We underwent identical cynical contrivances under the late, unlamented Sani Abacha when he sent storm-troopers to disrupt a planning session for a similar across-nation march at Tai Solarin School, Ikenne.
Nobel Laureate, Wole Soyinka, has condemned the arrest of
human rights activist, Omoyele Sowore.
Sowore was arrested and detained for organising a protest
against bad governance in Nigeria.
Soyinka, in a strongly-worded statement, also berated the
Inspector General of Police for propagating a false narrative that the use of
the word "revolution" implies violence.
The statement reads in full:
Surely, Not Again!!!
Wole Soyinka
Deployment of alarmist expressions such as “treason”,
“anarchist”, “public incitement” etc. by Security forces have become so
predictable and banal that they have become meaningless. Beyond the word
‘revolution, another much misused and misunderstood the word, nothing that
Sowore has uttered, written, or advocated suggests that he is embarking on, or
urging the public to engage in a forceful overthrow of the government. Nothing
that he said to me in private engagement ever remotely approached an intent to
destabilize governance or bypass the normal democratic means of changing a
government. I, therefore, find the reasons given by the Inspector-General, for
the arrest and detention of this young ex-presidential candidate contrived and
untenable, unsupported by any shred of evidence. His arrest is a travesty and
violation of the fundamental rights of citizens to congregate and make public
their concerns.
This is all so sadly déjà vu. How often must we go through
this wearisome cycle? We underwent identical cynical contrivances under the
late, unlamented Sani Abacha when he sent storm-troopers to disrupt a planning
session for a similar across-nation march at Tai Solarin School, Ikenne. This
was followed up by a personalized letter that was hand-delivered by the State
Security Services to me under their summons, at their Abeokuta so-called
‘Annexe’ with near-identical wording to the threats contained in today’s
release from the desk of the Chief of Police. At least, I was summoned, not
subjected to a terrorist midnight arrest. Some irony!
The same pattern Pavlovian conduct manifested itself under
yet another supposed democratic ruler who personally declared that the
gathering of civilians to deliberate on and propose a constitution for the
nation was ‘high treason’, and would be resisted by the full rigour of state
power if we persisted. The Inspector-General of Police mobilized his forces and
issued inflammatory proclamations, but PRONACO went ahead despite all the
thundering from Aso citadel. Can the police ever learn anything also their
tear-gassing and brutalizing of grieving mothers who marched peacefully to
protest the deaths of their children in a plane crash inferno? Their mission,
under that same regime, which was simply to deliver a letter to the government
house in Lagos, demanding greater safety in airline operations, yet such a
rational intent, born of traumatic circumstances, was quashed on the sidewalks
of a supposed twentieth-century nation.
And yet again, even a faceless cabal under yet another civilian
regime refused to be left out of the insensate play of power. A march on Aso
Rock calling for an end to governance by a ghostly entity was slated to be
crushed, but fortunately, a conflicting balance of interests decided in favour
of a reduced trajectory of protest. And so on and on and on, in a nation which
continues to speak at once through both sides of the mouth, spewing out the
same Treason monotone, as if this was a magic incantation that could substitute
for the venting of mass feelings, even as collective therapy!
May I invite the Inspector-General to wade through the daily
journals of the past few weeks and months, read and digest the calls by
numerous sectors of society – across professions and national groupings – for
demonstrations against the parlous conditions of society, all identifying ills
to which attention must be drawn, and urgently, through mass action?
Demonstrations and processions are time-honoured, democratic ways of drawing
not only the attention of the government to ills, but of mobilizing the public
towards a proactive consciousness of their condition, and thereby exhorting
civil society also to devise means of ameliorating their condition through
their efforts? Religious bodies have urged such remedies, so have civic associations.
The ready recourse to arrests, incarceration and threats to civilians are
ultimately counter-productive. They alienate the citizens, erode their
confidence in governance responsiveness, and thereby advance the very extremist
nightmare that security agencies believe they are acting to thwart.
If we cannot learn from the histories and experiences of
other societies, let us at least learn from ours. Freedom is not so glibly
qualified. It cannot be doled out like slops of charity from soup kitchens. Let
the Police stick to their task of protecting and managing protests, not attempt
to place their meaning and declaration of intent on bogey words like –
revolution!
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