A protest and the need for ‘common sense’

There are lots of lessons to learn from the on-going protests that started on August 1, 2024. Today is the seventh day and those who are keenly observing the developments will agree that there are innumerable lessons to pick up because of the multifarious characters either on the action field or from the numerous political analysts who have thronged the television channels struggling for public recognition.

The first premise of this article is that God, the creator of man has endowed him with the power of expression. For every action that is taken against man, there is always a reaction. Therefore, the right of protest is God given that no human can give or take away from him.

Let us also get it right from the beginning that if there are no citizens to challenge a government, autocracy will rule and become the order of the day. Citizens who lined up to cast the votes for their representatives and leaders have the inalienable right to demand for good governance. And this right is unquestionable, fundamental and unchallengeable.

However, freedom of any form or shape should be accompanied by responsibility, otherwise, protesting citizens will inadvertently create a space which the anarchists will fill with dastardly consequences as it is gradually becoming manifest in the current struggle.

Therefore, questioning the activities and calling the government to order must be done with decorum and those challenging the government must also realise that where their rights end is the beginning of the rights of other citizens.

No matter how well-intentioned these protesters may be it is indeed naïve and crude to believe that the only avenue for expressing grievances against systemic issues is by making other citizens suffer by blocking roads, shutting down the economy and scaring those who may not be interested in the protest from going outside their homes to conduct daily routine activities.

The surprise in the game is that some of these activities are most times led by those who should know better because a couple of leaders of the protest groups are lawyers and other highly educated people who come out boldly to tell the public the need to challenge the status-quo-ante.

While the defense of the defenseless is the primary job of an attorney, the inability to read the barometer during protests and quickly recalibrate when things are going out of tune seems to be absent and this lacuna leaves a bad taste in the mouth.

There are numerous questions that follows. Is childishly causing misperception in the public the essence of protest? Are peaceful protesters supposed to be the harbingers and catalysts of confusion and mayhem?

Yes, protests are meant to call the attention of the government to its deviation from good policies and what may be perceived as wrong implementation of good policies but this should be done with the motive to bring progress, improvement and development rather than engendering societal disorder.

Are these proptesters not supposed to base their demand for justice on facts rather than sentiment, political maneuvering and bickering, and lack of superior information and knowledge about governance and its attendant responsibilities? Sincerely some lawyers play the game of “media and talk shows” and sensationalism without taking cognizance of the consequences and final outcomes to the general well-being of the country they pretend to defend.

We are all in agreement that governance should be better than it is at the moment in Nigeria but a bird cannot fly with one wing. What is the role expected of each and every one of us in societal construction? Where did the model and template of nation building derail? In fact, and indeed, there are three major actors in the game. The International community, who seeing our shortcomings entered the space to connect the missing link to its own advantage.

The second community in this relationship are those of us who are protesting. That is, the Nigerians of today and yesteryears. The third in the tripartite equation is the government of Nigeria since 1967 because we have to be fair to those of the first republic who were not allowed by the greedy, senseless young men in uniform to give a solid footing and foundation to a nation in desperate need of it.

While handing over the mantle of leadership to our people, the international community (not the colonialists alone) did all it could to make the Nigerian nation unstable because without the tapping of our God given resources, their own people may not survive. They saw the sterling quality of the intellectual, managerial and leadership ability of the first generation of the politicians in Nigeria and decided that it would be better to give the mantle of leadership to the mediocre. Unfortunately, this didn’t work because they never expected what followed in terms strong opposition that guided the government of the day.

Hence, the promotion of the first military coup where a set of very young and administratively inexperienced military officers were placed in line to run the affairs of the nation. Since then the Nigerian nation has been scampering for identity and nation building.

Unfortunately, one of the men in the cycle of military governance of the nation who is still alive today, mistakenly increased the taste of Nigerians by introducing the Udoji largesse because in his lingo “Money is not the problem in Nigeria but how to spend it.”

This myopic action turned Nigerians into spend drift and extravagant people. Consequently, this created a push factor in the rural areas of the country with stronger pull factors in the large cities. Cocoa farms in the South West, Groundnut farms in the North and Palm Oil of the Eastern regions were abandoned by the able bodied for cheaper money in the cities, particularly Lagos.

The same government introduced the Basic Travel Allowance (BTA) in which a Nigerian could walk into the bank to exchange Naira for foreign currencies up to the tune of one thousand United States Dollars per trip whenever a Nigerian intends to travel abroad.

Multinationals who needed to repatriate hard currency saw the loopholes. Although, government thought it has put in place a safety-net, this was stylishly bypassed by the fraudulent minds. The procedure for buying the BTA was simple. The would-be traveler who must have a booked flight ticket and a passport indicating the intention to travel would walk into the bank with these documents, fill a Form A and exchange Naira for a foreign currency. The Bank Manager would stamp the Page 48 of his passport to prevent him from buying multiple times. This clause of stamping the passport led to the birth of the concept of “arrangee” in Nigeria because a group of criminally minded youngsters emerged in Oluwole area of Lagos whose preoccupation is to help the applicant to remove and replace the page 48 of a passport with a new passport page that will enable to return to the bank for another purchase. It was a matter of time before the purse of the nation was drained.

Consequently, the parallel foreign exchange market was born with Northerners dominating the show. What began as a joke at the Bristol Hotel in Lagos became a humongous institution that is called the Parallel market today. This was the beginning of the problem of Nigeria. Like in Chinua Achebe’s Best Seller “Things fall Apart,” the center no longer holds. In the manner of a dog that tasted a fresh blood, the search for wealth in Nigeria became uncontrollable because a lot of emergency importers rather than producers emerged.

Unfortunately, it is from this same national purse that we go abroad to buy all sorts of unnecessary luxurious items. Used tyres, Tokunbo vehicles, used refrigerators, spare-parts of all sorts, disused printing machines and materials so on. A walk through the street of London and some parts of Asia will bleed the mind as Yoruba women roams around London and Italy to purchase Italian shoes and Lace materials to sell in Balogun and Kota Alaran while the Yoruba men import all sorts of exotic cars that have become a burden to the owner in some parts of the world. On the other hand, the Ibo boys purchase spare parts for sales in Ladipo, and Wilmer in Ajegunle, used refrigerators, television, deep freezer and the likes in Lawanson in Surulere with computer and its accessories in the computer village in Ikeja. The Ibo women go to a remote part of India to buy “George materials”. The Northerners are content will ripping the dollars in the bank for the benefit of the two other tribes as aforementioned.
To be continued tomorrow.