The ENDSARS triangle

By Mike Kebonkwu

The state today finds it convenient to vilify the organizers of EndSARS protest for widespread mayhem and looting that followed at the heels of the youths’ campaign and inchoate revolution now scuttled.  From the footages and experience, the narrative of the state is misleading and does not capture the truth of protest.  First, there was the EndSARS protest which came like a storm and caught the government napping.  It was a budding revolution with youthful zest and by far the most well-organized peaceful protest in Nigeria in recent history with clear and defined demands and objectives.

Then comes the agents provocateur, hoodlums, hooligans, touts under the protective shield of security agents, the same underclass that state officials have used to dominate the political scene.  The rigging machines used for political ends.  They were not the usual street urchins but regular thugs properly armed who were dropped off from SUVs in the full glare of security agents. They were let loose to cause confusion and scuttle the peaceful protest.  They succeeded in part to make the protest violent and gave the government reason to come with iron fist and unleashed mayhem on the genuine protesters staining our national flags with blood of innocent youths.

Last emerged another group, the dispossessed, deprived and hungry Nigerians who spontaneously identified stores and warehouses where food items and palliatives meant to cushion the effect of Covid-19 are kept.  They looted whatever their hands could find, noodle, rice, milk just name it.  They carried these items with a sense of entitlement and anger of the selfishness of our political leaders.

The arsonists and anarchists who attacked correctional centres (prisons) and destroyed government and private properties were not part and parcel of the EndSARS protest.  They are political foot soldiers of the ruling elite employed for political bargain.  It was used by the government to seize the moment to blackmail the conveners of the EndSARS protest.  The panic responses from states and the federal government who set up judicial panels all over the place to investigate the activities of the notorious ogre of the Nigeria Police Force, SARS (Special Anti-Robbery Squad) has no hope of success, different from what we used to have in the past.

Beyond the demand for the scrapping of the SARS, the EndSARS protest is rather a movement for the restoration of the rule of law and campaign for good governance and an end to impunity.  The gladiators of the EndSARS protest have since gone underground due to the repressive response of the government identifying the leaders and conveners and targeting their investments and accounts.  This counter revolutionary response will certainly boomerang if the state allows these creative youths to go underground.  We should tread carefully to avoid a spontaneous demonstration to might give a fatal blow to our corporate existence which the government appears not to be aware of and which is highly likely in the circumstances of the lopsided clannish federation that we run.

Let’s make no mistake about it, the older generations are just pretending; they are as much disillusioned as the youths. The only thing with them is the disadvantage of age and the fact that some still manage to eke out a living which they want to protect the source.   The patterns of the aborted protest showed that the people appear to have identified their oppressors to be, people in government and their minions, without sparing the traditional stools.  No threat or intimidation can stop a people who have nothing to lose but the chain of servitude.

The EndSARS protest has set in motion consciousness of a budding revolution and going to arrest people for trial for allegedly looting warehouses and stores filled with food while they go hungry is a declaration of war and the next phase of it may well spell catastrophe for the nation and therefore should be avoided.  Nothing in human life is cast in stone and iron; our leaders are toying with our corporate entity.  The government should not consider it victory that they have reined in the youths; it is a lie.  The government may choose to go after the street mobs to collect their “loots” but it has to be careful the way it goes about it because the scale has gone off the faces of the ordinary Nigerian.

The government wants to gag the press and regulate the social media thinking that way Nigeria could be run like China while they beam falsehood and propaganda to the world.  This is a huge joke, hypocrisy and opportunism of the first order because this was the same government while in opposition employed the combination of the press and social media using the same youths to come to power.

Connecting the dots on the EndSARS triangle therefore, there were three distinct sub groups of the main group, the proletariat and the hoi polloi.  At the tip of the pyramid was the EndSARS protesters who were largely peaceful, well organized and did not constitute the vandals, looters and anarchists.  They made legitimate demand and every fair-minded Nigerian believes in their cause.  At the other end of the pyramid were the agents provocateur, the hoodlums, hooligans, touts who the state officials used to break the lawful protest.  They were responsible for jail breaks and other anti-social activities to give legitimacy for government to come in resulting in the killing of protesters and thereby staining our national flag.  At the base of the pyramid was the street mobs who are hungry Nigerians who do not have food on their tables; they are legions and they went for the palliatives.

The leadership of the military and the police got it wrong to use lethal force to disperse the peaceful protest.  Those that deserve the lethal force of the state are the insurgents, the bandits, armed robbers, kidnappers and treasury looters not the ordinary Nigerian who wants just good governance and an end to impunity in the country.    This is the greatest mistake the government will be making in their response, picking individuals and roping them in for trial for looting across the country.

These are people, poor hungry people who have nothing to eat who went in search of food and other items in stores and warehouses they could lay their hands on.

The youths have a historical duty and it time for this generation of youths to discover its own mission and set out to achieve it.  The liberation of the masses is not going to come on a platter of gold as the ruling class will do everything to betray and abort it. We are close to the promise land.

• Kebonkwu Esq writes from Abuja.