Tuesday, October 27,
2020 / 06:17AM / OpEd by Reuben Abati / Header Image Credit: Ecographics
Things
went out of hand very quickly with the emerging Nigerian "revolution" when on Tuesday,
October 20, 2020, soldiers stormed the Lekki Toll Gate Plaza in Lagos,
and started shooting. We were told they shot in the air. But the reports have
been conflicting and troubling. The protesters insist that persons died, and
that the attack was pre-meditated. The state authorities insist that persons
were injured and that there were no corpses; may be just one. They made it
sound as if one person dying was nothing to worry about. Nigeria is a country
of over 200 million people. When one person dies, it is hard for the people to
notice. The state does not even care. But the truth is that even if only one
person died as claimed by the state government, that is enough indictment.
There was no justification for anyone dying or sustaining gunshot wounds just
because they took the patriotic step of protesting about injustice, police
brutality, impunity and bad governance in their country. The #EndSARS protest
was about justice, and good governance. The protesters were peaceful.
In the
Northern states of the country, the protest was tagged #EndInsecurityNow,
and the protesters were also peaceful. At the Lekki Toll Gate in Lagos, the
protesters reportedly knelt down as soldiers stormed the scene. They waved the
Nigerian Flag. They sang the National Anthem. Someone had told the angry young
Nigerians - those I once referred to as the "collective children of anger" -
that once soldiers see the Nigerian flag, they would not dare shoot at the
target. The assumption is that soldiers only shoot the enemy, not their own
country's flag. The Lekki incident in Lagos turned that principle, if that is
what it is, on its head. The most impactful image from Lekki is that of a
blood-stained Nigerian flag, either as fact or symbol, but nonetheless a symbol
of the Nigerian government's clamp down on young Nigerians exercising their
rights under Sections 35, 39 and 40 of the 1999 Constitution (as amended).
Away
from the Lekki Toll Gate epicenter, other persons died in the course of the
mayhem that ensued: from stray bullets, physical attacks, and wanton
destruction. Amnesty International and other civil society groups have reported
over 56 deaths. It has been so bad, so embarrassing, so disgraceful, that not
even the military authorities are willing to admit that they sent soldiers to
the streets. All of a sudden, Nigeria is back to the past, the military era,
the bad days of dark-goggled Generals, the Abacha era, when human lives meant
nothing; Nigerians disappeared in broad daylight; and the state claimed that it
would not tolerate any form of dissent. This throwback to the military era was
further reinforced by the reluctance of the Nigerian leader, President
Muhammadu Buhari to address the nation. Both the protesting Nigerian youths and
the international community had to plead with him to take the situation in the
country far more seriously and speak to the issues, empathize, say something to
douse the tension in the land.
The
official response was that the President had already acceded to the five
demands of the angry young protesters. So, what else did they want? The
President later spoke at an event tagged Presidential Youth Empowerment Scheme
(P-YES) but nobody took that seriously. His promise of an investigation that
will ensure justice was dismissed as an afterthought, and an aside. The minimum
demand of the angry youths of Nigeria soon changed from the 5-for-5 demands to
a declaration that the President must speak up, and speak directly to the
youths. On Tuesday, October 20, 2020, a day that is now a defining moment in
the life of the Buhari administration, Lekki Toll Gate happened. It is now
known as Black Tuesday. Or the Red October. A toll gate plaza, at which angry
youths of Nigeria gathered has now become a symbol, indeed a watering hole, of
the conflict, the alienation, the distance between the people and those who
govern them.
After
Black Tuesday, President Muhammadu Buhari finally summoned a meeting of the
National Security Council. When the meeting ended, Nigerians were told to
expect something important. The President had directed the Security Chiefs to
use every lawful means to restore law and order, not just in Lagos, but across
the country. By then, the #AntiSARS, #AntiSWAT, #AntiInsecurityNow protests had
begun to spread like wildfire. The country was in turmoil, on the boil. We were
told the President would finally address the angry youths. This was by the way,
48 hours after the blow-out in Lekki, Lagos, and 14 days after everyone had
been pleading with the President to have a national broadcast.
Expectations
were high. On Thursday, October 22, 2020, the
President showed up on national television. But it was an anti-climax. The
27-paragraph, 12-minutes delivery-time broadcast by the President was shallow,
hollow, condescending, full of gas lighting and completely lacking in empathy,
and emotional intelligence. It began on a note of warning, followed by
threats, a thank you but shut up riposte to the international community, a bit
of wrongly-timed self-congratulation about the government's poverty alleviation
programmes - now tell me, who goes to a condolence party to boast about their
personal achievements! - and it ended on a note of threat. Nigerian were
flabbergasted. They complained about the failure of the President to
acknowledge the lives that have been lost. There was a line in the broadcast about
the policemen that died in the course of duty, and yes indeed, police lives
matter, and there was another line about the attack on the palace of the Oba of
Lagos whose shoes, staff of office and other valuables are now missing, but the
President said nothing about the many Nigerians who died, those whose
investments and assets were attacked and destroyed, not even a word about the
anguish in the land, the emotional trauma of citizens at home and in diaspora
who had taken to the streets in every continent to condemn the reign of anarchy
and chaos in their fatherland.
