INTRODUCTION
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Here is how Enugu, Southeast Nigeria kicked off our Independence protest like #EndSars Protest.
and didn't lick no whitemans butt for a day or allow dem become kings in dere land.
Historical accounts state that the coal workers, agitated by rising inflation and the failure of the management to recognize the Colliery Workers Union had started to demand for increases in their wages and the recognition of their union as far back as 1944. However, matters came to a head in November 1949 when the workers decided to embark on a work-to-rule strike to drive home their points: they refused to work for longer than the minimum required hours and operated strictly within the confines of their minimum deliverables and thus considerably slowed down the operations of several coal mines. Three days into the work-to-rule strike, the management attempted to sack 200 hewers. For several days the fired hewers occupied the mines so they would not be replaced by new recruits. In solidarity with their husbands, the miners’ wives protested at the colliery’s office destroying equipment and breaking windows. In response, the management called the police to disrupt the protests and in the fracas that ensued, some of the women were wounded. Even that event did not dislodge the miners. The tenacity and wide support for the protests led the colonial government to believe it was an insurrection with communist backing and that it was instigated by members of the Zikist Movement, who were agitating for national independence. It also feared that the protesters would steal the explosives from the mines and use them in terrorist attacks. It therefore dispatched 900 soldiers and policemen from the northern part of the country to dislodge the miners and secure the explosives. The ensuing standoff between the colonialists and the miners led to the killing of 21 and the grievous wounding of 51 unarmed miners by the Colonial Police. Historical records cite that Captain F.S. Philips, a colonial officer vexed by the striking miners’ solidarity chants, fired the first shot, which hit a hewer - Sunday Anyasado - in the mouth, killing him instantly. Another military officer joined Captain Philips in shooting at the protesters and in the aftermath of the ensuing mayhem, 21 miners were dead. These events became known as the Iva Valley Massacre and have become a reference point in the history of the labour movement in Nigeria. It also marked a tipping point in Nigeria’s quest for independence – a fact often lost in the formal teaching of Nigeria’s history.

The event catalyzed mass protests in other cities including Port Harcourt, Aba and Onitsha. According to political scientist Richard Sklar, “Historians may conclude that the slaying of the coal miners by police at Enugu first proved the subjective reality of a Nigerian nation. No previous event ever evoked a manifestation of national consciousness comparable to the indignation generated by this tragedy”.


The Iva valley massacre monument in Enugu

We have no Slave trade museum through out d southeast. Only War n Battle Museums. It tells our Story n Bravery. #EndSars through out d southeast was another example. Nobody bleeps

After over 106yrs of this massacre, Nigeria police force has not progress away from colonial sense of olden days. Still backward as 1914 police force.


If I can have my way, outright disbanding of Nigeria police force will be my first assignment, they are damaged beyond reform.

Nigeria police officers are worst than witches