The Insights by Lateef Adewole
“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable.”
– J. F. Kennedy (1962)
I have been an advocate of freedom of speech and freedom for citizens to express their feelings through peaceful gathering and protests. However, I am against any unprovoked assault or attack on individuals or groups. Most often, violence is never the answer. That said.
If anyone had foretold the former Deputy Senate President, Senator Ike Ekweremadu, about what happened to him in Nuremberg, Germany on 17th of August, 2019, he would have dismissed it. But, it happened. He was attacked by “his own brothers” at the venue of a sociocultural function of welcoming and eating new yam. It is a tradition in Igboland. However, it turned out bitter. He was disgraced, his clothes torn and had to be whisked away from the venue.
He could not have anticipated such, given his standing among the Igbo leaders in Nigeria. As at today, he could be considered the most politically prominent person from the South East, being a three-term deputy senate president, and has been in the national assembly since the return of democracy in 1999 (20 years) and still counting.
The attack was orchestrated by the members of IPOB. They accused him of being part of the Nigerian government that has created hardship for the citizens, made lives difficult and unsafe, and particularly, the deployment of the military to maul his people in the South East during the “Operation Python Dance”, which resulted in the deaths of their members.
Unfortunately for Senator Ekweremadu, Germany is not like Nigeria where political leaders fortify themselves and their families with state security apparatus, which make them untouchable. Retinue of security agents protect them, even if it is at the expense of the rest of the populace. So, he was vulnerable.
Also, the people, whether indigenes or immigrants, are allowed to voice out their opinion and protest publicly, without fear of being hounded, battered or arrested by the security agents. These are contrary to what currently obtain in our own Nigeria. We are all witnesses to what our democracy has now turned to. Every complain or criticism about government, its policies, actions and inactions, is termed opposition. You are tagged an enemy.
Nigerians can no longer speak out their minds without fear of being harassed. Peaceful protests have almost become suicide missions. Such actions can even be declared terrorism by the police. The #RevolutionNow experience is still lingering as I type this. Sowore and some protesters some weeks ago are still languishing in jail.
All groups championing one cause or another, have been disbanded, banned, or proscribed and declared terrorist organisations. The previously vociferous Bring Back Our Girls (BBOG) Movement has been chased underground and rendered impotent. IPOB, IMN and #RevolutionNow groups have been declared terrorists organisations.
Even prominent personalities and human right activists were prevented, two weeks ago, from gaining entrance into the venue of a public lecture organised by Sowore’s group. Mr. Femi Falana (SAN), Professor Wole Soyinka, and others, were part of the victims. Even when these same people in government now, while in the opposition, rode on the activities of some of these groups and personalities in hounding former President Jonathan out of office.
The opposition latched on to them to bring down that government. Fortunately or unfortunately, so many of the people involved then, have become victims of the authoritarianism of the government they helped installed. Apart from BBOG group, whose members are also suffering the harassment now, politicians like Chief Obasanjo, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, Senator Bukola Saraki, Kwakwanso, Dino Melaye, and so many others have had a taste of that brutality. Like the saying goes; “those who rode on the back of a tiger, will end up in its belly.”
To be fair to Senator Ekweremadu, he is one of the few courageous voices that stood in support of Igbos. He and Senator Abaribe were at the forefront in fighting for the release of the IPOB leader, Nnamdi Kanu, when he was detained in perpetuity. The only difference in their approach from that of IPOB is that, they believe that all Igbo interests should be fought for, within the Nigerian state, as against IPOB’s quest for a separate country, Biafra.
Nnamdi Kanu has also ordered his followers worldwide to target and attack all political office holders and leaders of Igbo extraction, wherever they are sighted around the globe. He even placed a bounty of one million naira for whoever can provide information of their itinerary outside Nigeria.
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Like a joke, it is becoming a reality. Just last week Tuesday, it was reported that the current Minister of Foreign Affairs, Geoffrey Onyeama was nearly mobbed at a programme in Austria. He had to hurriedly abandon the function, for fear of receiving the “Ekweremadu treatment”. This has put many Igbo leaders on their toes. It seems like they are becoming very mindful of where they go now, outside Nigeria, though they deny that.
