Behold traditional healing home on the lagoon....Mender of broken bones

Mender of broken bones
 •Behold traditional healing home on the lagoon where men, women rush to repair damaged bones

Deminiwe working on Matthew’s broken ankle. Photos: DELE OJO

On the murky waters of Makoko, a sprawling aquatic slum on the edge of Lagos Lagoon lives an orthopaedic doctor. He is Sunday Deminiwe, aka Water Angel – an Ijaw man from Ondo State.

 Deminiwe, who is also called Baba Emole, is not the suit-wearing orthopaedic surgeon in the theatre of one of the country’s highflying medical schools. However, he claims that as far as mending broken bones is concerned, he has no rival, insisting that even government hospitals refer patients to him for treatment.

 “I’m the best in mending every broken bone,” he boasts. “No one does that like I do. That is why people call me Water Angel.”
 For the first timer, it takes courage to step into Deminiwe’s healing home. You must have the heart of steel or be driven by the desperation to get healing to do so. For one, Deminiwe’s home, a part of which serves as his inpatient clinic, is a suspended wooden shack. About five metres below the house’s wooden floor is the lagoon water. The same water is almost everything to the community - lavatory, waterway, fishing ground and many more. Deminiwe’s home is the meeting point of water and the land.

 A few metres from his sitting room and clinic are his family’s latrine and bathroom. Piles of human waste lie below, softly caressed by mild sea wave. The scene is a touching distance from the kitchen where his meals are cooked. To assess his sitting room, one must connect a wooden footbridge whose planks are loosely laid. Just a misstep, you are down in the water, struggling for life. Beneath the outer part of the bridge are piles of nauseating rubbish washed ashore by the lagoon water. It is home to giant size rodents running wide with ecstasy. Such is the environment patients endure for months to get healed.

 Deminiwe tells Daily Sun that not minding the state of his environment, patients flock there in droves from all parts of the world to seek help.
 “As I talk to you, the world knows me too well. People come here from all over the world – Ukraine, USA, Germany, Belgium all over the world. If you come here tomorrow, you will see patients from Germany – people from all over the world, I tell you.”

 Mending bones, Daily Sun gathers, is not all that Deminiwe, a father of 21, does in his clinic. He is into some other traditional healthcare delivery services too. “I’m also a traditional gynaecologist. I inherited it all from my father. Even my mother is doing same job. If a child is coming out of the womb with the legs, I will simply get it to come out with the head. I don’t operate, I don’t speak to the baby; I simply use my hands and turn the baby in its proper position. This hand you see is the hand of God. It works by itself. Even if someone has a spinal cord injury, I correct that with my hands.

 “I treat hunchback too. In this world, nobody treats hunchbacks like I do. I don’t perform any operation on it. I simply work on it and it disappears. This woman (drags a hunchback patient, Adebimpe Adeloye closer) had a very big hunchback when she first came here. She was bent over and couldn’t walk properly. That was long before she got married and began to have children. Since then, I have been on her case. Now, it has disappeared, as you can see. Her father used to carry her on his back to this place. I simply use leaves and palm kernel oil to treat hunchback. I give the patients oil to drink and rob the same oil on them and they get healed with time.’’
 Testifying to Deminiwe’s prowess in dealing with ailments, Adebimpe, 30, says: “I have been coming here for the past five years. I was 25 years then. But now, I have been healed.”

 Deminiwe works with a certain Sola Useghan. He says he also sometimes works with Samson Mudairo, a prophet and founder of Holy Progressive C&S Church in front of his house. Deminiwe says: “If a patient is not responding to treatment, we send him for prayers so that his healing might be rapid.”
 Speaking through an interpreter, the prophet says: “If there is any treatment they want to do here, and they want to confirm the situation further, they often ask the patient to come for prayers. Sometimes we pray for patients and do some spiritual cleansing for their healing to come.”

 Kokowei, an industrial radiographer and a relation of Deminiwe who often helps out in the clinic, adds: “If the problem was caused by the person’s enemies, it is probable that same enemies will be blocking the patient’s chances of recovery.”
 Deminiwe, 60, proudly believes that he is a bundle of talent, insisting he’s many things rolled into one. “I started living here in Makoko in 1997 although I came to Lagos in 1977 from Ondo State and began this work in 1997. Formerly, I was a palm wine taper and a fisherman. But in 1989, I abandoned both for timber sales. I was then using a caterpillar to push my logs into the river. I used to drive my logs all the way from Rivers State to Lagos to sell. But when my father died, I stopped.”

 He says the healing power runs in his family. “As I said, I inherited this work from my father. He too inherited it from his father. It has been like that in our family. I have a son who is training to succeed me. Four have long graduated from various universities. I have 11 children from my most senior wife. The second wife gave me five children. The other two wives that I divorced had three and two children respectively for me.”
 Peter his son, an SS3 student, is already honing his skills to launch into the trade. “My father says I will succeed him,” the lad says shyly, smiling. “Maybe that will happen since I already know a lot about the job. But I’m still learning.”
 On the wooden floor of the dingy clinic, three patients: Bashiru Akanu, Omoseyi Odimayomi and Michael Matthew lay sprawling.

 Recalling the incident that landed him in Deminiwe’s clinic, Akanu says: “I had gone to see one of my customers at Igando area of Lagos. I was crossing the road when a motorcycle from nowhere knocked me down and broke my leg.
 “I have been here for one month and five days. The broken bones are healing. I feel better. I look forward to getting well soon. This man is good. I’m happy I was brought here.”

 Matthew’s case is very pathetic. His anklebones are almost cut into two, and they are seen surging out. Pains are engraved all over him as he grimaces. “I was felling timber in the woods,” he recalls. “Suddenly, a branch tore off and smashed my bone. I was treated at a Teaching Hospital in Osun State but I couldn’t get better. From there, I was taken to a government hospital in Ondo State. Next, I was taken to another government hospital at Arugbo. It was from there that I was brought here.”

 Deminiwe is not happy that Matthew delayed in coming to him, boasting that the injured man would have been walking again if he was brought there early. “When he came here, his condition was too bad. His leg was already a write-off. But I will still cut off some parts, straighten the rest and then allow it to heal. This man will walk again. He spent a month and half going about before he came here. He has spent a month and a week here. But in another one month, he will be up, I tell you. If he was brought here immediately the incident happened, he could have been up and about by now.

 Confirming Deminiwe as the king of bone healers, the Baale of Makoko Alhaji Ibrahim Albeitan says: “That man there is doing wonders. He runs an inpatient home right there on the waters. All manner of people – victims of okada and motor accidents, people who broke their legs and arms, people who fell from trees, and got their hips and other parts of their bones broken all flock to him daily and he has been treating them well. I leant that he works in collaboration with some big government hospitals in the state. Those they couldn’t treat, they refer to him and he has not disappointed. I will enjoin the government to encourage him in his work of helping the society.”