In a democracy, protest is a legitimate means of ventilating grievances. It is a right guaranteed in the constitution. But the law is also not silent on the responsibility of organisers to stick to the rules.
The rights and responsibilities of citizens, however well enunciated in their national laws, become deeply inane where some of the citizens lack knowledge about acceptable conducts. You cannot, for instance, find a lawyer getting drunk in public. A professional conduct is in tandem with the tenets of his calling.
In some parts of the country, especially in the Southwest, most families emphasise good conducts among their members. They impress family etiquettes, the Omoluabi ethos on their sons and daughters. The values are passed to generations to ensure their name is not soiled. Members of such families conduct themselves impeccably, no matter the profession or vocation they find themselves. Where some individuals fail to imbibe such values, the society suffers some consequences.
This is why there is a nexus between human conducts and the psychological dispositions of individuals. Human beings, being rational creatures, have the senses for positive and negative thoughts. The thoughts give birth to consequential actions. Both senses are ignited by circumstances. In times of peace and crisis, human beings conduct themselves in different ways based on their psychological dispositions.
All human beings are teachable where appropriate means of communications are available. But a lack of requisite channels to enlighten the mind results in misdemeanor.
An analysis of the #EndBadGovernance protest has thrown up issues about the handling of the protest, which was hijacked, and degenerated into arson, looting, vandalism, destruction of public utilities, maiming and killing.
It is settled in law that protesters do not need a police permit to hold rallies. Yet, citizens have the right to be protected by security agencies during demonstrations. This legal provision is challenging in a country like Nigeria where the number of policemen is inadequate to effectively carry out this function, especially during nationwide public rallies.
The matter is further compounded by the frosty relationship between protesters, mostly human rights crusaders, who perceive the police as state agents for brutalisation of civil societies, with the police also perceiving the societal agitators as trouble makers. It is a carryover of the right activists’ perception of the Nigerian police and military as a colonial or neo-colonial institution aptly dedicated more to regime protection than the much flaunted commitment to the defence of sovereignty and territorial integrity.
What is most striking is that peaceful protests are usually rare these days, except they are organised by experienced academic union leaders and labour organisations whose intentions are not to wreak further havoc on the society. Most protests organised by youths are characterised by the usual exuberance peculiar to their adolescent period of adventure, impatience, storm and stress. Up to now, the pains of the wounds inflicted by the #EndSARS protests of October 2020 have not healed. The scars remain indelible.
It becomes more problematic when protesters are called out to the streets by faceless planners who may later lose control of the crowd they had mobilised. It is now obvious that the arrowheads of protests can hardly control or persuade the crowd to stick to the rules of the action. It is usually a mixed crowd of actual agitators and area boys who were not party to the planning.
In fact, the miscreants do not understand that a protest should be conducted within the bounds of reason. To them, a protest is an opportunity to display their unruly behaviours. When hoodlums hijack protests from the original mobilisers by easily infiltrating the ranks of genuine and peaceful protesters, there is derailment and the fundamental objective is defeated.
When protesters refuse to be confined to parks for legitimate protests and they insist on staging rallies on highways to deliberately disrupt the flow of traffic, thereby causing confusion and mayhem, criminal elements unknown to the planners have dominated the show.
More worrisome is the tacit support given to protest by opposition politicians seeking a pound of fresh from the ruling chief executive. The growing partisan feeling that only violent protests are more impactful is more worrisome.
If state police was in vogue in Nigeria, maybe, the local, community or state policing structure would have been more effective in preventing the riots. The assumption is that the District Police Officer (DPO) and his men may have knowledge of the hyperactive youths in the locality and fish them out while attempting to hijack a lawful protest.
Also, many believe that intelligence gathering becomes relatively easier because policemen operating in specific area are conversant with the geography, sociology, tradition, and demography of the environment.
Many protesters see policemen as enemies that thwart their action. In some instances, they deliberately provoke the police, abusing and calling them names. Many policemen have lost their lives during riots and, in most cases, society did not bother about the implications of their demise for their bereaved families and loved ones. When they are pushed to the wall and they shoot, they attract public rebuke. No matter the extent of arson or violence perpetrated by protesters, the public expectation is that in the event of police intervention, there should be no single casualty; there should be no firing of shots and no life should be lost.
