Francis Tim Mbom
28 August 2008
A mob in Limbe, Sunday, August 24, nearly lynched Henry Atabong, a 17-year-old Form Five student of GBHS Dschang, West Province.
The mob caught Atabong in full flight at the Lumpsum entrance on Church Street, New Town, after he had pinched a woman's purse in and quietly eased himself out of church.
It was reported that Atabong and his victim were sitting on the same bench during the 6 am mass at the New Town Catholic Church.
The story goes that when the time for offering came, the woman removed some money from her purse, put the purse on the bench and moved up to the altar.Atabong did not go to the altar. Instead, he snatched the purse and glided out of the church. But one of the Church orderlies, one Ms. Stella Ade Muma, told The Post that she saw Atabong as he was slinking out.
She said Atabong then darted behind a car and began emptying the contents of the purse into his pocket, started hurrying out of the church compound.When the woman whose pursed had disappeared realized that her bench mate had vamoosed, she immediately raised an alarm.
One of the Christians, who had caught a glimpse of Atabong as he slouched away with the purse, leaped after him. By the time he was outside, Atabong had just finished emptying the purse and taken to his heels. But he was caught with the help of bendskin riders (commercial motorcyclists).
Then the mob fell on him, but the priest and some church orderlies came to his rescue.
"I don't know what came to my mind. I did it because I have become desperate since my parents disowned me," Atabong, said when they questioned him.
He told The Post that he was barely two weeks old in Limbe. He said his uncle at Bonadikombo (Mile Four) quarters, one Gabriel Atem, had abandoned him and left for Dschang two days back.
"Before coming to Church this morning, I spent the night out in the open at the Down Beach. So I was just trying to see how I could raise money, maybe to go back," he said.Asked why he was not living with his parents, Atabong said it was because he had made one of his school mates, aged 15, pregnant and his parents had thrown him out.
Atabong's explanations, did not, however, convince Rev. Father Sebastian Fonsah.He said many Christians had complained on several occasions of how their belongings missing, while they were making offerings or receiving communion.
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