By Babatunde Jose
The Messenger of Allah, peace and blessings be upon him, said, “There is no leader who closes the door to someone in need, in hardship, and in poverty, but that Allah closes the gates of heaven to him when he is in need, in hardship, and in poverty” – Sunan al-Tirmidhī 1332
Protest is an invaluable way to speak truth to power. Throughout history, protests have been the driving force behind some of the most powerful social movements, exposing injustice and abuse, demanding accountability, and inspiring people to keep hoping for a better future.
‘World Protests: A Study of Key Protest Issues in the 21st Century’, is the work of a team of researchers with German think tank Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung (FES) and the Initiative for Policy Dialogue, based at Columbia University.
Studying more than 900 protest movements across 101 countries, the authors concluded that we are living through a period of history “when large numbers of people rebelled against the way things were, demanding change.”
The authors highlight one particular problem: democratic failure. Their research found that a majority of the protest events they recorded were prompted by a perceived failure of democracy. Other themes included inequality, corruption, and the lack of action over climate change.
In reality, we are living in the age of protests. Why we seem to be insulated from this movement is understandable. The proverbial lethargy and resilience to suffering of our people accounts for this. But it is changing. People are increasingly getting restless and fed-up with the turn of events: Their impoverishment, deprivation, incessant hunger, food insecurity and exposure to kidnapping and violent encounters with devilment.
To many Nigerians, democracy seems to have yielded few benefits or dividends. Hence, the low turnouts are recent elections. Between 2015 and 2022, the democratically elected government of Buhari presided over worsening security, continuing corruption, and two recessions.
The ENDSARS movement showed the democratic dynamism of young Nigerians. And technology has helped demands for better government to transcend old ethnic, religious, and linguistic divides. Unfortunately, ENDSARS did not produce a political party, but it showed a hunger for more democracy, not less, among Nigerians and a solidarity among Nigeria’s enormous population of young people.
In most African countries the relationship between the states and citizens is fragile. Engaging in violent conflict by different segments of the state, as a means of registering discontent on bad governance, has become a perennial occurrence. Such socio-political conflicts in Nigeria are wrongly profiled or tagged ethnic conflict and have heightened trust-deficit among different ethnic groups that make up the Nigerian plural state. These conflicts have also exposed the states’ lack of capacity to deal with past and recurrent complex security and conflict matters in a plural society.
In addressing socio-political conflicts, the Nigerian state is found wanting. It is always prone to the use of force, even during the colonial days. An excursion into past experiences would suffice.
December 6, 1929, Aba Women’s Riot, Eastern Nigeria. The women protested against tax levies imposed by the colonial government. It was brutally repressed and led to the death of many of the women.
Abeokuta Women’s Revolt, 27 November 1947, Abeokuta Women’s Union led by Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti. The women protested against an unfair tax regime which led to the abdication of the then Alake of Egbaland, Oba Sir Ladapo Ademola II and the abolition of the tax regime by the colonial government.
The Enugu Colliery Massacre took place on 18 November 1949, when a British Superintendent of Police, F S Philip, commanding a number of British and Nigerian Police Officers ordered the shooting of unarmed coal miners of the Iva Valley Coal Mine who were on strike.
Immediately Nigeria got her independence in 1960, all the existing geopolitical regions witnessed political violence which arose from the contradictions left behind by the British imperialist government. The manifestation of these political problems in the Middle Belt region especially to the present-day Benue State was the Tiv riots of 1960 and 1964, which was the earliest sign of an impending turbulent political system witnessed in this part of the country. The Tiv riots were eventually quelled by the army.
Before Emeka Ojukwu declared the Republic of Biafra in May 1967, Isaac Adaka Boro had declared the Niger Delta Republic in February 1966. Aguiyi-Ironsi ordered Odumegwu-Ojukwu to hunt down Boro. Mbiama and environs was surrounded by federal troops. To save the people from the siege and attendant harassment by the federal forces, Boro and his comrades had to come out and surrender themselves. In 1967, General Gowon created Rivers State and Boro was released from prison and absorbed into the Nigerian Army. He died mysteriously the following year during the war.
April 17, 1978, Ali Must Go Riots. Universities nationwide were on the move over a 50 kobo increase in student feeding fees.
