South Africa has a protest season, that's an annual ritual, sometimes I wonder if they'd had a year where they found absolutely nothing to protest about, or had so much that they couldn't easily summarise them in few words or items, or under just one theme; but knowing how it is between the government and the governed, it is virtually a given that reasons for protest will exist continually. The protest titled "
END BAD GOVERNANCE" in Nigeria started about the time the Kenyans were witnessing an end to theirs, which was against proposed tax hikes, that led to the sacking of the entire cabinet by President Ruto, besides the withdrawal of the policy, amongst other changes. It also coincided with the one in Bangladesh that eventually led to their prime minister bailing and flying off to exile in India, as well as in Ghana which of all the aforementioned seemed less volatile.
This protest in Nigeria will for a while remain one for scholarly expedition, in the manner it was interpreted and executed by various groups, and in different regions and parts of the country. Though the common denominator is the hunger in the land, the demands, as to how the anger in the land can be assuaged varied, not just amongst the different groups involved in the protest, but even amongst protesters in the same group. Now, this is not an unusual finding amongst protesters, especially a protest which was planned and talked about online for weeks before the D-Day of August 1, 2024 but what made it the more exceptional is the fact that there was no central control or particular leader(s), to make the rallying cry, or give directions to the movement, hence the seeming range of views thus dispassionately expressed.
The experience from the ENDSARS protests of 2020 which ran for days without known leaders, must have informed the decision by the groups that organized this to tow the same path, and may also now become the pattern for future protests in Nigeria, as members of civil societies and Labour Unions are shut out of popular demonstrations by the masses, having lost hope in the ability of the institutionalised bodies above to either fight on their behalf, or coordinate protests to push for the betterment of the living conditions of the Nigerian masses. This is because over time, these groups have been found to compromise their stands, and shortchange their own for reasons that leaves so much to be desired.
The first sign of disconnect between the government and the governed, was the fact that the protest held, in spite of the frantic efforts by the government days before the event, to prevent it by engaging with so called "stakeholders", which involved traditional and religious leaders, same civil society groups whose numbers have grown exponentially in recent times, fighting for one cause or the other, or just springing up with some name or acronym, anytime the government wants to sway the minds of the masses. It doesn't even matter if the proponents of these groups engage the masses on a good day, in quiet times, not to talk of the period of emergencies when the masses need to be discouraged from revolting against government's plans and policies.
You could tell that most of the youth and student groups that purported to be speaking on behalf of their peers were opportunists who saw an opening to line their pockets with "their share" of the "national cake". It was such that some of them even held protests, to protest against the protest to end bad governance in Nigeria, and ended up undoing the crowd they rented to push their agenda, by disappearing without paying them the agreed stipend, as caught on videos that went viral at the time. A few of those interviewed went on to say they didn't even know what they were protesting for, or against, which you can tell by the way some of them held their placards upside down.
There were protests in most Southwest States with the epicentre been Lagos, and except for a few skirmishes, notably by and with thugs, who some say were state sponsored, the protests were largely peaceful, with most of the protesters understanding the purpose. The protest in Lagos also aroused the good nature of Nigerians when they offered support, financial and otherwise, to protesters whose pathetic stories were broadcast while the protest was ongoing. Sadly, in the end the police that initially offered protection to protesters, stood back while the latter were harassed by thugs by the fifth day of the ten day protests, making it impossible for the protest to continue in Lagos.
When Chief Asari Dokubo warned people in the Niger Delta regions against protesting, one would've taught his word will be law, especially after pronouncing his heroics and exploits in the Obigbo area of Rivers State during the ENDSARS protests, where he claimed the glory for putting down the protest in that axis. Alas, not only were there protests in the oil rich region, it held even in his state of Rivers, and was significant enough to have the governor come out on two occasions to appeal to protesters to protest reasonably, before even theirs was quelled in a similar version as Lagos'.
It was only in Delta and Edo States, that thugs didn't have that kind of muscle to disrupt protests. In deed in Edo State, protesters set up canopies and the protests there were carnival like. This caused disruption in the flow of traffic, that it was only at spots where the protesters had benevolent leaders that vehicles were allowed to pass after paying for thoroughfare. One protester who made it to one of the venues in Benin had to hastily dash home, after he saw protesters been handed, or sharing berets (synonymous with cult groups) amongst their kind, and been the "Jew-man" that he is, seeing as it surely was becoming something he hadn't bargained for. No wonder, thugs couldn't hold sway there.
