Let Justice Prevail
Moses A. Orang'o
Written by Moses A. Orang'o
Edited & Revised by Ilona Gracia
Chapter Thirteen
Section 1
Congratulation Sir," Ojijo said to Abdi the moment he took a seat in his oval office. This room was bigger than his own office, which made him wonder what exactly this man did with all this space.
"Congratulation for what," Abdi inquired seemingly bemused.
"For winning of course, and I must admit that I am pretty much in the dark over what happened yesterday," Ojijo told him.
It was on the seven o'clock news when Monday's death was announced. Apparently, he had written a confession before committing suicide. At the same time, the Attorney General had reported that all the allegations, leveled at Mr. Abdi, were all maliciously fraudulent and outrageous. Hence, he had no other option, but to terminate the whole case. The same story was published in the 'Daily Mirror' newspaper on that said day on January, Monday the 6th.
"Listen Austin, I am not a winner," Abdi declared, although it seemed as if his thoughts were far beyond their conversation.
"But you have just won the case," Ojijo expressed in a confused kind of way. He didn't quite comprehend Abdi's reaction to the entire matter.
"Yes, but the case is over and with it is the support of my people," Abdi stated.
"Have you not seen the crowd that is gathered outside your party's headquarters? I believe that is the largest crowd ever that one could get in such a short notice," Ojijo said defensively.
"Yes, I agree with you Austin and I have also watched the news; I received calls from the public, colleagues, and also the media, but do you know how many registered voters there are? What do you propose for me to do, make them all hear the outcome of the case in the coming week?" Abdi asked.
"For starters Sir," Ojijo replied, upon realizing this man needed assurance more than anything at that moment, "You could go to your party headquarters and celebrate with the people." Abdi was about to comment on that when his office phone rang.
"Yes Millicent, what is it?" Ojijo asked his personal secretary while he placed his phone on speaker.
"Sir, Mr. Kongoni Mwea wants to speak to you," Mr. Kongoni Mwea was the Party's Secretary General.
"Put him through," Abdi instructed when he heard the voice on the other end offer him greetings.
He responded by saying, "Hello to you too Mr. Mwea, how is it going so far?"
"Everything is fine Sir. The party's members want to meet with you, Sir," Mr. Mwea reported.
"Where and when?" Abdi inquired.
"We had hoped to have a private meeting at the County Hall Hotel today at eleven. Afterward, we will go and address the crowd that is waiting at the party's headquarters. We believe by two o'clock in the afternoon news of your victory would have traveled far, and the crowd will have greatly increased in numbers. Congratulation Sir," Mr. Mwea finished.
"Thank you, but don't you think by two o'clock the people will be worn out. According to the news, they started gathering there as early as seven o'clock this morning," Abdi reported.
"We thought about that Sir, and we decided to contract a Soft Drink Company and Millers to sell them soda and bread at half the regular price, the other half of the cost, the party's loyal forces have offered to cover. Besides, there are a number of us who will be there, talking to the people every now and then just to assure them that you will be coming, and to let them know that you are aware of their presence. All media houses, I believe, are covering the event. Even the privately owned Southern Media Group requested to have a live coverage of your speech, when you issue it," Mwea informed him.
"Thank you Mwea, I shall be at the County Hall Hotel meeting, see you there," Abdi assured him before getting off the phone. Thereafter, Abdi felt much better, and he seemed to lighten up. Ojijo could clearly see he was happy, besides, why shouldn't he be? He had quietly listened in to the conversation on speaker, and he hoped that Mr. Abdi would not change his mind and decide to listen through the receiver instead.
"Sir, will I be informed as to exactly what happened?" Ojijo asked hopefully.
"Yes you will know, but not now. Meanwhile, do you think I would have won the case through the right channels?" Abdi asked while he looked Ojijo directly into the eyes.
Ojijo took his time to answer. He knew this was more or less a trick question. He recalled how they were so close to getting Monday without the help of the police. Patrick had been informing him on how they only reached at every hotel he was just a day or hours after he left. He must have been having spies around otherwise he couldn't have been so elusive.
