#EndSARS a year later: who is bold enough to rebel? | Opinions

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The day after the Lekki tollgate massacre on October 20, I was in bed listening to the songs of American rapper Ab-Soul. The air was loaded with anguish and the acrid stench of death intrusively crept into my nostrils whenever I stopped shaking long enough to breathe. At intervals, I turned and turned, desperately trying to push from my mind the bloody events I had witnessed practically the night before.

Instead, I focused on the gruff raps and biting social critiques of Soulo (as Ab-Soul is affectionately called), which equates the personal with the political. “What is your life about? / Light me up / Are you going to live on your knees / Or die on your feet?” He posed on “Ab-Soul’s Outro”. Later that day, as I wiped my tear-stained face, I wondered the point of the #EndSARS protests and if the payoff was worth it.

Around the same time last year, Nigerian youth made history. Fueled by pain and united by unwavering determination, young Nigerians took to the streets to courageously challenge the extrajudicial executions of young people carried out by the now “defunct” police unit of the Special Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS). The atmosphere at the event site – both physical and virtual – was unlike anything I had ever seen. At protest venues across the country, there was a sure sense of camaraderie among young people as we stood in unison to protest against bad governance. The movement was largely decentralized and particularly devoid of ethno-religious tensions that generally affect the framing of socio-political issues in Nigeria. We were one.

But one dark Tuesday night at the Lekki tollgate in Lagos state, it all came to a screeching halt. On October 20, 2020, following the announcement of a state-imposed curfew, soldiers opened fire on peaceful protesters, who waved the Nigerian flag and sang the national anthem, some losing the life for the cause that night.

The massacre – and the chaos that followed – left a bitter taste in our mouths, considering how brutally the exhilarating momentum of the protests ended after it. Young people who were beginning to imagine a new future were brutally brought back to reality by the sound of guns and the screams of wounded colleagues. It did not help that the government made relentless attempts to erase the horrific events of that night from our memories. In the end, it became clear that justice is probably not a tangible concept in this country.

As such, the aftermath of the protests had a polarizing effect on Nigerians, straddling optimism and pessimism. For some, the fight is far from over, but they fear further bloodshed. And for others, this perspective reaffirms their initial belief in the public’s superficial relationship with radicalism. But what makes a revolution? The people or the cause?

In his book The Anatomy of Revolution, the American historian Crane Brinton compares the revolution to a fever. And just like a fever, a revolution can be good for the surviving party. As Brinton says: “Fever burns wicked germs, as revolution destroys wicked and harmful and unnecessary institutions. In this sense, a revolution often results in a positive outcome for the survivor – but survival is no easy task.

Revolutions don’t happen overnight – they’re often a long, winding tunnel to the other side of freedom, usually with many setbacks along the way. And a successful journey to the light at the end is a journey of resilience rooted in a desperate hunger for survival. Therefore, those who seek to start a revolt must understand that it brings about a kind of sacrifice: time, energy, resources, lives.

In December 2010, Mohammed Bouazizi, a Tunisian itinerant merchant, set himself on fire in protest against the seizure by the police of his cart of fruit and vegetables. The seizure itself symbolized the continued systemic dispossession and oppression he suffered at the hands of his own government. Bouazizi’s sacrificial act catalyzed the Jasmine Revolution in Tunisia and ultimately the Arab Spring, a wave of protests, uprisings and unrest in North Africa and the Middle East, which ultimately toppled the Tunisian, Egyptian governments , Libyan and Yemeni and shake up others.

However, this has not been without price: since the fall of Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi in Libya, the country has been ravaged by civil war. Likewise, Yemen sank into a bloody civil conflict after President Ali Abdullah Saleh was forced to resign. In Syria, President Bashar al-Assad retained power despite a national uprising against his regime, at the cost of hundreds of thousands of Syrians killed and the displacement of millions of people.

After the heart-wrenching Lekki toll shooting, #EndSARS protesters retreated to their homes, fearing for their lives and what law enforcement might do next. Slowly but surely, we realized that revolutions are not for the faint of heart.

In his two-part essay “The Anatomy of EndSARS Protests as an Incomplete Revolution,” Nigerian philosophy professor Douglas Anene draws parallels between a successful revolution and the successful delivery of a new baby, arguing: “The disadvantages of pregnancy experienced by the potential the pains of mother and childbirth during labor are analogous to the pain and suffering that often accompany revolutions.

Against this background, it can be easy to attribute the deaths in the Lekki massacre – and during protests in general – to the expected fallout from such an uprising. But many fail to understand this point of view. On the one hand, the Nigerian socio-political climate has deteriorated considerably since then. Across the country, there has been an increase in violence and insecurity, a nationwide hunger crisis and a continued suppression of press freedoms. It’s almost like we are taking one step forward and three steps back.

Throughout her book, On Revolution, German-American political scientist Hannah Arendt describes the revolution as a restoration, in which the rebels seek to restore the freedoms and privileges of citizens who were lost due to the government’s brief shift towards authoritarianism.

To contextualize this in Nigeria would be a myth; my country had been burning for decades before I was born. Long before witnessing a plane crash, around 100 children my age were killed, long before an armed militia first launched an attack on a town in northern Nigeria. So restoration, in that sense, is almost impossible, as the current dystopian state of Nigeria is all I have ever known. Our parents know it too. Like us, change was bubbling in their hearts, but their activism gave way to the lack of true belief in its eventuality, leaving them riddled with the disease of Hollow Hope.

Essentially, the protests against SARS were inevitable. According to Brinton’s theory, the “fever” rises because of the complaints of a people. Symptomatic of this fever is the collapse of the power body. The fever is raging; then it is clear that the people cannot tolerate it, and this rage is replaced by an improved body of power and a happier people. In Nigeria, years of unbridled violence and utter disregard for the lives of citizens have undoubtedly sparked the discontent that erupted in the fury of the righteous nationwide last year. Despite this, we are not yet “a happier people”.

Yet the movement has taught us some positive lessons. The first being that we are much stronger together than apart. Across the country, young Nigerians from six geopolitical zones have come together with the common goal of ending police intimidation, oppression and brutality. Our united front was what kept the protests going as long as they have been. It has also shown us that it is possible to have an accountable and transparent civil society that responds to the needs of its citizens.

The main cause of the deep-rooted political rot in Nigerian soil is the government’s constant lack of respect for human rights, regardless of the very people it has been elected to serve. Therefore, seeing platforms like the Feminist Coalition voluntarily raising and disbursing funds for social services such as food, shelter, health care, physical security and legal aid during the protests has instilled a new hope in the future of the country.

Looking ahead, the only way forward is a comprehensive reform of Nigeria. We have learned that the rot does not start and end with the illegal operations of a single rogue unit, but is spread by all the factions within Nigerian society that allow and reward abuse of power and use. disproportionate force. But the political upheaval we seek will not be put back on a silver platter, as we have learned to learn.

In her essay, Anene adds, “Only a deep appreciation that revolutions involve life and death situations can generate the mental dispositions necessary to lead a successful revolution. In revolutions, halfway measures are futile and counterproductive.

So the million dollar questions remain: who is willing to go all the way to overthrow these systems of control? In the face of violent and fatal resistance, who is ready to hold on? Who is bold enough to rebel?

The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial position of Al Jazeera.



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