A lady in her mid twenties was caught with a stollen pair of shoes on Valentine’s Day at the Bamenda Food Market. She was forced by a group of buyam sellers and other onlookers to pay for the shoes or will be beaten and undressed.
The sales boys at the shop recounted “She came here in the morning saying she does online business,showed images on her phone , Shoes were given to her instead of taking them to shop owner at the counter, she used another passage and went away with them”. As its commonly said 99 days for the thief one day for the owner, she returned again at about 4:30 for more shoes but still carrying the ones she got in the morning in a plastic bag. Upon selecting the second command she now took them to the owner for payment and behold the others were confiscated, poured down and she was asked to provide receipts of payment but she could not.provide any.
She started babbling with words. At the end the stolen goods were calculated at 45.000frs which she paid after fruitless explanations before being set free.
Valentine’s day fondly called lovers’ day celebrated yearly on February 14th is a day noted for exchange of gifts like flowers ,post cards, shoes, dresses, jewelleries, pastries etc accompanied with love messages.
The most interesting part of each Valentines day celebration is the part of going an extra mile to get a gift for a loved one and not receiving anything in return. Given the fact that young people have taken the central stage for the day there is always a high level of competition among themselves to match up and catch up with their space in the lives of their loved ones .This often times goes sour as many who can’t afford the gifts engage themselves in stealing inorder to measure up.
Hers is just one amongst many and mothers at the scene used the opportunity to encourage all the young people there to avoid unhealthy competition and equally get themselves busy with income generating activities.
By Anyam Yvette
