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I was paid ₦5,000 to clap at a rally. Then I met the man who hires the crowd for every party. · Wetin

Wetin Next? · 5 parts · Ongoing

I was paid ₦5,000 to clap at a rally. Then I met the man who hires the crowd for every party.

@kola_ajstarted 2d ago · 0 following

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Original story Update 1 Update 2 Update 3 Update 4

I was paid ₦5,000 to clap at a rally. Then I met the man who hires the crowd for every party.
Part 1 of 52d ago
Na ₦5,000 dem pay me to clap, and I thought na one-day work. After the rally the man wey organise the crowd tell me make I enter him van. Inside: folded shirts in six colours, caps for six parties, banners rolled like carpets. He said, I only do crowds. He showed me a notebook. Ninety-two events in one season. Same four hundred people at all of them. I recognised my own cousin, in four different caps.
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He offered me ₦150,000 a month as crowd manager. First job: make two rallies look like one.
Part 2 of 5 · Update 11d ago

Wetin Next? Nobody knows yet

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Two aspirants on the same day, one in Ikeja, one in Surulere. He wanted me to split the crowd so that cameras at both would show a full ground. Shirts would be switched in the bus. Same chanting, different names. He said, Nobody checks. People only look at the front row. I said I'd think about it. He wrote down my number anyway.

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At the Surulere rally, an aide paid my boss double to make the crowd scream louder.

Part 3 of 5 · Update 21d ago

He asked for the crowd to scream louder when the rival's name was mentioned. Not boo. Scream. My boss turned to me and whispered that this is how you know the ground is real: the other side is paying to look afraid. Back on the bus, I counted: three hundred and sixty people, none of whom could name the aspirant. Including me.

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I recorded all of it. My phone just buzzed: Delete the video. You are in the front row.

Part 4 of 5 · Update 31d ago

A message from an unknown number. A photo of me, at the Surulere rally, in a green cap, mouth open, mid-scream. Under it: The front row is the only row that is ever seen. I'm sitting in a bukka with the recording on my phone and a plate of rice I cannot finish. The man in the next seat has just put his phone on the table, facing me.

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I recorded all of it. Then my phone buzzed: delete the video, you are in the front row.

Part 5 of 5 · Update 421h ago

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