By Pauline Odhiambo
July 13, 2018. Naronate Akum Ngwa had just finished selling all her dishes for the day, and was settling in for a nap when two men came calling for lunch.
The 20-year-old rustled up for the duo a meal of Jollof rice, a West African staple. As they stood up to leave after finishing the food, one of the men shot her in the head without provocation.
"I slumped to the floor but didn't realise I had been shot until my two younger sisters started screaming and calling for help," recalls Naronate.
The shooter and his accomplice had fled the scene by then. She would hear later, having fortuitously survived, that her assailant was part of an Ambazonian militant group fighting the Cameroon government.
The shooting happened during a two-week curfew in Cameroon's northwest region, where a conflict had been raging between the military and separatist groups.
The fighting was fiercer in the town centre, where Naronate lived with her parents and three younger siblings. To escape the violence, the family had moved to a nearby village that was deemed safer.
'Fire inside head'
Naronate was shot early afternoon, but it wasn't until hours later that she could be taken to the nearest hospital. The family's neighbours feared being targeted by both the army and Ambazonian militants if they stepped out during the curfew period.
"I was begging my neighbours not to leave me on the floor to die. I lay there for almost five hours, pleading with them to take me to hospital," Naronate, now 25, tells TRT Afrika.
"I was in so much pain. It felt like someone had lit a fire inside my head. The only thing I wanted at that moment was to survive."
When the neighbours eventually mustered the courage to take the wounded girl to hospital, it was through back routes to avoid militants or soldiers blocking the main roads.
"We had to walk through bushes and across little rivers. I had my sweater covering part of my face to help stop the bleeding, but my right eyeball still fell out and nobody noticed," says Naronate.
She lost her right eye, and might have died had she not been immediately shifted to a larger hospital in Bamenda, where she spent two months in recovery. A skin-grafting procedure was done to cover the empty socket of the right eye.
Fragments of the bullet are still lodged in her skull, causing migraines and problems with her hearing. She has so far had two ear surgeries, neither successful.
Dreams dashed
Two people had approached Naronate to help her raise funds for corrective surgery, only to steal the corpus built from donations. The young girl sank into depression.
While she eventually overcame the mental scars to study law, her hopes of becoming a lawyer were thwarted by incessant bullying over her missing eye.
Worried about his daughter's mental health and safety, Naronate's father began exploring ways for her to seek asylum in Greek Cypriot Administration.
Between 2021 and 2022, Greek Cypriot Administration received 1,050 asylum applications from Cameroon, only 46 of which were accepted. Naronate was among the chosen few.
“I couldn't speak about my story in Cameroon because my family was afraid the militants would come back to finish me off,” Naronate says. "For years, I would tell people I was struck by a stray bullet while out in the market."
Rebuilding her life
Naronate finally felt safe to share her story with the world via social media on her arrival in Greek Cypriot Administration in 2021, going on to amass more than a million followers on TikTok. But the life she expected still eludes her.
Naronate has been on housing support since her arrival, with prospective employers rejecting her because of the way she looks.
"I have even applied to work as a waiter or dishwasher in restaurants. One restaurant owner told me she couldn't hire me because I might scare away her customers," she says.
"I get €214 in allowances every month. That's the money I spend on food and trips to the hospital," she explains. "I don't really know what to do at this point."
To supplement her income, she has turned to making crotchet dresses that she sometimes sells for up to €50, but there aren't enough orders.
“I learned how to crotchet in primary school where we did it in school as part of arts and crafts," she says.
"This skill has helped me to make crotchet dresses for sale to supplement my income. I can buy food and other items with this money”
It takes Naronate about two days to crotchet a full dress. Some of her clients sometimes give her gifts to appreciate her talent.
Naronate remains optimistic about finding stable employment after reconstructive surgery.
Getting a job is my top priority. I believe that if I have a job, I will be able to work and take care of my siblings," she says.