Section 2
Immediately after Patrick had left Oboswa's office, he came to realize that he was on his own. So he quickly called Anthony and Mike to a private meeting; he told them to exclusively put their efforts into locating Monday. So separately, the two spies had managed to get to Monday's social circle and even Anthony went ahead and introduced himself to Monday's wife as his colleague at work and he told her that he was worried about his whereabouts. Luckily for him, he was left in the living room for some five minutes when she went to prepare some tea for him. He had wasted no time when he quickly planted a bug inside the telephone receiver. By doing that, he realized that Mrs. Monday never left the house, not even during the time when their two children had gone off to school. The thing that really worried Patrick was the fact that no single policeman ever came to the house, at least not on those days they listened to the bug in the house. Patrick had gone as far as installing a listening device in a room he had hired at the Golf Windsor Hotel. Monday used to call mainly around midnights, though he was a lousy criminal; he always talked just long enough to be traced. Patrick located his area every time, then immediately transmitted the information to Mike and Anthony, who would then rush to the scene, unfortunately only to find an empty room. That, Patrick guessed, was only possible if Monday had spies. That was the reason why on those last two days, they concentrated on the yet undetected spies more than they did on Monday himself. Fortunately, they caught one of the spies, and when they did, they nearly beat him to death. He confessed on how a man paid him to inform him whenever someone asked for him. His job was to hang around the various hotel lobbies and listen to any inquiries made about their boss, and then inform him of such. Nonetheless, he explained that he never accompanied him much. This made it easy for Patrick and his men. They were able to eliminate all of Monday's spies from a venue before embarking for Monday. They simply threatened them or held them captive. On the evening when they discovered Monday's body, they had caught up with him only to find the place hovering with police officers. They inquired to one of the receptionists at the desk who revealed to them that two men had come earlier to see the dead man; they had flashed badges from the Criminal Investigation Department.
Section 3
"Yes Sir, we would have won the case," Ojijo confessed to Abdi after a long silence.
"I believe you would have," Abdi agreed, "Have you thought about working for me permanently?" He asked.
"Thank you for the offer Sir, but I am a man who enjoys his independence; I would not mind, though, if you would come to me anytime you need me. Besides, you are my favorite client," Ojijo proclaimed while he smiled.
"Why is that?" Abdi was curious.
"You pay generously," Ojijo stated, and they both busted out laughing.
"Okay then, I will invite you to our meeting at the County Hall Hotel," Abdi announced in the midst of laughter.
"Sir, is that possible?" Ojijo asked, seriously considering.
"Why not, I am the Chairman," he responded, "Besides, you had asked me a question, and I believe if you want the best answers, then you should join me," Abdi justified.
"Thank you Sir. I will follow you in my car," Ojijo replied happily.
"No, you come with me. We go in my limo. Right now, considering the meeting is at least an hour away, I allow you to go and finish with your errands as I deal with mine. Come back twenty minutes early, and I shall allow you to park your car in the VIP section of my company," Abdi offered.
Just as Ojijo got ready to leave, a beautiful woman barged into the office. Ojijo was totally bemused on how she could just barge into the office like that. When he took a closer look, however, he noticed some resemblance to Mr. Abdi's wife. He knew then that they were related.
"Before you go, Mr. Ojijo, let me introduce you to my daughter Jemima, she admires you a lot. She is also working towards a law degree at the Man Harm University," Abdi informed Ojijo, as he stood up to escort his guest; he was also shocked by the way his daughter had entered the room, but he realized that she had done so because of Ojijo's presence.
"I am flattered," Ojijo expressed, and he extended his hand to greet this extremely beautiful girl, "Pleased to meet you, I am Orwa Ojijo. I don't think I need to tell you that I am your Dad's lawyer, do I?"
"No, you don't," Jemima replied with a smile as she reached out to meet his extended hand, "I admire your work a lot, and I hope we could talk about it someday," she inquired pleasantly.
"Yes please, anytime," Ojijo somewhat stumbled.
"Enough of that Jemima, Mr. Ojijo was just leaving. Let me show him out," Abdi interrupted as he walked Ojijo to the door.
"Bye," Jemima called shyly and yet a bit flirtatious, after Ojijo before she disappeared through the door.
"Okay, so tell me, what brings you by? And how is your camp. I thought it wouldn't end for another two days," Abdi asked his daughter when he returned to the office and found Jemima seated.
"I came as soon as I heard the news, and I have some of my friends outside, they want to meet you. I hope you don't mind," Jemima queried anxiously.
"No, I don't mind, I promised to attend to you any time you needed me, but tell me are they in your class?" Abdi questioned her.
"Yes, they all study law. We had debated a lot on your case, and we went as far as having mutual courts. These were the members of my legal team who believed in you. I promised them that they would meet you personally when everything was over," Jemima explained.
"Okay Jemima, I have very little time; let's go and meet them now."
Section 4
Ojijo had made no plans, but even so, he decided to go to his office to check on things to kill the thirty minutes that were available. Upon his arrival - his employees, who must have been waiting for him already - applauded him.
"Congratulations Sir," was the greeting he received from his employees; he nodded in acknowledgement but then immediately proceeded towards his office. Once inside his office, he asked his secretary to summon his PI, and Winnie his co-counselor, and he requested for them to be there at the same time. Shortly after, they arrived.