Abuja could be said to be one of the places where protesters stayed through to the ideals of the demands of protesters, despite pleading and threats simultaneously by government and the law enforcement agencies, and for the days while the protests lasted tear gas replaced oxygen for those who ventured out to the protest grounds, as they scampered for safety from warning gun shots. These brave men and women would return the following days to continue from where they left off, before it became nearly impossible to protest because of the crackdown, even though certain individuals like Ms. Ene Obi of Action Aid and her colleagues, decided to stage a sit-in at the gate of the Moshood Abiola stadium, for the duration of the protest days.
In Kano, Kaduna and Zamfara, and some other parts of the North, where the protests easily turned violent, many of the protesters were kids, which is not surprising considering that the region has the highest number of out of school children, which is almost synonymous with "out of home" children, who then invaded public and private properties, destroying everything on their path. One of the most interesting event, was the invasion of a library by the mob, who carted away furniture and furnishings, and leaving behind the books. An ICT infrastructure in Kano was stripped of its content, and even when the security personnel were deployed to halt their advance, they were met with defiance, with protesters kneeling before water jets, and kicking tear gas canisters back to the senders. In the end it took curfews declared by the governors of the affected States like Plateau, Kano, Kaduna, and the likes for normalcy to be partially restored, which also forced the protest to end, sadly with some loss of lives.
What was peculiar with the protests in some parts of the North, was that the protesters moved beyond just calling for an end to bad governance, or an end to hunger in the land by retaining fuel subsidy and reduction of cost of food, or reduction in the ostentatious lifestyle of those in government, to asking for regime change, to the point of waving Russian flags. This must've been the last straw that broke the camel's back for the forbearance of government and it's security agencies, especially seeing as this was how protests in countries bordering Nigeria in West Africa started before it was followed by coups in countries like Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger, where the military allied to Russia took over the reins of government.
One social commentator in his explanation noted that the protesters were not exactly seeking Russian intervention, rather they sought an end to the bowing of Nigeria to the dictates of the international financial corporations, like the World Bank and International Monetary Fund, IMF whose policies (which have brought untold hardship to the masses) the government seems to align with, and are considered as western. The Russian flag therefore signifies the alternative pathway, even though Russia has also shed communism, for some kind of capitalism, hence more like a denouncing of western capitalist ideals.
While almost every region managed it's form of protest, only in the Southeast did the people spend time downing slaughtered animals with liquor of varying percentage of alcohol in their homes, or other like gatherings, when they couldn't be at their place of business. Indeed, some people in government and outside of it had pointed fingers at the Igbo for been behind the protests, to the extent that a faceless group in Lagos has planned a movement to chase the Igbo out of Lagos, scheduled for the coming days, only for the Igbo to be a no-show, in their home states, as well as their states of residence. Some of them say they already protested with their votes last year, hence this is the protest of the rest of Nigeria following from the consequences of their vote.
Many have berated President Bola Ahmed Tinubu for not speaking to Nigerians, before and in the early days of the protests. When he eventually did, they shook their head in disappointment as he apparently failed to speak to the demands of the protesters, while simply highlighting the actions his government has taken since assuming office. The same policies that have been described as not impacting the lives of the ordinary Nigerian in positive light, which brought about the protest in the first place. As if things were not bad enough, Nigeria then went on to record one of its worst outings at the Olympics, which was not only because the athletes performed badly, but also because many of the below par performances followed self inflicted acts of omission and commission, as well as own goals by the sports authorities in Nigeria saddled with the responsibility of engendering best possible outcomes for the contingent to the Olympics.
Maybe one year isn't enough time to judge a government, maybe the government needs more time, but surely there must be short term measures that can alleviate the sufferings of the masses in the interim, while the longer term policies begin to take shape. Till date Nigerians are yet to come across the ₦40,000 for a 50kg bag of rice the government promised, neither has the numerous trucks conveying rice to states seen anywhere by anyone, save for those looted by protesters in some warehouses in Edo state. One of the governors even claimed he received no subvention from the federal government for poverty alleviation purposes, and even if the ₦570Billion support fund was sent, one wonders how much of a dent that will make on the hunger crisis, seeing as the purchasing power of the naira has significantly tanked, following the floating of the Naira to other currencies, and the resultant devaluation, with the crippling effect on the import dependent economy that Nigeria currently is.
For now the din of protests allover Nigeria has been silenced, with some of the protesters and leaders arrested, including some foreigners found with, or waving foreign flags. There's quiet, but seemingly that of a graveyard, suggestive of one for which the slightest of triggers will result in a conflagration, especially if there's no visible and remarkable improvement in the lot of the lives of the masses of this beleaguered entity called Nigeria. If only the government can just for once forget the sweet indices of what the outlook reflects macroeconomically, and focus even just a bit on the microeconomics of putting food on the table of the masses, and go ahead to do something about it, the pains of the easily governable Nigerians will surely be much assuaged.
'kovich