If there are enough protesters, the policies of those in power may become unworkable. When the UK government introduce the flat-rate Poll Tax in 1990, huge numbers of people protested and refused to pay the tax. It became clear that prosecuting everyone who refused would be impossible, chaos threatened, and the government abolished the tax.
The two main sources of grievance are political exclusion and inequality. This may be the result of marginalization, oppression, intimidation, or violence. Typically, revolutions take the form of organized movements aimed at effecting change, especially socio-economic change.
Here in this clime, let us not be deceived that a widespread protest cannot become a revolution. With all the catalogue of grievances brewing in the land, revolution is imminent and possible.
Take a cue from protests in other lands and realize that we are sitting on gun powder. Remember the Arab Spring?
On December 17, 2010, a young Tunisian who sold vegetables from a barrow set himself afire to protest against police harassment. Mohamed Bouazizi died on January 4, 2011, but not before his gesture went viral, sparking protests against the cost of living and the country’s authoritarian President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali.
Ben Ali’s 23-year-rule ended 10 days later when he fled to Saudi Arabia, becoming the first leader of an Arab nation to be pushed out by popular protests.
The protests inspired a wave of revolts across the Arab world as people rose up to protest against authoritarianism, corruption, and poverty. It became known as the ‘Arab Spring’.
On January 25, 2011, thousands of Egyptians marched in Cairo, Alexandria, and other cities, demanding the departure of President Hosni Mubarak, who had been in power for 30 years.
On February 11, as more than a million took to the streets, Mubarak resigned and handed control to the military.
The most violent protest in history was in 1947 – Partition riots, India, and Pakistan. The hardest hit region was the densely populated state of Punjab (today divided between India and Pakistan), death toll estimates between 500,000 and 2,000,000, the deadliest riots known to humankind.
Protesters may organize a protest as a way of publicly making their opinions heard in an attempt to influence public opinion or government policy, or they may undertake direct action in an attempt to enact desired changes themselves.
Political protest is on the rise in almost all countries.
In 2020 there were protests against responses to the COVID-19 pandemic – a series of protests around the world against various governments’ responses to the COVID-19 pandemic, particularly lockdowns.
2020–2023 United States racial unrest ‘Black Lives Matter’– a series of protests against racial inequality and police brutality, sometimes in favor of abolishing or defunding the police. George Floyd protests. Breonna Taylor protests. Kenosha unrest.
2020 Malian protests, also called “Malian Spring”. And the End SARS protests to abolish the Special Anti-Robbery Squad in Nigeria.
In 2021 we had the Tunisian protests, Senegalese protests, South African unrest and 2021-2023 Eswatini (Swaziland) protests.
All these are not far from home and the causes are not too far-fetched. There is no gainsaying the fact that we have had it coming. The various grouse we harbor did not start yesterday. Incidence of hunger, high food prices and worsening socio-economic conditions have been with us since the coming of civil rule. Power deficit, housing deficit, infrastructure deficit, food insecurity, health, and education decay; closure of universities for a whole session, and corruption scandals of unimaginable proportion. Sixteen years of the PDP locust and the last 8 years of APC impoverishment and pauperization. And the past 8 months of socio-economic perambulation.
In its editorial of last Monday, titled: ‘The Ominous Pall of Nationwide Industrial Unrest’, Premium Times pointed out that, “The majority of citizens can no longer feed themselves.”
It continued: “Ironically, no regime of palliatives, whether at the federal or sub-national levels, can pull Nigerians out of the seeming cul-de-sac the economic policies…have hauled them into. Everything is wrong with their execution. It appears that corruption and profiteering – two market leviathans have come into the mix. They need to be dealt with.
“The government has to discover where it got it wrong, fix things and arrest the seething cauldron the country has become. No Nigerian wants to live on tokenisms with their ephemerality. Consequently, the economy must be made to work for all!”
According to Bismark Rewane of Financial Derivatives, the economic regression of the country is well documented, and this has been going down the hill for over 30 to 40 years and nothing done to reverse the trend, but lip service. Indeed, it has been a ‘long walk to protests and possible revolution’.
The Messenger of Allah, peace and blessings be upon him, said, “Whoever is appointed over the affairs of people in any way, and he conceals benefit from them, Allah will conceal benefit from him on the Day of Resurrection.”
Source: Musnad Ahmad
Barka Juma’at and a happy weekend.
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