By Ayodele AKINKUOTU 

MANY decades hence, memories of the youths’ October protests, tagged #EndSARS, and the rage that came on its heels would continue to haunt Nigerian leaders. Not only for its smooth handling and coordination by the organisers but by the massive looting and destruction of properties that followed when the government mishandled its containment.

It has been insinuated that some agents of government were complicit in the violence unleashed on the peaceful protesters. Thus, one of the first lessons for the youths who are trying to reclaim Nigeria from those at the helm of affairs at present is that their mission is not a tea party. Those who have been running and ruining the country are not about ducking under their wives’ beds because some youths are angry.

While many of our leaders are shivering and foaming in the mouth at the development, not a few patriots are heaving sighs of relief as to the dawn of a new era.  For, while police brutality and extrajudicial killings were the issues that ignited the protests, it quickly evolved into a larger agenda. An end to chronic unemployment, poor funding of education and health sectors, obscene salaries and allowances of political office holders, poverty in the midst of plenty, rampant inequality and mindless corruption. Many concerned Nigerians have cried themselves hoarse highlighting these salient issues in the past.

In private conversations with some of my professional colleagues in the last few years on the Nigerian Question, the wonder has been how did Nigeria journey its way back into the wilderness, the political jungle we are in today.

At the dawn of civil rule in 1999, there was hope writ large on the political landscape. The 15-year period, 1984-1999, was a nightmare for millions of Nigerians. And understandably for many journalists, it was no less so.

Last May 29 made it exactly 21 years into democratic rule when Nigerians retired the military to their barracks. Alas, many thought that with their exit, the years of the locusts had ended. How wrong we were.

A new army of invaders took over the helm of affairs from the locusts who had laid the socio-economic and political landscape bare. And the patriots who might have made a difference were side-lined. Since 1999, the nation has been blessed (or is it cursed) with politicians at all levels of government who are nothing but parasites. Those who claim to serve Nigerians have behaved like a neo-colonial army who have nothing to lose. What with their greed and arrogance.

They have behaved like vultures, perching in their multitude on the commonwealth recklessly gorging themselves, giving free rein to their insatiable appetite. The political class’s total indifference to the suffering of millions of Nigerians is at the heart of the youths’ October revolt.

As the young men and women ruminate over the goodwill harvested from the protests, they must realise that going forward is not going to be a tea party. The rapacious and clueless politicians exploiting the nation are too well entrenched with their tentacles sunk deep into the nation’s treasuries. Thus, so used to filthy lucre, which comes to them with little or no sweat, they are not about to loosen their vice grip.

So, going forward, how do the youths “move Naija” into a new dawn? Although the streets of the cities and towns that bore the brunt of the youth rage in October are now free of protesters, the disquiet is not over. The genuine protesters are saying government has not done anything about their five-point demand. They include the release of all those arrested in the course of the protest; justice and compensation for the victims and families of police brutality; setting up an independent body to investigate all cases of police misconduct; carrying out a psychological evaluation and retraining of all disbanded Special Anti-Robbery Squad operatives before redeployment; and above all better conditions of service for men and women of the police force.

And the Youth Rights Campaign, YRC, served notice at a recent press conference that because of this perceived lethargy on the part of government in addressing the issues urgently, the youths might be heading back to the streets shortly. The members are saying the struggle to reclaim Nigeria has become a do-or-die affair.

Considering the losses in both lives and properties to the rage in October, not many Nigerians would be amused. The Lagos State police command has asked the youths not to embark on fresh protests. Even an attempt by the #EndSARS promoters to meet and discuss the issues and lessons of the protests at the Africa Shrine in Lagos was aborted by the police. The authorities are riding on the wave of the public’s incredulity at the massive loss of lives and properties that ended the protests on a tragic note. In a society where transparency is anathema, various figures have been bandied as to the number of people killed in not only the “Lekki Massacre” but at several flash-points.

Many of the wounded, with bullets still lodged in their bodies, are believed to have been left to their fate. A Premium Times report said some of them were hurriedly discharged from the private hospitals treating them because of intimidation by the Lagos State government. The bank accounts of some of the youths regarded as the promoters have been frozen by the federal government. As the epicentre of the protests, the authorities in Lagos State are still trying to come to grip with the massive damage to both public and private properties, estimated to be worth over a trillion Naira.  The state has set up a Lagos Rebuilding Trust Fund.

Therefore, against the backdrop of the tragic note on which the protests ended, what next for the #EndSARS Movement? Although the Movement comprises many groups, opinions would surely be divided on what the next steps should be. For, youth is an identity and not an ideology. Many ageing Nigerian leaders of today came into the public limelight as youths. And not a few of the political office holders who emerged in the last few years are youth. And they are all equal in the eye of the storm for running the country aground. Alarmed by the fact that many youths holding public office have not made much difference, many are asking what guarantees there are that those protesting now would do better. Of course, this kind of scepticism is healthy.

Therefore, the ideas as to what to do to reclaim Nigeria will be as many as the different groups involved in the movement. That has its advantages as well as disadvantages. The youths must let these ideas contend. That is not going to be easy. It is an avenue those who don’t want them to succeed in their bid to salvage the nation will use to divide them. Right now, what should be of immediate concern to the youths should be a review of their well organised and coordinated October protests.

In spite of the fact that there is no mistaking the yellow card sent by the youths to the political class, those who have been running the affairs of this country for decades are not simply going to beckon to them to come and take over the reins of government on a platter of gold. As long as democracy remains a political game, the youths must get ready to take power through the ballot box.

Luckily, the Not Too Young to Run law has lowered the age at which Nigerians can contest for political office. The time is ripe to take full advantage of that law. They should not make the mistake a group of prominent Nigerians made in 2018 when frustrated by the mis-governance of the ruling elite of both the All Progressive Congress and Peoples Democratic Party, they rallied to plant a Third Force to counter the duo. The discerning knew immediately that the efforts would not yield much fruit. For, the spirited efforts came too late with barely a year to the general elections. There emerged over 60 political parties. And there were a plethora of presidential candidates, many of whom would not win a chairmanship position in a well contested local government election.

Thus, if the youths must recapture their country from the vice grip of those who have been running its affairs in the past 20 years, they must realise that all politics is local. Thus a mass movement that would embrace the grassroots in all the nooks and crannies of the country must have a taproot at the wards and local government levels. The first step is a mass mobilisation of youths of voting age to register to vote in 2023. Two, they should move to initiate a political platform to unify their vision into a realistic manifesto. The YRC is talking about a socialist state, “in which the commanding heights of the economy should be placed under the control of workers and not for individuals to make a profit at the expense of society”.  This statement looks like a rehash from popular communist manifestoes of the 1960s and ‘70s. Against the backdrop of the prebendalism prevalent in our politics and the winner-take-all mentality of the political class, there is no doubt that what form of government to practice is one area that will task the youths in the months ahead. Thus, there will be some groups like the YRC canvassing socialism while others would be arguing for capitalism. Such arguments are healthy though. For it is not possible for all of us to lie down with our heads pointing in the same direction. A word of caution for the socialists though; contemporary history shows us that socialist states have a penchant for curtailing individual freedoms. Two, many workers in Nigeria, especially civil servants, have privatised their individual “fiefdoms”. So, they will be in the vanguard of those resisting socialism. That is because already, a good number of civil servants have perfected ways to earn extra incomes from the jobs they have been employed to perform. So, they have, like political office holders, already attached conduit pipes to the so-called “commanding heights of the economy”. And the harvests are flowing directly into their individual silos.

Ayodele Akinkuotu, former Editor – in – Chief of TELL, writes from Lagos