Up until yesterday, when unexpectedly the feudal despot, General Muhammadu Buhari, capitulated to the will of the people and scrapped SARS, one could say democracy had ended in Nigeria.
Democracy under Buhari has become a one-man rule. Power at the center has been over centralized. He gags the media, manipulates the courts, divides the country, erased the rule of law, voids the Constitution, and squelch protest. Under him, we see a darker future. Millions of Nigerians are oppressed and their rights taken away.
For the first time in the history of the present generation of Nigerian youths, the #EndSARS protest organized by them proved what Ramsey Clark said: “A right is not what someone gives you, it’s what no one can take away from you.” They dared Buhari. They called his bluff off. They refused to give away their rights. What the youths did was what many of us who are familiar with history of revolutions had long advocated. We had called for a prolonged and sustained peaceful protests in the form of civil disobedience. I doff my hat for the youths for the victory.
The #EndSARS protest reminds me of the saying that “Big things often have small beginnings.” I remember protests in Iran in 2018. The nation-wide protests were caused by a sharp increase in the price of eggs. It brought out Iranians in their hundreds on the streets of Iran second city of Mashhad on December 28, 2018. Like the Iranian protests which spread to more than 70 towns and cities, the #EndSARS protests like wildfire engulfed towns and cities except the northern states where there is nothing like SARS.
The victory over the agents of evil who created SARS is a salient but powerful revolutionary message to Yoruba and Igbo youths fighting for self-determination on behalf of their oppressed people. The end of SARS is not the end of an evil empire. SARS is only a small piece of the giant puzzle of the evil empire. We need to dissemble and dismantle the whole puzzle. Now that SARS is dead and buried, the next move is to #EndNigeriaNow!
As President Dwight D. Eisenhower reminds us: “History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid.” Until now, the youths have underestimated the power they have. Little did they realize their oppressors are cowards. I say to the youths: don’t surrender your will. Determine your own destiny. Your future matters!
In a true democracy, there’s majority rule with limited rule guaranteed by the supreme law of the constitution. There’s protection for individual rights. There’s no room for tyranny by minority over majority. So also, minorities are shielded from the tyranny of the majority.
The instability, nepotism, injustice, and confusion propagated and promoted by Buhari are the mortal disease that caused affliction for Yorubas and Igbos to agitate for Oduduwa Nation and Biafra Republic respectively. Complaints are rife and heard everywhere by our prominent and respectable men and women. Their complaints are the same: Buhari’s regime is too parochial, too nepotistic, too backward, too brutal and barbaric, too insensitive, too wicked with unwarranted partiality, and with brazen disregard for the public good. We can’t breathe!
Just like SARS was beyond reform, likewise Nigeria is beyond restructure. Nigeria’s future holds the ominous threat of calamity. Nigeria’s litany of woes is perpetrated by the loonies in charge. It is further compounded by corrupt electoral system that makes it impossible to elect revolutionary minded leaders who can turn Nigeria around. Immediate and complete change of direction is needed to avert the calamity. And the only practical lasting solution is break up, not restructure.
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Original Author
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Bayo Oluwasanmi
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