I have
argued on Arise TV that whoever wrote the draft of the President's
speech did him a bad turn. Whoever had a hand in the construction of that
broadcast is unkind. The psychology of power, especially in Nigeria's
Presidential Villa conditions the people around the President to tell him to be
strong and refuse to be intimidated by anybody. They would tell him: 2Sir,
you are the Commander-in-Chief, you cannot appear to be weak." They will
confront him with conspiracy theories: 2Sir, it is your enemies that are
behind the protests in Lagos. We know them. You must teach them a lesson. Your
Excellency, you have nothing to worry about sir, we will deal with those
hoodlums. We have everything under control."
While
such behavior can be explained away as human and archetypal, it is unacceptable
that anyone will write a speech or offer such advice that will turn the
President of Nigeria into his own fall guy. I am often reminded of the US
President Harry S. Truman's saying that the buck stops at the President's desk,
yes, but no two Presidents are the same. Buhari is not Truman. Some Presidents
require more support than others. President Buhari's advisers, who are now
shockingly trying to edit, a posteriori, a speech they should have
cleaned up properly, threw him under the bus. This singular error will redefine
his Presidency and legacy. The best way to understand the ineffectuality of
that broadcast is to assess what happened after in Nigeria, and in terms of
international response to the Nigerian situation.
Things
simply got worse. It would in fact have been better if that broadcast had
not been made.
Before
Black Tuesday, there had been indications that hoodlums, fifth columnists and
trouble-makers had hijacked the protests, infiltrated the ranks and were beginning
to change the tone of the protest. With the alleged shooting and killings at
Lekki Toll Gate, the peaceful protesters withdrew, and what was left was a
spectacle of riotous and destructive behavior. Everything degenerated very
quickly. Earlier, in Benin, Edo State, there were reports of the escape of
prisoners from two prisons: the Benin Maximum prison and the Oko prison. This
would eventually become a pattern as there were reports of attempted jailbreaks
in Ikoyi and Kirikiri Prisons, Lagos and successful jailbreak in Okitipupa,
Ondo State. Last week, in defiance of the President's threat that those who had
hijacked the protests will be dealt with, about 27 police stations in Lagos,
were attacked and razed to the ground. The same was the fate of other police
stations across parts of the country. Arms and ammunition and police uniforms
were stolen. By weekend, Nigeria was in a state of anomie. In Lagos, Calabar,
Jos, Osogbo, Ilorin Kebbi, Jalingo, warehouses storing COVID-19 palliatives
were attacked by hungry and angry Nigerian youths. They said they were taking
what belongs to them. They protested that it was wrong to hoard the COVID-19
palliatives meant for the people.
It was a
bizarre situation. Not all the looters were hungry young men and women. Some
middle-class persons also went in cars, and tricycles and carted away their own
part of the loot. Some of the palliatives - bags of rice, sacks of garri, boxes
of Indomie and other food items ...were found in private homes. In Lagos, the
majority leader of the State House of Assembly said the palliatives found in
his house in Ikorodu were being kept for distribution during the celebration of
his forthcoming birthday. In Ibadan, another prominent politician from whose
home over 300 motorcycles and 200 refrigerators were carted away said the
materials were meant for the people's empowerment. In Ilorin, Kwara State,
soldiers were seen telling looters to loot peacefully and return peacefully! In
Calabar, the home of Senator Gershom Bassey was raided. Furniture and other
household items were carted away. Other persons and institutions were not so
lucky. In Lagos, iconic buildings were set ablaze. BRT terminals across the
city were torched, along with newly bought buses. In Calabar, 52 different
sites were attacked. The home of Senator Victor Ndoma-Egba was set ablaze.
Malls, supermarkets, private assets were not spared in Lagos, Ebonyi, Benin, Abia,
Kano, Jos, Calabar, Kebbi and Taraba. Banks and their ATMs were a special
target. The President's words about maintaining law and order rang hollow. As
the violence raged, the police were nowhere to be seen. The military also beat
a tactical retreat and opted in Lagos for a strategy of pacification. Military
officers became preachers appealing to the people to "calm down".
