DENIAL ON DEMAND

It was hot in the farm and the air was so still, animals had difficulty breathing. Animals would climb and fly to hilltops to see if the air was cooler. It was dry too and vegetation was withering away.

Many animals had resolved to give White the farm manager some time to sort things out on the farm, and even now that he was busy having a nice time on other farms, they were reluctant to treat him with the displeasure that they treated the previous plundering farm manager Goodhead.

Whitist priests on the other hand did not let the stillness of the air or dryness stop them from singing hymns and holding praise worship sessions to declare White’s goodness. They were using oxygen masks to help with their breathing as they screamed. And for the dryness they had large bottles of water which they sipped in between hymns. And when people pointed out their struggles, they would say: More time. Give White more time.

Meanwhile the pack of rabid dogs that lived on the northern fringes of the farm, notorious for killing swans and ducks and sheep - the same dogs that the genocidal farm hand Dick-Tai claimed to have eradicated - were still showing up on the farm and setting fire to animal dwellings and killing. White had claimed, before he began his tour of farms, that they had been defeated.

“What you do not admit does not exist,” one farm hand said. “If we say the rabid dogs have been defeated, they have been defeated. If we say there is no more rabies, there is no more rabies. And if we say White is our loving lord and collective saviour, then he is our loving lord and collective saviour.”

Meanwhile another set of wild wolves, this time operating somewhere around the middle of the farm, went on a killing spree of animals, appearing in the night and disappearing before anyone could see or identify them. Animals would wake up to dead bodies all over their quarters. White had never commented on this. Goodhead in his time never commented on this either. The wolves travelled in packs, clashing with animals through whose quarters they were passing through. Sometimes the wolves would be attacked by animals on the way and sometimes the wolves would attack, but over time, without fail, the wolves would be blamed for everything. No animal was interested in solving this problem, not even prominent wolves whose interest was trying to accumulate as much food as they could. Not even White, who was himself a wolf. And wild wolves among them would kill and fade into the night, unchallenged.

While White was planning the finances for the farm, he had asked his farm hands to prepare expenses that would be sent to the committee of animals that approved spending for farm managers. While this was going on, several farm hands inflated their expenses and caused great embarrassment to White when the committee detected the fraud. Upon exposing the fraud, the spokesperson for White, the rambunctious owl called Mai-Karya, swore by all the animal gods that existed and by White that nothing of the sort had happened. He claimed that as Whitists, they could do no wrong and perhaps the committee members were suffering from dementia. But as the outcry among animals over this fraud became louder, White waded in and indeed confirmed that there were many strange items in the list of expenses, swearing by all things holy that he was going to deal with all those who inserted elements of fraud into his list of expenses. He sacked at least one farm hand because of this. Meanwhile Mai-Karya, who was the official denier of the White administration just blinked slowly, carrying on as if he did not just swear by all the animal gods that there was no fraud. His job was to deny all things embarrassing even before White, who was often slow to act, would respond. He had denied it and White had confirmed it but he was not going to offer an apology to anyone.

“Every mistake is a style,” Mai-Karya said, “and even when White farts, it is sweet smelling. If the White administration makes mistakes it is just to prove that we are animals and can stoop low to the level of you mortal animals. Think if we never made a mistake. Would we not seem like unreachable gods? So we sometimes make mistakes so that you animals can feel like we are part of you, even though, truth be told, we are bigger, better and whiter. White is love. And it is his love that shines through when he allows errors. We should praise him for this.”

And White kept travelling, visiting farms which were closer to the animal gods so he could pray for his farm.

And Mai-Karya continued to deny all things embarrassing on behalf of White.

And darkness filled the face of the farm.

And the farm became hotter and the air dryer.

And slowly the animals began to forget about the bats massacred and buried by the genocidal Dick-Tai.

