KISIThe Republic of Kisi
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Honourable Minister

Pete Okpara “The Fence Walker”

Peter Chukwuemeka Okpara

The Republic's Minister of Security, appointed the week after Bantu died. He walks the fence line twice a night, counts every bird by name, and has promised the flock he will not lose another one.

Tribe
Noiler
Age
Adult rooster
Laying status
Not applicable
Party
Progressive Peckers Party (PPP)
Favourite food
Whatever is left after everyone else has eaten

The story so far

Pete Okpara spent years as an ordinary citizen with an unusual habit: he could not sleep until he had walked the whole perimeter and looked at it himself. Neighbours found this funny. The night the monitor lizard came through the drainage channel, Okpara was the one already awake, already outside, already shouting.

He was too late for Bantu. He has never once said otherwise, and he refuses the word 'blameless' when it is offered to him. When the President appointed him Minister of Security four days later, his acceptance speech was two sentences long: 'I know what the job is. Ask me again in a year.'

Since then the ministry has changed shape around him. The nightly headcount is now read aloud, by name, at the door of every coop, his idea, and unpopular for about three days until the flock realised what it felt like to hear your own name confirmed safe. The drainage channel is barred. The fence line is patrolled in two shifts. Sergeant Danladi runs the second one.

He keeps Bantu's whistle-feather in his office. He does not discuss it. Everyone knows it is there.

Life events

  1. 9 July 2026

    The night of Coop Two

    The grate moves shortly after midnight. Bantu gives the alarm and holds the doorway while twelve chicks go out the far side. Every one of them gets out. Danladi reaches him in under a minute.

    Coverage in The Coop Times →

  2. 13 July 2026

    A two-sentence acceptance speech

    Pete Okpara is sworn in as Minister of Security. 'I know what the job is. Ask me again in a year.' He institutes the Bantu Protocol the same night: every bird counted aloud, by name.

  3. 15 July 2026

    500,000 grains

    The Assembly posts a standing bounty for information leading to the lizard's capture. Unanimous; seconded by the Leader of the Opposition, who declines to demand a recount.

    Coverage in The Coop Times →

  4. 5 August 2026

    The Republic's hardest question

    Grief has a way of turning, after a few days, into a question, and the Republic's question was a hard one: how does a bird die inside her own coop, on her own farm, among her own flock? Nobody wanted to ask it out loud. Minister of Security Pete Okpara asked it for them, called a press conference, and made it clear from the first word that he would not be dressing the answer up.

  5. 5 August 2026

    A name, said plainly

    'A fight broke out over the perch,' Okpara said. 'One bird went too far. Her name is Eseosa.' He did not raise his voice and he did not soften it, and the room went quiet the way a room does when everyone already half-knew. Eseosa was moved to a pen of her own, apart from the flock. Not to punish her, he was careful to say, not yet, but to keep every other bird safe while the Republic worked out what would truly be fair.

  6. 18 August 2026

    The birds come home

    Then came the day everyone had waited for: the birds went home. Sisi Ngozi organised the move the way she organises everything, quietly and completely, so not one bird was left standing about wondering where to go. That first night the air moved cool through the new vents, and there was high perch enough for every single bird, with room to spare. When Okpara called the roll in the dark, every name answered, and the count came back whole. Somebody said it out loud: this is the coop Cindy should have had. Nobody disagreed.

In The Coop Times

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