There are puzzles: how can the wheat be separated from the chaff in that moment of tension when an orderly march turns bloody and miscreants become the companions of genuine agitators?
Should security agents allow the disruption of public peace to continue by those whose activities threaten national security?
If the violence perpetrated by hijackers is not curtailed on time, would the public spare law enforcement agents for not coming to their rescue? Would the police not be accused of dereliction of duty?
How should policemen or soldiers, in extreme cases, respond to invasion of private property and public utilities, and the carting away of valuables under the guise of hunger protest?
How should security agencies restore normalcy without casualties, especially among recalcitrant agitators?
Two eminent Nigerians – former Vice President Atiku Abubakar and Nobel Laureate Prof. Wole Soyinka – raised objections to the police management of the protest. Soyinka felt that it fell below expectations. Atiku complained about the use of lethal arm. It is reassuring that where a policeman was found culpable in the death of a protester in a northern state, the officer was made to face prosecution.
As violence erupted and tension rose, the Chief of Defence Staff, General Christopher Musa, even warned that soldiers might come to the rescue, if police efforts became inadequate. The ‘Aid to Civil Power’ is offered as a last resort by the military, following the glaring failure of police action. It is a special operation, and the civil method of the police may have to give way to optimal ruthlessness. Whenever this method is adopted, it is obvious that the nation is on edge.
Nationwide protests do not occur suddenly. Organisers usually give a notice of intention. This gives security agencies an opportunity to also issue their warnings against violence. The danger is that unscrupulous elements that cause violence often resort to using peaceful demonstrations as cover.
Policemen drafted to the scene should be specially prepared through short training for management of protest. Coordination of intervention is also crucial. From the psychological point of view, there could be a rush of emotion. Indeed, handling protests by policemen could be stressful.
While the use of teargas, rubber bullets, and hot waters could be acceptable to disperse protesters, the temptation to use live bullets should always be avoided. Force could be used to disperse rioters but not necessarily to punish or repress demonstrators. The global acceptable standard appears to be that lethal weapon should not be used where there is no clear threat to safety of life and property by protesters.
Policemen should understand that protesters may be associated with minor violations that do not constitute a great infraction or real threat to public security. For example, in the protest environment, mass gathering may momentarily cripple vehicular movement, thereby constituting a negligible infringement on other people’s freedom of movement.
Also, instead of focusing on arrest, detention and use of force, policemen could also use psycho-social skills. For example, the Lagos State police commissioner deployed his human relations skills while managing the recent protest at Ojota.
While protesters wanted to invade the Ojota/Ketu highway, thereby causing traffic snarls, he employed persuasion. They listened to his pleas, knowing that he was on the ground to protect them.
The police public relations skill extended to cracking jokes, serving water and some snacks. Even, policemen occasionally joined the crowd in dancing along with them to show a sense of solidarity. The sustained flow of communication between the policemen and protesters engendered a sort of mutual trust. There was no molestation by the policemen. There was, therefore, respect for the sanctity of life.
The police boss demonstrated wisdom and tact. Aided by the court injunction, he was able to restrict many of the protesters to the Gani Fawehinmi Park, which was prepared as protest ground. When some of them stayed on the highway, he deployed his men for traffic control. The result was that, unlike the disastrous #EndSARS protest, public utilities were not destroyed and no life, either of a policeman or protester, was lost. There was no casualty.
The protest would have achieved its major aim across the country if there was psychological understanding and trust among the agitators, government officials and the security agencies.
The government – at all levels – needs to embark on a wide public enlightenment campaign on the need for peaceful conducts during agitations. The government of defunct Western State employed this method to enlighten the people even where there was only one radio station and a television station in the region. That approach could be brought back in a modernised way.
It is easier to destroy than to build. Infrastructure that was built for years takes only minutes to bring down in a moment of uncontrolled fury. Prevention, we all know, is better than cure.
