.

We pushed the flyer harder.

Shared more.

Prayed more.

In two days, we hit ₦22 million.

We smiled.

We believed.

The hope was alive again.

Then… the Imam’s last wife disappeared overnight with her children, with the money, with our hope.

That was when I learned the bitter truth no one dared to tell me before...

the Imam was not even the biological father of her four children.

He married her as a single mother.

He raised them as his own.

He never exposed her secret.

Yet, she left him in chains and ran away with his last hope.

When the deadline passed, we begged the bandits again.

They extended till the end of the month.

Today is the end of the month.

₦1,368,460 is all we have left.

We cannot go online again.

No one believes us anymore.

Some even accused me and said I planned it with the woman who ran away.

Allah cleared my name,

but the damage remained.

In today’s meeting, the decision was made that we should send the money to the Imam’s first son.

I suggested adding from mosque funds to make it ₦2,000,000.

They refused.

One woman said,

“We don’t even know if he’s still alive.”

Another said,

“He’s old. Let’s assume he’s dead. We can start reading Suratul Ikhlas for him.”

That was when the words escaped my mouth again:

“Ah… I hope you know we’re talking about the Grand Chief Imam of this community?”

They looked at me.

Calm.

Unmoved.

“Yes. What do you expect us to do again?”

And I understood.

The Imam had spent his life praying for people

who could replace him with another voice by Friday.

The Jumat prayer he rushed home to lead

has never stopped since he was taken.

And all the Jumat donations meant to save him

have not even crossed one million naira since.

Some people don’t die in the forest.

They die in the hearts of those they served.

And sometimes,

the loudest lesson life teaches is this:

You can give your whole life to people…

and still be forgotten before your body is found.

© Yushab A. Ayomide

-Nigeria