What
happened in Lekki on October 20, and the tone-deaf Presidential broadcast also
seemed to have energized Nigerians in diaspora. After the President's speech,
more Nigerians trooped to the streets of UK, Germany and Canada to register
their displeasure. The international community, asked by President Buhari to
get the facts right before jumping to conclusions simply ignored him. It was
after that ill-fated speech that the following spoke up: the Pope, the
Archbishop of Canterbury, the US Department of State, the Congressional Black
Caucus, the Special Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC) and
many more. All of a sudden, Nigeria was on its way to becoming a pariah state
all over again, as Nigerians signed petitions, directed at world parliaments
and the International Criminal Court (ICC) to ask that Nigerian leaders should
be blacklisted and arraigned for crimes against humanity.
Before
Black Tuesday, there were insinuations of an ethnic, religious and geographical
tint to the protests. The first sign in that regard was the emergence of a Pro-SARS
group that emerged in Abuja and the Northern part of the country, a certain
Northern Youth Alliance (NYA) which argued that there was nothing wrong with
the Nigeria Police and that indeed, the people of the North needed the Special
Anti-Robbery Squad that is considered lawless by protesters in the South.
Before long, anti-SARS protesters were being chased off the streets in a
violent manner by the pro-SARS groups, particularly in the Federal Capital
Territory, Abuja. Northern Governors would also soon visit the Presidential
Villa to tell the President that the people of the North need SARS. What was
meant to be a peaceful protest against police brutality which exists all over
Nigeria, was thus reduced to the politics of ethnicity and geography. Eventually,
a group known as the Northern Coalition of Youth Groups joined the fray. It
called for protests across the 19 Northern states, but the coalition focused
majorly on insecurity and banditry and the failure of the Northern leadership
elite. The most fertile arena for a revolution is the mind of the people. But
Nigeria was in the grips of collective psychogenesis. In Calabar, a psychiatric
hospital was attacked. The patients were freed. The beds were carted away.
Across the streets of Nigeria, armed robbers, thieves, mental health patients,
drug addicts took over what started out as a peaceful protest. In Lagos, there
were reported clashes between the Yoruba and the Hausa Fulani. One Yoruba boy
in London asked Igbos to leave Lagos. Another Igbo activist in Europe
reportedly asked Igbos in Lagos to attack Yoruba interests and
investments.
This is
what happens when leadership and the state are compromised. The #EndSARS
protest in Nigeria has gone through all the initial stages of a full-scale
revolution as seen in the French, American, Orange, Red and Velvet Revolutions.
The crisis must not be allowed to tip over. Losing the trust and confidence of
the same young Nigerians, and the international community, that brought them to
power in 2015 and 2019 is the biggest damage that the APC and President
Muhammadu Buhari have both suffered. But what are the lessons of the
current rude awakening? The gains. The loopholes. Next week.
Related Videos
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2.
The #ENDSARS Protests: A
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Previous Posts by Author - Dr. Reuben
Abati
1.
#EndSARS: The Generation that said "Enough is Enough"- Oct 20, 2020
2.
#EndSARS: Almost a Nigerian Revolution -Oct 13, 2020
3.
How Organized Labour Deceived Nigerians, Again! -
Abati
4.
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Nigeria and the Southern Kaduna Question
7.
Thoughts on Nigeria and Chinese Loans - Reuben Abati
8.
NDDC and Other Stories of Dysfunction and Impunity
9.
Governance Beyond COVID-19: Back to Kwara
10. Coping with Coronanomics - Abati
11. Corona Blues - Abati - Apr 07, 2020
12. The Psychology of COVID-19 - Abati
13. Amotekun: The Politics of Protection - Abati
14. New Electricity Tariffs: Questions by Reuben Abati - Jan 07, 2020
15. Omoyele Sowore: Portrait of A Life in Protest - Abati - Dec 10, 2019
16. Of Constituency Offices and Projects - Abati - Dec 03, 2019
17. The Supreme Court and the Atiku Election Petition -
Abati - Nov
05, 2019
18. The Constitutional Crisis in Kogi - Abati - Oct 30, 2019
19. The Spiritual Solution to Boko Haram - Abati - Oct 08, 2019
20. Oct 1: The Journey So Far - Oct 01, 2019
21. Presidential Powers and The Vice President - Sept 24, 2019
22. Nigeria, Xenophobia and Ramaphosa's Apology - Sept 18, 2019
23. Mohammed Adoke Writes Back - Sept 18, 2019
24. P and ID vs. Nigeria: A Review by Reuben Abati - Sept 10, 2019
25. When Soldiers Do Police Work: Disaster - Aug 14, 2019
26. Peter Drucker and The Things That Changed
27. FBI, Nigerian Fraudsters and Other Stories
28. P and ID vs. Nigeria: A Review by Reuben Abati
29. When Soldiers Do Police Work: Disaster
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34. Ogun 2019 Politics and Deployment of Violence - My
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35. Chief Anthony Anenih: A Personal and Political
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