At various times in Nigeria’s sixty years of sovereignty, several “revolutions” have occurred, masterminded by various military and civilian groups with a common purpose to change the course of leadership and governance system in the country, perceived to be inimical and antithetical to the principles and practice of good leadership, democracy, social justice and equity as the enduring props of a free society.
Beginning from the January 1966 coup d’etat staged by a dozen or so Nigerian young military officers in their innocent and patriotic quest to oust ingrained corruption fueled by tribalism and winner take all by the country’s political leaders at the time, to the secessionist attempt by the former Easterners, the nation wide protest that trailed the annulment of June 12 1993 election considered to be the best democratic election in Nigeria, the Gideon Orkar and group coup, down to Sowore-led #RevolutionNow episode, none of these revolutions achieved the objective for which they were conceived and executed. They were all crushed by the mighty arms of the Federal government’s armed forces.
And now, another revolution is on the Nigeria’s socio-political space, this time with the hashtag ENDSARS, which has the coloration of the first successful revolution I Nigeria, or so it has seemed with the Federal government seemingly bowing to the demand of the Nigerian youthful revolutionists.
One of the factors that has made the current revolution different from and “more successful” than previous revolutions lies in the sheer extensiveness of national and international support, which traverses tribal, political, religious sectors at local and international levels, they all agreed that the ongoing revolution has been long overdue, with the nation’s most eminent men and women from all walks of life politicians, men of God, celebrities, students, university dons, name them, all loudly lending their voice in expression of support.
The momentum of the revolution has even spread outside Nigeria, where Nigerians organized #EndSars protests in several cities they are domiciled, including London, Dublin, New York and Canada among other places. Even the United Nations has expressed interest and attention to the revolution in Nigeria to which it has expressed tacit support.
However, the seeming success of the EndSars revolution remained very much under a serious test, with all the possibilities of the victory so far achieved becoming a pyrrhic victory after all.
The signs were clearly ominous. Even then, the success ostensibly achieved so far was not without a price, gruesome price at that, with over twenty victims of government counter force felled by the bullets of security agents drafted by government to monitor and possibly stifle the revolution.
This is perhaps to be expected, if the maxim is true as it indeed is, that there cannot be and has never been a successful revolution in world history without bloodshed.
It all started as a social media campaign on Twitter, using the hashtag #ENDSARS with millions of Nigerians calling for the banning of the Special Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS), a controversial unit of the Nigerian Police Force, widely accused of oppression and brutality .
Within a weekend, 9 -11 October 2020, the #ENDSARS hashtag had up to 28 millions tweets with Nigerians sharing both stories and video evidence alleging how members of SARS engaged in kidnaping, fail to wear face coverings, murder, theft, rape, torture, unlawful arrests, humiliation, unlawful detention, extrajudicial killings, extortion in Nigeria. SARS officers were alleged to profile youths based on temperature readings, mount illegal road blocks, stop and search, conduct unwarranted temperature checks, arrest without warrant, rape women, extort young Nigerians for driving exotic vehicles and using iPhones and an avalanche of other allegations.
On Saturday 3 October 2020, a video started trending on social media showing a SARS police officer shoot a young Nigerian in front of Wetland Hotel, Ughelli, Delta State. It was alleged that the police officers took away the young man’s vehicle – a Lexus SUV.
On Thursday 8 October 2020, after weeks of outcry and anger with videos and pictures showing police brutality, harassment and extortion of Nigerians, the campaigners moved from social media to organized, peaceful nation-wide protests on ENDSARS in Abuja, Lagos, Ibadan, Osun, Benin, Delta, Ilorin, Ogbomosho, Owerri, Jos, Kaduna, Enugu, Anambra, Port Harcourt, and other Nigerian cities and states, promising to continue if the government refused to disband the force.
The protests were led predominantly by young Nigerians in different cities alongside many activists and celebrities.
By all indications, government’s body language suggests that the revolution can hardly be confidently be described as completely Uhuru in the sense of accomplishment, not even with government ostensibly scrapping the SARS.There may indeed be more battles ahead for the revolution, more so as a revolution without leadership, at best a chequered and rudderless leadership without a leader, thus prone to collapse in the face of more battle and more resistance from the powers that be. Check for instance the sudden decision of the Nigerian military to mount a fresh operation crocodile smile project in the midst of the revolution and the real purpose of such a timing.
Check also the15 October 2020 re-promulgation of the prohibition of demonstrations in the Federal Capital Territory announced after a Security Committee meeting which held on Wednesday, 14 October 2020 and which was chaired by FCT Minister, Malam Muhammad Bello. While the announcement recognized the rights of citizens to gather and demonstrate, it went on to point out that “the EndSARS protests were unruly, caused discomfort to people, violated COVID-19 protocols and should be discontinued in view of the fact that Government had met the demands of the protesters”. Does this sound a note of something?
Many Nigerians rightly thought this absurd since there had been several huge gathering of people in the country in recent months including elections in Ondo and Edo along with massive rallies in preceeding weeks, all with little or no adherence to COVID-19 guidelines.
THE ECHO 