Greetings!
There are some people that would always want to cheat you if you are not careful or smart enough.
It all started when Mr. Lawal, the account officer in my workplace, wanted to cheat me. This man is the account officer in the government school where I work and he would always ask all the members of staff to give him money to prepare the staff voucher.
This man, Mr. Lawal, would be demanding for the money as if it's his right and the funny thing was that, people would not question his authority as they would always heed to his threat and pay him the money.
I have also fallen a victim of this man on so many occasions which means, I'm also a victim of this man's multiple threats.
There's a time this man, Mr. Lawal called for a staff meeting and at the meeting he said,
“Good morning everyone, I'm here to let you people know that your voucher fee has increased and if you fail to pay on or before Monday, then say bye bye to your salary.”
After saying this, people raised up their hands to comment on what he had said, but this man would not even listen as he walked out on everyone at the meeting including the Principal of the school, Mr. Oyebamiji.
It's after he had walked out that people started forming groups to talk about his behavior. One of the staffs, Mr. Oye, even asked all other members of staffs, saying,
“Who is even the boss in this school?”
After he had asked this question, nobody dared to answer his question as the boss himself was on sit. Although the boss, who happened to be the principal, was not a party to what the account officer was doing, because of the fear he had instilled into the heart of everyone, nobody dared challenge the school accountant authority which is more feared than that of the principal.
So, before we know it, everybody has started paying their voucher fee which had already been inflated by the school accountant officer just because of the threat.
Less I forget, the reason people feared the fierce account officer was because they believe he's a traditionalist and also a politician and for this reason, nobody, I repeat, nobody can challenge his authority including the principal of the school.
However, on a particular day, when our salary was being paid, I realized that my own salary was not paid and I went to this man to complain and instead of him talking to me in a polite way, he started threatening me with future salary.
This man said if I'm not careful enough, he would make sure I was not paid my following month's salary. Although, I didn't talk nor say anything as he was threatening me with my other month salary, but when it got to a point, I was moved with a slight anger, but still I didn't say anything and for him not to tempt me into a monster, I left his sight and it's when I left his presence that all other members of staff came to me and asked me to let go of my salary, but this was so annoying to me as they were begging me to let go of my money.
So, when this begging of theirs continued, I asked them saying,
“Which of you can accept such a plea?” But no one replied to me and because of their inability to answer me, I left their sights and it's when I left their sights that I summoned the courage to go to the ministry of education that employed me.
When I got there, they asked me why I had come and then I narrated everything to them and immediately I complained about the issue going on in our school. The commissioner who was on ground put a call to the school principal and summoned both the principal and the account officer.
When they both came, the commissioner and other members of the ministry asked them a few questions and both of them could not talk, it's there and then I got to know that both the principal and the account officer were working together to exhaust all the members of staff through their later confession.
When I realized this, I was shocked. But because that wasn't the reason I went there, I decided not to say anything as I left the ministry with the promise by those in charge of payment that my money would be paid and to my greatest surprise, my money was paid before I got home.
On the second day, when I got to school, we got the news that the duo of the principal and the account officer had been suspended and that's the last news I got about them.
After they had been suspended, another account officer and a new principal were transferred to our school to maintain sanity and with this, all members of staff were happy as the year of tyranny had gone.
Nobody believed I could do what I did, but I just have to do it not only for myself but for every member of staff who was shocked when they heard about the principal involvement in the whole saga. They could not believe the man's involvement.
Thanks for reading.
Picture is Ai generated.