What began about a fortnight ago as “genuine concerns and agitations” by Nigerian youths against the excesses of the Special Anti-robbery Squad of the Nigeria Police has suddenly transmogrified into expressions of hate against the land, leading to murder, mayhem and arson. My sympathy and condolence to family and loved ones of the dead, irrespective of how they came to their unfortunate ends.
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As loyal members of the All Progressives Congress and importantly as patriotic Nigerians, we need to appeal to our leaders, in particular President Muhammadu Buhari, to kindly and urgently hasten intervention through appropriate civic engagement across every parts of the country to ensure restoration of peace in the country.
Being full text of President Muhammadu Buhari’s full speech on the #EndSARS protest on October 22, 2020
How did Lagos, a city of refuge, become a shooting range against defenceless young people waving the flag and singing the anthem?
Yesterday’s events were no doubt some of the darkest gradients of our history as a State and as a people. As you are perhaps aware, I have been engaging the #EndSARS protesters since Monday 12 and Tuesday 13 October 2020 respectively.
Our death was never planned, all we wanted was the chance to stay alive. Forget what some may say about us. They may call us anarchists or revolutionists.
It is sad that the most populous black nation on Earth has been greeted by such occurrences, gaining roots from alleged injustices that pervade the country over the years. What started out as a peaceful protest took a new twist over the last two days, leaving behind several questions begging for answers.
They are saying “Enough is Enough”, and they would not be deterred until they see concrete assurance that the change that they demand is in the horizon. The “slouching beast” of their protest is a notorious unit of the Nigeria Police: the much dreaded, now defunct Special Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS).
While remote work undoubtedly has certain advantages, some teams may be experiencing a morale drop after months of being stuck at home without a chance to socialise. There are also concerns about adverse mental health impact.
Buhari’s laughter wasn’t hearty. It was dry and mirthless, whizzing like a horsewhip on bare skin in harmattan. The laughter echoes the snapping of the windpipe when the tiger buries its yellow fangs in the back of the antelope’s neck, eyes glazed
At the time to respond, he took me by storm. Critical, informed and potentially dissembling questions shot out of him. He asked his orderly to fetch a map which he instructed be laid beside his office table. Like a scientist studying a fallen object from Mars, his pen dimensioned the map and his audience’s area of operation.
That political jokester, Agboola Ajayi, and his master, former Governor of the state, Olusegun Mimiko, of the Zenith Labour Party polled a miserable 69,127 votes. What that means is that even if the highly-trumpeted alliance of Jegede and Ajayi had seen the light of the day, it most likely wouldn’t have been able to upstage Akeredolu.
As the crowd in Abuja, Lagos, Ibadan, Port-Harcourt and other cities multiplied, with unimaginable resilience of trudging Nigerian youths putting their lives on the line in the face of merciless repressive machineries of the Nigerian state, in a moment, I was in Kenya. You would think reincarnation had flung the revolutionary leader and guerilla hero, Dedan Kimathi, who led the armed military struggle against British colonial regime in Kenya, called the Mau Mau war, back to Nigeria.
On the physical layer, Network Admission Control technologies were implemented to prevent intruders from having direct access into the network by preventing them from plugging unauthorised devices into the network. Before a device was admitted, it had to meet a minimum requirement defined by the organisation.
Back then, civil society deeply offended by trillions of naira stolen by government officials and campaign donors to the ruling party in the name of petrol subsidy mounted protests that rocked the country and nearly brought President Goodluck Jonathan’s government to its knees.
We grew up reading your poems. We saw ourselves in your writings. You wrote in specifics. You wrote for the masses. In my secondary school days, we tried to act your plays. I played the part of Ozidi—that mythic Ijaw hero in the epic-drama: Ozidi. The simplicity of your language thrilled us. No one needs a dictionary to understand your writings. You always have us in mind when you write. What a writer you were!
As I sweated and fidgeted with plugs and fuses I hardly understand, I chanted all the Quranic verses that I have been taught could protect one from danger in such desperate situation. God is indeed a wonderful God. Within minutes, strident siren heralded the arrival of a police truck. Before I could even shut the bonnet of my car, I had been surrounded by several gun-toting men.
And in that period of time too, I have had strident efforts being made to position me as an enemy of the people. Very serious efforts by mean people, who are simply out to generate hatred and animus against other people, for no other reason than Luciferous and pernicious feeling of smug satisfaction.
He is no heavyweight boxer, yet he packs a devastating punch. He does not possess the oratorical prowess of Marcus Cicero or the fiery Rev Martin Luther King Jr, or Bola Ige, our own Cicero, God bless their souls; yet his eloquence is striking and his words can rouse a crowd to action. He is no soldier, yet he as bold as a lion.
Most campaigns through protest movements in Nigeria have been geared towards entrenching the rule of law, good governance, transparency and accountability, equity and justice. They have generally been mobilisations towards a freer and more livable society.