The IPOB members were also directed to mobilise to Japan, to “disgrace, attack and arrest” president Buhari, who is attending the 7th Tokyo International Conference on African Development (TICAD7), taking place in the city of Yokohama, Japan between 28th and 31st of August, 2019 and hand him over to Japanese authority. That is preposterous! Was it not the same Japan government that invited him?
True to the call. IPOB members actually mobilised and staged public protests in Japan. Though, the situation was well managed by the security, which prevented them from accessing the venue of the conference. Asia is not Europe. Moreover, a whole president of another country cannot be allowed by their host government, to be ridiculed by anyone. That will amount to diplomatic recklessness. Many of the IPOB members are said to still be on ground right now.
So, that attack on Senator Ekweremadu was widely condemned for the reasons mentioned earlier. Curiously, from my observations, it was like the “loudest” condemnations came from the elites and politically exposed personalities (PEP), who themselves, are “prospective” victims of such attacks. The people on the streets have mixed reactions to it. In fact, many have turned it to memes and jokes on social media.
An old video from Ukraine suddenly resurfaced. There, the country’s lawmakers were seeing in different locations, being harassed, arrested and “trashed”, by dumping them inside public trash cans. Dirts were poured on many of them. This was done by the citizens who were not satisfied with the state of governance in the country at the time. Similarly, there is another video of the former president of Côte d’Ivoire, Laurent Gbagbo, who was attacked by Ivorian citizens in foreign land.
The implication of this is that, Nigerians are sending subtle messages to the people in authority, that the Germany’s incident is not new and not peculiar to Nigeria and Nigerians. That will be a very dangerous trend being established. By extension, that one day will come, when the “goat would have been pushed to the wall, then, it will turn back and attack its persecutor”, like Yorubas will say. They need to be more conscious of that.
This is what you get when you silence your citizens from voicing their opinions out. When people feel like they are being enslaved and becoming endangered, in their own country, they can resort to such deadlier actions against their country’s leaders in another jurisdiction, where they are given freedom and feel more protected.
I even read an opinion piece which highlighted the “positive” consequences for Nigeria and Nigerians, of such “mob actions” in foreign lands against Nigerian leaders, who have found “safe haven” in those countries, after they might have destroyed their own. They run abroad on medical tourism, after turning their own hospitals to death bays. They put their children in foreign schools after seeing to the collapse of public schools in their country. They import everything they need for their own use, after all the industries closed down under their watch. They run to more secured countries after creating insecurities in their own.
In that piece, such mob action was proposed to target all past and present leaders, who have contributed in one way or another to the sorry state our country have gotten to. They should be exposed, named and shamed worldwide, including all their family members. Where possible, they should be prevented, through “peaceful” public protests against them anywhere in the world, wherever they go for such services in another country. Let all the people who promised to serve Nigeria and Nigerians, also live, patronise and enjoy those services they give to the citizens.
Or, how does one explain a Minister of Health who cannot allow himself to be treated in the hospitals he superintend, a Minister of Education, who cannot put his own children in public schools, a Transport or Works minister who cannot travel by rail or the same road he built, a Power minister who runs his home on generator, a governor who feels unsafe in the state where he is the Chief Security Officer, a president who lives large while his citizens die of hunger and in undignified penury. And all public “servants” (political and civil) who are being served by the public rather than they, being the ones to serve the people? What a shame!
Anyone who cannot live the same lives he or she intends to provide for the citizens, who put them in office, should have no business being in the public service. And if it will take them to be hounded, harassed or chased from foreign lands, back to Nigeria, for them to do right by the citizens, then, so be it! If they have no hiding place globally, they will be forced to stay back at home and make Nigeria a better country, suitable for them to live as well as the masses. Enough of this nonsense.
Unfortunately, can the citizens across the country agree and unite to carry out such actions, without being divided by tribalism, nepotism or religion? That remained to be seen. And the ruling class understands this. That’s why they play on it to keep the masses disunited, despite being confronted by common enemies of joblessness, poverty, hunger, poor education, poor healthcare, bad roads, insecurities, lack of public power, collapse of infrastructures, and so on. All of which are due to bad governance, foisted on the country by bad, selfish and greedy leaders. When will this end? We cannot continue like this forever. Enough is enough!
May God continue to guide us aright.
God Bless Nigeria.
Lateef Adewole is a political analyst and social commentator can be reached by email lateefadewole23@gmail.com or via WhatsApp +2348020989095