And the worshippers of White kept singing praises through their oxygen masks:

In the name of the White father

And of the farm hands

And of the holy Whitists…

Bless us White for we have sinned

Bless our thoughts

Bless our desires

Bless our intentions

Blessed be thy name

Thy will be done in every quarter among every animal species

Teach us to love your will

Teach us to be teachable

Teach us to trust your will even when your will may not be clear

Teach us to defend your will before it becomes your will

For thine are the decisions, the thoughts and the glory

For as long as you choose to be farm leader

Amen

ONE FOR ONE

White is love.

The animal who does not love White does not know love

For White is love

And in the name of White every animal’s knees shall bow

And every tongue shall give him glory

For White’s is the wisdom

The power and the glory

For the rest of his tenure as farm manager

Amen.

The farm had been fitted with loudspeakers that could be heard from all the corners of the farm. Every morning there was the anthem and a call to prayer. Animals were urged by Whitist priests to pray for White. To pray for the farm. But most of all to accept the farm as the sole property of White the wolf.

Because the land on the farm was not suitable for production of all the crops that the animals needed, they often had to import a lot of food. All the farm had was yams. Yams and water (which was taken out through pipelines out of the marshlands in the south of the farm and sold to other farms). Animals used yams to trade with animals on other farms for other items. The water was solely controlled by White as was also the case with every farm manager before him.

As White returned from visiting the veterinarian in a farm far away, he informed his farm hands that he was going to begin a tour of farms. He claimed that Goodhead had ruined the reputation of the farm and it was only when he went farm after farm telling other farm managers how useless some of his farm animals are, that respect would come back to the farm.

Meanwhile White pegged the value of yams on the farm. It was twenty tubers of yam to bag of grain. However everyone knew that unless it was White who was giving you the grains himself, you could not sell twenty yams for one bag of grain. On the streets and in other farms the real value was almost double what White had pegged it to be. You needed at least forty tubers of yam to buy one bag of grain. Other farm managers had told White that he should deregulate the value of yams or watch the value of his yams go so low that no one would be able to exchange yams for any commodity profitably. Animals would starve: you can only eat so much yams especially when you do not make anything apart from yams.

Many animals stopped trading outside the farm altogether because no one knew what the real value of yams were. The cost of imported food became so expensive that animals started to complain, even animals that were attending and singing praises at Whitist services.

As White prepared to go on a tour of farms, his priests and farm hands hailed him loudly, declaring that he was doing a great thing going around and improving the reputation of the farm.

“No one cares about yams,” they told him. “Yams will fix themselves and as soon as your work begins to pay off one yam will be equal to one bag of grain.”

Indeed that was what he promised the animals when he was trying to take over the farm. The slogan was One for One - one tuber of yam for one bag of grain. He was going to work wonders he claimed, as soon as he became farm manager.

White began his tour with a farm that had recently faced turmoil and whose leaders routinely tried and sentenced its animals to death, even if they were baby animals.

White also gave orders for all the animals that held positions under Goodhead to be relieved of their positions. As soon as he did this, his farm hands and the Whitist priests and their children began to hustle to be replacements for the now vacant positions. Their praise and worship had to pay off.

And the Whitist priests increased the volume of their singing.

And even though White promised to look into the massacre of bats by his genocidal farm hand Dick-Tai, another week passed when bats were swept into the bushes.

And no one cared or asked Dick-Tai to account for the whereabouts of hundreds of bats. Or at least the decency to tell the animals how many bats exactly he massacred and how many he buried in secret graves.

And the pain in White’s side persisted.

And White planned more trips to foreign farms.

And White refused to let the value of yams be controlled by the market.

And the value of yams kept depreciating.

And Whitists sang into the loud speakers that reached the length and breadth of the farm:

In the name of the White father

And of the farm hands

And of the holy Whitists…

Bless us White for we have sinned

Bless our thoughts

Bless our desires

Bless our intentions

Blessed be thy name

Thy will be done in every quarter among every animal species

Teach us to love your will

Teach us to be teachable

Teach us to trust your will even when your will may not be clear

Teach us to defend your will before it becomes your will

For thine are the decisions, the thoughts and the glory

For as long as you choose to be farm leader

Amen

THE CRIMINALS ON WHITE’S FARM

For the first time since White began to visit other farms, he officially announced that his nearly invisible deputy, a squirrel named Sin Bad Jo, would be in charge of the farm for the one week that he would be away on a farm that had good veterinarians. Sin Bad Jo was a nickname he got growing up when he would always tell his friends who wanted to go steal groundnuts in farms, that he would not join them because “sin is bad jo”. 

