BY STEVE AKINKUOLIE
February 27, 2026
WEST AFRICA

There are certain things that makes you Nigerian as a child.
Not your accent.
Not your surname.
Not even your tribe.
It is your mother sending you on an errand and threatening your entire future before you leave the house?
My name is Daniel and exactly this time last year my mother trusted me with the most dangerous assignment of a Nigerian child.
“Go and buy Maggi.”
Simple.
Just Maggi.
A task that should have taken exactly four minutes.
Was a task that almost ended my existence.
Now, Nigerian mothers don’t send you on errands normally.
They send you with prophecy.
And as I stood at the door holding one crumpled two hundred naira note, my mother looked into my eyes.
“Daniel.”
“Mummy.”
“If this money misses…”
I swallowed.
“…don’t come back.”
Then she returned to washing plates.
Just like that.
No explanation.
No negotiation.
No peace treaty.
No nothing— just like that.
Now my journey to the shop was smooth.
Too smooth.
That should have been my first warning.
Because in Nigeria, whenever life becomes easy, something is planning against you.
Halfway to the shop, I saw my friends.
Big mistake.
The devil rarely appears with horns.
Sometimes he appears as Chinedu carrying a football.
“Daniel!”
I turned.
“We need one player!”
“No. I’m on an errand.”
“Just one match.”
“No.”
“First goal wins.”
I paused.
First goal?
That sounded reasonable.
The shop wasn’t going anywhere.
Maggi wasn’t running away.
My mother would still be at home.
I looked at the money.
I looked at the football.
I looked up to the sky.
Heaven remained silent.
So I joined.
Twenty-three matches later…
The score was somehow still 0–0.
My shirt was soaked.
My slippers had retired.
My future was uncertain.
Then suddenly I remembered.
MAGGI.
The errand.
My mother.
My blood pressure immediately became an adult’s.
I checked my pocket.
The money was gone.
Gone.
Gone.
Gone.
I searched again.
Nothing.
I checked the other pocket.
Nothing.
I checked my socks.
Nothing.
I checked places that had never held money before.
Nothing.
The two hundred naira had disappeared from the face of the earth.
Panic entered my body.
Not normal panic.
Nigerian-child panic.
The kind where you start calculating whether another family might adopt you.
I searched the football field.
Nothing.
I searched the road.
Nothing.
I searched inside destiny itself.
Nothing.
The money was gone.
Now.
A white child might go home and explain.
But me, a Nigerian child?
Explain to who?
A Nigerian mother already knows you’re guilty before the investigation begins.
Evidence is optional.
Judgment  is guaranteed.
So I sat under a mango tree and started planning my escape.
At ten years old, I had no passport.
No visa.
No money.
No relatives willing to hide a child.
But I was determined.
Anything was better than returning home empty-handed.
I considered joining the army.
I considered becoming missing.
I even considered faking I was robbed.
But who would actually rob you of two hundred naira? 
After thirty minutes of suffering, I finally gathered courage.
Maybe…
Maybe my mother would understand.
Maybe she would forgive me.
Maybe today would be the day she chose mercy.
Then I remembered something important.
This was the same woman who once beat me because she dreamt I was misbehaving.
A woman who trusted revelations more than eyewitness accounts.
Mercy was not looking likely.
Still, the sun was setting.
I had to go home.
The walk back felt like journey to execution.
Every step was accompanied by a prayer.
“God, if you save me today, I will never play football during errands again.”
A lie.
But desperate times, you know.

***

When I reached our compound, I noticed something unusual.
There was silence.
No sound.
No movement.
No shouting.
The gate was open.
I entered carefully.
Like an burglar into an unsuspecting house.
But there was my mother sitting outside.
Waiting.
And Nigerian mothers don’t wait outside unless judgment is involved.
The moment she saw me, her eyes narrowed.
“Daniel.”
“Mummy.”
“Where is the Maggi?”
I swallowed enough saliva to irrigate a farm.
“Mummy…”
“Where is the Maggi?”
“Mummy, something happened.”
She stood up.
Ah.
The standing up.
Every Nigerian child knows that stage.
Once the parent stands, negotiations have officially ended.
“What happened?”
“The money…”
“What about the money?”
“The money was…”
I looked at heaven one last time.
“…missing.”
Silence.
Birds stopped singing.
The wind disappeared.
Even mosquitoes paused to hear the rest.
“Missing?”
“Yes, Mummy.”
“How?”
Now, I thought of my several lies.
Armed robbers.
Kidnappers.
Economic recession.
But under pressure, my brain abandoned me.
“The money fell.”
“How?”
“I was playing football.”
The slap arrived before the sentence finished loading.
Not a violent slap.
Just a notification.
A warning message from management.
My ears started producing surround sound.
My mother looked at me.
“You were playing football?”
“No.”
Another slap.
This one corrected the first answer.
“Sorry. Yes.”
“You lost the money?”
“Yes.”
“And you came back?”
At that point, I realized something.
My mother had actually meant it.
The “don’t come back” speech was not motivational speaking.
It was policy.
Then she sighed.
A dangerous sigh.
The kind that means she’s no longer angry.
She’s disappointed.
Which is somehow worse.
She disappeared into the house.
I stood there waiting for punishment.
Maybe a beating.
Maybe a lecture.
Maybe both.
Instead she returned holding another two hundred naira note.
I was confused.
Very confused.
She handed it to me.
“Go and buy the Maggi.”
I blinked.
What?
That was it?
No beating?
No funeral arrangements?
No public humiliation?
I grabbed the money immediately before she changed her mind.
Then she added:
“And if this one misses…”
She didn’t finish the sentence.
She didn’t need to.
Some threats are too powerful for words.
I ran.
Not walked.
Ran.
Past the football field.
Past my friends.
Past temptation itself.
One of them shouted,
“Daniel! We need one player!”
I shouted back while running,
“Use goalkeeper!”
I reached the shop.
Bought the Maggi.
Collected the change.
Collected the receipt.
Collected evidence.
I even memorized the shopkeeper’s name in case there was an investigation.
Then I ran home.
When I finally handed the Maggi to my mother, she nodded.
“Good.”
That was all.
Good.
No praise.
No award.
No recognition.
Just good.
As if I hadn’t survived the greatest crisis of my childhood.
It was later I discovered that the money had never actually fallen from my pocket.
It was Chinedu that actually stole the money. 
My friend Chinedu.
The idiot that invited me in the first place.
He only ‘remembered’ to tell me after three weeks.
Three weeks.
Three entire weeks.
By then I had already suffered all the emotional damage, spiritual gaslighting and economic hardship from my mother. 
And that was the day I learned two important lessons about being a Nigerian child.
First: never stop for football during an errand.
Second: when your mother says “don’t come back” she probably doesn’t mean it.
But it is extremely unwise to test that theory.