Nigeria: Underestimating Revolution
Not till a revolution happens do men believe in it. – Confucius.
When money stops flowing in the streets blood will flow in the streets. – Gerald Celente.
When Nigerian activist, Yele Sowore, declared Tinubu’s election as president would hasten Nigeria’s much needed revolution many thought it another sensational statement by a radical. Sowore’s prediction is proving correct. Whether the revolution will happen is anyone’s guess. Not till it happens. Yet, Nigeria is now closer to revolution than at any time in its history. The current threat of revolution is not the action of young military officers or student leaders of old. The threat is from the everyday people.
Nigeria has been ripe for revolution for almost a decade now. Revolutions are not regular occurrences and thus easy to doubt. They only occur when poverty and hunger chase the population like an avenging angel would do due to misgovernance. A combination of poor policy choices and monumental thefts by public servants and their clients are responsible. The people know this as well as anyone.
The sign a revolution is succeeding or has succeeded is no secret. Any student of revolution will tell you that revolutions succeed when the security forces (police, paratroopers, infantrymen) refuse to fire bullets or any other weapons on the protesters. Nigeria is now so hard in the economic sense that the security forces sent to shoot on sight any protesters will soon realise that they are shooting their brothers, mothers, sisters, fathers, children and friends.
Is there any soldier or police officer so blessed that hunger and poverty is not biting his family or friends? How well does the Nigerian government take care of or pay its security forces?
The killing of protesters in some states by security forces at the moment may give joy to some non-ethnic people of that state. What folly! The hunger and poverty harshly oppressing Nigeria are tribeless. The people in Zamfara, Oshun, Akwa-Ibom, Enugu, Adamawa, Kogi, and Delta states want to protest too, hardship is dehumanising them. Security forces will not hesitate to shoot on sight in those states or anywhere else. You will then have the dilemma that when others were dying you laughed with joy but now your own are dying you want everyone to cry with you.
The cost of living in Nigeria is crippling if not mortal. There is no way out. The tiny fraction of Nigerians enjoying life are blind to this most visible reality. Famine levels of hunger, unaffordable school fees, fear of marriage. Or the dread of medical expenses, excessive financial desperation, the legitimation of sex for food. And other misfortunes are very common experiences for the Nigerian in Nigeria. The despair in Nigeria is so high that kidnapping, rituals for money, and the sales of human body parts too many Nigerians consider “smart.” Where else can you earn good money outside government office they argue?
May we add that Nigeria is the only nation in the world where you can harvest the body parts of a person without clinical consent. Thanks to Senators Ekweremadu, Ifeanyi Okowa and Chris Ngige. It was not a revolution that provided payment for such a crime against humanity. Poetic justice ensures that Ekweremadu is in jail in the UK for criminal body parts trafficking. Human parts trafficking is now a free-for-all in the country. Can you imagine that?
Back to Sowore, revolutions overturn systems not extend them. The more people in power delay revolution with brides, police brutality and the mad dog syndrome the bloodier and more cataclysmic it would be when it happens. Billionaire politicians can offer some activists millions of dollars to back down. Ruthless “elected” politicians can be as brutal if not more brutal than evil tyrants.
The bribes and brutality do not put food on the tables, improve the cost-of-living crisis or offer better living wages. Or create jobs, pay medical bills or school fees. Nor does it improve security. Those tactics without a doubt makes things worse for the Nigerian. How many activists can you bribe? Governments fall when they run out of money to bribe or to offer rents to activists, opponents, and corporations.
Let’s talk about brutality. An ex-policeman told us of his experiences during the Kaduna Riots. The police with a small number of bullets for their guns would see hundreds of rioters slowly approach them. When they get too close a policeman would shoot and hit a random rioter with a bullet. The rioters would runaway only to return to collect the body of the injured or murdered rioter. The rioters would then start moving slowly towards the police again. As the bullets ran out the police had to escape the area for their dear lives. The ex-policeman said it was the scariest thing he ever saw, people not afraid to die, people saying your guns are a limited force.
This is what revolution looks like. But why?
American author, James Baldwin, famously said “The most dangerous creation of any society is the man who has nothing to lose.” There are too many Nigerians today that have nothing to lose, over two hundred million of them. Ask yourself what does the everyday Nigerian have to lose? Ask the question well. Nigerians in Nigeria want revolution as much as those in diaspora do and like last year. It is neither easy in Nigeria or abroad for them. Only one per cent of Nigerians enjoy the oil wealth.
When the bribes and brutality run thin the government will leave the country perhaps by helicopter because airports will render them sitting ducks. For now, most Nigerian politicians of stature have flown overseas with their families for safety. They know better than everyone else their evils towards the Nigerian people and the awaiting consequences that abound. And no stepping aside will be allowed.
We must note, revolutions succeed by the occurrence of unexpected flashpoints the government cannot prepare for. National protests and strikes hardly ever lead to revolutions. The government can throw money and violence at them with ease. Unexpected flashpoints that gain momentum take the government unawares. Then it’s happening.
Before we shed tears, we play the song “The Time is Now” by Moloko. Right now, anything can make a Nigerian happy. Football match victories, Olympic medals, Nigerians doing well oversees and another man’s misfortune. These distractions or delights are ephemeral. Afterwards the people go back to the hardship, hunger and poverty that engulfs them red-eyed.
It is too late for Nigeria to underestimate revolution.
Be Good, not Lucky
Grimot Nane