Sin Bad Jo was delighted because for the first time since he became White’s deputy, people could see and hear him. Being called acting farm manager was nice, even though he knew that in reality he was just a squirrel with no real power. 

And as he walked on his hind legs around the farm, Whitist priests carried on their prayer and supplications for their real farm manager. 

There were now seminaries where young animals were taught how to become Whitist priests. At the opening of one Whitist seminary, a Whitist priest gave a welcome address to the newly admitted student-priests: 

“I welcome you in the holy name of White, who can do no wrong, whose only defect is the pain in his side, which if you really think of it is not a defect at all. White is no follower of a human religion but there is something we can learn from human religions like Christianity. If you think of the foremost follower of Christ, Paul, who wrote most of the books in the new testament of the Bible, and whose words form much of the foundation of Christianity today, he too had a thorn in his flesh. And what was the purpose of that thorn? Well I will not speak for Paul. He said in 2 Corinthians 12: 7: ‘there was given me a thorn in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to torment me-- to keep me from exalting myself!’ So, the pain in the side of White is just to keep him from exalting himself. And if you think of it, it is our job as Whitists to exalt White, to show his holiness to all animals and affirm his infallibility. And as the Hausa say: Allah ne kawai ya rage ma aya zaki. Think if White had no pain. He would have been too perfect for us, too pure, too white. God has deliberately reduced the perfection of White so he can walk among us mortal animals.” 

Meanwhile, just before seeing the veterinarian, White gave a speech at the farm he had visited, denouncing his animals that lived on that farm, calling them thieves, wild animals and criminals. 

“My animals go to other farms to cause havoc,” he said. “And I apologise on behalf of my criminal animals. I promise you dear foreign animals that I will deal with my animals and make sure they leave your lands and come back home where I can discipline them properly. Sometimes, when you have children who steal meat from the pot, you must dip their fingers in hot water for them to learn a lesson. And I have told my squirrel to prepare hot water.”

Upon hearing this, the animals on White’s farm were incensed that White would call them all criminals especially when they were doing great things both on his farm and on other farms. In fact, the same week that White had criminalized all the animals on his farm, one animal was on the lips of people for doing great things. There was a beaver that built sophisticated rafts as well as vehicles for land transportation of animals. White did not talk of the beaver when he spoke to foreigners. He did not talk of the beautiful peacocks on his farm. He did not talk of his animals that excelled in other farms. He chose to talk about how bad his farm was. And the other farm managers just stared at him, knowing they could never visit a foreign farm and begin talking about how bad their farm was. But White did what White wanted to do. 

Every month that passed, finding food became harder and harder. And to defend the bad state of food supply, Whitists reminded every one of Goodhead and how Goodhead plundered the farm. Whitists refused to talk about the fact that farm hands could do nothing without direct orders from White and every one was afraid to act confidently because while they had positions, they had no authority. Whitists did not talk about the fact that, months after, no one cared about the bats that were either dead or missing or buried in mass graves by White’s genocidal farm hand, Dick-Tai.

As White returned from visiting the veterinarians, he took back power from his deputy squirrel, Sin Bad Jo. And the Whitist priests rejoiced and welcomed him home, assuring him that he was right to insult his animals when he went to foreign farms. They called it tough love. And they prayed:

In the name of the White father

And of the farm hands

And of the holy Whitists…

Bless us White for we have sinned

Bless our thoughts

Bless our desires

Bless our intentions

Blessed be thy name

Thy will be done in every quarter among every animal species

Teach us to love your will

Teach us to be teachable

Teach us to trust your will even when your will may not be clear

Teach us to defend your will before it becomes your will

For thine are the decisions, the thoughts and the glory

For as long as you choose to be farm leader

Amen.