THE LEKKI ‘MASSACRE’

It is quite unfortunate that Nigerians will first judge you in their court of emotions even before your case is opened in a court of law. We are all such unfair and biased people in almost all the judgements we are called upon to deliver as we are mostly blinded by our religion, tribe or the geographical location we hail from.

At the risk of being repetitive on the subject of human rights, freedom and liberty let me say for the up tenth time that protest is a legitimate exercise and the fundamental right of the people in their pursuit of the promise of democracy. In fact our constitution has recognised this fact under Section 40 where it provides that every person is entitled to assemble freely and associate with other persons and to protest any government action or inaction that affect the peaceable enjoyment of his life or curtail his freedom and liberty. This is what I was taught in school. So I will continue to encourage Nigerians to protest because it is a fundamental right to so do.

However what most Nigerians do not know is that every right is attached with a responsibility that goes with it. That is why Section 45 of the same constitution permits the right to protest to be restricted in the interests of defence, public safety, public order, public morality or public health, or to protect the rights or freedoms of others.

Therefore if you are protesting, which is your right to do, you have no right to close down Abuja Airport road or the Lekki gate in Lagos. You have no right to loot or burn down other peoples houses, car stands or shops. Nor do you have a right to break open government warehouses at Kwanan Waya to loot palliatives.

I did not support the EndSARS protest and I have given my reasons severally in this arena. Two among the reasons I gave still stand valid. First, the protest was without leaders and secondly, my believe, based on experience, is that if you call out a black man to the street to protest, you must have intended the consequences of your act, which is very well known to all of us. One of such consequences has always been looting innocent persons property; whether the black man is in Minneapolis, Minnesota protesting over the death of George Floyd, whether he is in South Africa or in the most populous black nation on earth - Nigeria.

People have protested. Having protested without leaders and having blocked the Lekki gate in Lagos, it is in the open now that onions are beyond the reach of the common man in the south east and south south of Nigerian and the irony of it is that it is wasting away in Dasin. The protesters have therefore made onion farmers in Dasin poorer.

Ok. Now people have protested. The protest has produced death and material loss as a consequence. But if you ask the protesters, they would tell you that it was miscreants that carried out the dastardly acts. But my question is, would one not be right to say that the protesters called out the miscreants? Is it therefore wrong to attach the liability for the acts done by the miscreants to those who called them out to the street in the first place? You may decide for yourself.

Now the aftermath. You may recall that it was a girl called Obianuju Catherine Udeh, or ‘DJ Switch, ‘a music DJ who lived-streamed the break up of the protesters by soldiers at Lekki and called it ‘massacre’. When I looked up the meaning of the word in the dictionary, it says massacre is -

“the unnecessary, indiscriminate killing of a large number of human beings or animals, as in barbarous warfare or persecution or for revenge or plunder. a general slaughter, as of persons or animals: the massacre of millions during the war”.

Then Nigerians sang “Lekki massacre”, “Lekki Massacre” in a chorus. But was there actually a massacre on 20th October, 2020 as a result of the standoff at the Lekki Toll Plaza? A commission of Inquiry will decide that for us as hearing has commenced on the matter.

The outcome of the commission’s findings, shall, if made public, enable us determine whether there was a massacre at Lekki or it was a lady music DJ that misled us or it is the case of Nigerians first judging you in their court of emotions even before your case is opened in a court of law.

You judge for yourself.