In the end, Nigeria will happen to you.
In a democracy, your silence is consent when the government kills citizens.
“It is certain, in any case, that ignorance, allied with power, is the most ferocious enemy justice can have.” ― James Baldwin.
The Nigerian national anthem is the most meaningful in the world as far as I am concerned and our elected leaders aided by the Nigerian army and the police made a mockery of it — equally. When institutions that swore oaths to protect citizens turn on them, where does one start to correct this grievous anomaly.
I have never been prouder of a group of people like the young people of Nigeria who essentially became their own government in the two weeks of the protests. With citizens fundraising and financing the protest: providing their own security, food, healthcare. I am sure nobody needs a government that never fulfills their end of the social contract.
The greatest mistake #ENDSARS protesters made was assuming they were dealing with humans and not power-drunken elites. I have to ask at what point does it become an all or nothing game for politicians?
An entire generation was outwitted into thinking they were playing chess when in actual fact they never got the chance to see the board. That is what you get for underestimating the Nigerian political class with years of experience in dishing “sorrow, tears and blood –their regular trademark”.
The protests might have been halted but the conversation must never stop. We must never let go of that consciousness. At least it is what we owe those who were killed while fighting for a better Nigeria.
The videos of the victims narrating their ordeal with SARS that circulated during the protest are sufficient to leave one traumatized and angered enough to persist in demanding justice. In some of the videos, family members narrated on behalf of victims who sadly did not survive—it hurts anew. How does one forget that?
It is even more regrettable that citizens have to abandon demanding justice for the lives lost in other parts of Nigeria: Mushin, Ilorin, Ogbomsho, Surulere, Benin, Abuja, etc. to focus on the #LekkiMassacre. And to think, if not for the overwhelming evidence against the government, the #LekkiMassacre would be put together in the file for negligible deaths.
At the moment, I am mortified it took the murder of unarmed citizens by the Nigerian army at the nation’s former capital to consider the Shiite massacre worthy of our outcry.
The leaderless approach to this protest gave it credibility and this in turn must be used to demand justice from the government. The peak shocking highlight of the #ENDSARS protest was the passionate turnout of Nigerians in the Diaspora. You can literally see their eyes screaming, ” Enough is enough”, “I AM TIRED OF RUNNING AWAY FROM MY COUNTRY,” and similar variations. Nothing has changed and yet things will never remain the same. The lives we lost must count for something.
For a better Nigeria, it is crucial for citizens to see participation in governance as an obligation. And also push for adherence to laws that make it unacceptable for the government to suppress the media. #ENDSARS protesters need to note in the Nigerian pecking order, Twitter is a detachment from the ordinary Nigerian’s reality. Another central note is the erroneous assumption that the ‘thugs’ introduced to incite violence into the protest would automatically buy into their ideology without any incentive apart from the abstract.
It is important to sensitize those thugs because, as you can see, there are a lot of them, many of whom are less exposed and less educated. They are a by-product of bad governance and deliberate low-quality education.
A sustainable approach must be the ultimate goal—to entrench in them a sense of demanding accountability from public officials. It is important that the goal does not further feed into their sense of entitlement and dependency because private citizens cannot outspend the government.
As they are carried along, it has to be evident in the interactions that they are humans first before anything else. In the absence of opportunities and an enabling environment, that can, without doubt, be any young person living in the country. Politics can be a lot of things as well as a game of numbers; young people need the numbers to be in their favour for the next elections.
Nothing has changed about Nigeria by the way; the President is still tone-deaf and so out of touch as is evident in his speech after the 20–10–2020 #LekkiMassacre. And to those who reduced the entirety of the protest to an attempt to overthrow the sitting President, what can I say; in the end, Nigeria will happen to you.
Demanding excellent governance from African leaders may not seem right, but we must make it so. We are aware that a country is not always built to aid its citizens but rather to make money. But when citizens pay their taxes and generally uphold their half of the bargain, it is unacceptable for the government to repeatedly break the social contract again and time again.
#ENDSARS
#ENDPOLICEBRUTALITY
#ENDBADGOVERNANCEINNIGEGIA
