I DID NOT KILL HIM!! MY OWN SIDE OF THE STORY!
I stand before you today, a broken woman, accused of a crime I did not commit. They say I killed my husband. They whisper it in the barracks, they shout it in the markets, but I swear on all that is sacred, I did not kill him. He did it to himself. And now, I must tell my side of the story, the truth that has been twisted and contorted into a monstrous lie.
From the very beginning, our marriage was not what I had dreamed of. The joy of our wedding day quickly faded, replaced by a dark cloud of fear and pain. My husband, [Husband's Name], began to beat me in the very first month of our marriage. It started subtly, a harsh shove, a tight grip, but it soon escalated into brutal assaults. Every resident in the barracks can bear witness to my suffering.
They saw the bruises I tried to hide, the swollen eyes I covered with dark glasses, the limp I developed after particularly vicious attacks. They heard my cries, muffled by our thin walls, and they saw my shame.There was a time, not so long ago, when his rage reached a terrifying peak. He beat me so severely that I suffered a miscarriage. The life within me, a tiny spark of hope and a promise of a future, was extinguished by his violence.
The physical pain was immense, but the emotional wound, the loss of our unborn child, was a devastation I thought I would never recover from. Yet, I stayed. I stayed because I was scared, I stayed because I had nowhere else to go, and I stayed because a part of me, a foolish, hopeful part, still believed he might change.
The cycle of abuse continued, a relentless torment that wore down my spirit and body. Then came September 22nd. That day, [Husband's Name] came home in a particularly foul mood. He demanded I leave his house, threatening me with dire consequences if I remained. He declared that I was to leave without taking any of the belongings he had bought for me during our wedding, vowing to burn them all to ashes if I dared to touch them. His words were cold, his eyes filled with a terrifying resolve.He then left for work, his parting words a chilling ultimatum: he did not want to come back and find me in the house. The threat hung heavy in the air, a palpable weight that pressed down on me. I was terrified.
Where was I to go? What was I to do? I had no family nearby, no friends I could impose upon. I was trapped, a prisoner in my own home, a home that had become a battlefield.I didn't leave. I couldn't. Fear and despair paralyzed me. When he returned, he came back with a jerry can of petrol. My heart pounded in my chest, a frantic drumbeat of terror. When he saw me, still there, his face contorted with rage. He screamed at me, ordering me to leave, or else he would set me ablaze.
I stared at him, my mind reeling. Surely, he was joking? This was a new level of cruelty, a sick, twisted game.But then, he pulled out a lighter. The metallic click echoed in the silence, a sound that pierced through my disbelief. This was no joke. He was serious. In a desperate attempt to save myself, I immediately called the commanding officer (CO), hoping for intervention, for someone to stop this madness. But he couldn't respond in time.
The seconds stretched into an eternity as I fumbled with my phone, my fingers trembling.As I was speaking, or trying to speak, to the CO, my husband, still enraged, made a sudden movement. He mistakenly nudged the petrol can with his foot, and the highly flammable liquid spilled onto the floor, spreading rapidly across the linoleum. At that very moment, whether from his sudden movement or from the shock of the situation, the lighter slipped from his hand. It fell, a tiny spark in the growing puddle of petrol, and instantly, terrifyingly, it ignited.A whoosh of flames erupted, a wall of fire that separated us. Panic seized me. I screamed, a raw, primal sound of terror, and ran out of the house, calling for help at the top of my lungs.
The heat was immense, the smell of burning petrol acrid and overwhelming. My only thought was to escape, to find safety.Through the chaos, I saw him. My husband, engulfed in the rising flames, was trying to get to his documents. Perhaps he wanted to save something, anything, from the inferno he had unwittingly created. But the fire, merciless and swift, rose higher, consuming everything in its path. I watched, horrified and helpless, as the flames enveloped him.
The last image I have is of him, consumed by the very fire he had threatened to unleash upon me.The neighbors came, alerted by my screams, and the frantic shouts for help. They saw the smoke, they saw the flames, and they saw me, a distraught woman outside, covered in soot and tears. I tried to explain, to tell them what happened, but my words were a jumbled mess of fear and shock.And now, I am here, accused of his murder.
They say I started the fire. They say I stood by and watched him burn. But that is not the truth. The truth is, I was a victim of his violence, a woman living in constant fear. The truth is, he brought that petrol into our home, he threatened to burn me alive, and in his rage, he caused his own demise.I did not kill him. I simply survived.
And I pray, with every fiber of my being, that justice will prevail, and that my voice, the voice of a woman who endured years of abuse, will finally be heard. I pray that you, the people of Nigeria, will believe my side of the story. I pray for peace, and for the strength to heal from this unspeakable tragedy.