"Please, be seated. We seem to have come to the end with this case, and I want to congratulate you for all the work that you did. If it were not for your determined effort, all this matter would not have come to an end," he expressed to both with all sincerity.
"But Sir, what happened, and why the sudden change of events?" Winnie questioned him.
"Apart from what we can all guess, I have yet to get to the real story from a meeting of the 'Peoples Democratic Movement' that is to take place at the County Hall Hotel. I have been invited. Though, I believe it was our discoveries that helped solve the whole matter," Ojijo stated.
"Sir, do I now drop everything that I had dealt with on the case?" Patrick asked.
"Patrick, I believe you have a lot, dropping things is not an alternative. Hold on to what you have and discover any other things that are obvious. Nonetheless, there are two things to note; the first one is, don't put all your time on this anymore. Second, don't make your intentions known to anyone. Furthermore, who knows, maybe later on our discoveries may be required, especially upon taking Mr. Abdi to the Statehouse," Ojijo concluded with a sly smile on his face. This made Miss Ndamwa suppose that their office might as well have taken on another dimension from now onwards. "So, I urge you to continue diligently with the other work you dealt with before. Is there any matter that requires my immediate attention?" Ojijo finished by asking.
"Yes Sir, in fact there is," Winnie popped in eagerly, "The case of the Mentaculous Chemical Company is due for mention in a week's time. Can I handle it? You had exclusively asked for it."
"Yes please Winnie," Ojijo said without giving it as much as a thought, "Prepare everything and be ready to go on without me. Have you tried to negotiate with the employees yet?"
"Yes, but they are still adamant; they are demanding three million dollars each and the Company said that it cannot possibly pay that entire amount," Winnie replied.
"How much is the Company willing to pay?" Ojijo asked.
"One point five tops, otherwise they are pushing for dismissal of the whole suit," Winnie informed him.
"Is that possible?" Ojijo wondered aloud.
"It is possible, especially if the lack of limbs on the employee's siblings can be tied to some other cause or parental negligence," she replied.
"Patrick, you have work to do; find out all you can about these families!" Ojijo ordered, as he looked over to his P.I...
"But there are over two hundred and I have very little time," Patrick complained.
"We will try to push for more time; meanwhile you should be out of this office by now and save yourself some more time. Okay then, see you all when I get back," Ojijo responded with finality.
Once he left his office building, he wanted to call Jane and ask her to join him. He knew she would have been thrilled, but he decided against it. In any case, he was only a visitor; hence he was not at liberty to invite others without permission from the host. When he arrived at Abdi's office parking area, VIP section, he spotted a number of young men - most of whom he had seen earlier when he had left the building that day. When he reached the office, he asked the secretary if he could see Mr. Abdi, but he was told that Abdi was already in the parking lot waiting for him.
"You are late," Abdi told him after he greeted him.
"Sorry Sir, I lost track of time," Ojijo apologized.
"Don't worry, we can go now," Abdi replied, before leading Ojijo to the waiting vehicle. There, the Chauffeur opened the doors for them, while they seated themselves onto the back seats. Ojijo was amazed by all the settings of the vehicle. He noticed the interior was using fluorescent light. The light from the sun had been blocked out by the tainted windows, which he later found out were also bullet proof. There was enough room to seat ten people quite comfortably. The seats were made out of leather, two in number with a semicircle design. One was facing away from the driver while the other one faced the front. In between them, was a transparent glass table, and next to that, it had a side desk with a computer, a telephone, and a coffee machine. Ojijo wondered how this vehicle could have so much room, and yet it looked just like an ordinary one from outside.
"This is one of a kind in the world." Abdi said when he noticed Ojijo's bewilderment.
"Of what make is it?" Ojijo asked.
"It's a supersonic with many features. Open that vault, and you can find its manual there," Abdi instructed.
"What's the combination?" Ojijo asked when he saw lettered buttons on it.
"Actually, it is already opened. It is coded with my voice. When I entered earlier, I immediately said 'open' and it unhooked itself," Abdi explained.
Ojijo quietly studied the manual as they drove on; he read that the vehicle could survive hand grenades aimed directly at the vehicle, or even placed beneath it. Furthermore, it could continue driving on flat tires in the case where the rubberized parts would be shredded and ripped off. The built-in jet engine allowed for high speed travel; it carried them with such ease as to almost make them fly across roads. Shortly before they approached the County Hall Hotel, Ojijo wondered how much it must have cost; he was certain that it must have been a fortune. This made him think about exactly what Mr. Abdi Anwar Bashir's net worth was. Although, just by looking at him he did not look like he was that rich.