“To revolt on behalf of an ignorant people, is to set yourself on fire in order to light the way for a blind man!”
Mohamed Rachid Rida.
I came across the quote above early in my life, and as I have watched the evolution of the Nigerian struggle, from its putative beginnings as a human rights struggle, to its graduation to a pro democracy struggle, to its current state of ideological inertia, and as it has labored to grasp the truth of the liberation struggle in front of it, I have had occasion, to ponder the depth of the clear meaning of Rida’s words.
I was on a Buharist friend’s Facebook page a couple of days ago, and he had an admonition up about the potential damages that might be caused by a wrong usage of social media. He being the only one of his ilk that I would tolerate, and my salutary contribution to the idiocy of tolerance, I jocularly asked him to be sure to tell Lie Mohammed about the admonition. What’s the use of tolerating him, if I cannot send him to his conclave?
I left without ensuring that I wouldn’t be kept informed of further comments on the post as I would normally have, but particularly more so, in his case. He is in truth a Buharidindinrin, and his friends are mostly his kind, whose opinions are devoid of any cogitations. That was the mistake. I was informed and I read.
A mongrel in the throes of his buharish afflictions commented and spoke of how one of his egbons has continued to speak about the Lekki massacre, even when there have been no cadavers presented before the Lekki Tribunal. Accomplices and accessories to crimes against humanity.
Another group of self abnegating fools have asked why Sowore wouldn’t just “keep the peace”? Ingrates! The man has literally set himself on fire for the blind lots that are called Nigerians to see the way, and we have collectively refused to see, to varying degrees.
What has Yele done to earn the systemic oppression that you have endorsed by your demands that he should keep the peace? What are his crimes? Exactly how did he fail to keep the peace? He was at a candlelight vigil for the victims of the Lekki massacre. It was completely peaceful.
At least it was, until the purveyors of violence arrived to arrest the enemies of the Nigerian state. Every demand for the recognition of citizenship must be crushed with maximum force, and ferocious brutality. The Nigerian state is fine with all forms of venality, violence, and criminality, as long as you have no demands for citizenship rights to make of it.
It is the nature of evil to go round, and the laws of Karma remains as potent as ever. The Yoruba would say: “eni to ba sun, ohun la n’ji, enikan kii ji apiroro”. It is the one asleep that you awaken, you cannot awaken the one pretending to be asleep.
DJ Switch had a live Instagram feed from the scene. The Nigerian press, much as I have vilified them as a collective, rose to the occasion with the depth of reporting by certain journalists, and television stations. I single out Ozi Okoli of AriseTV and the station itself, The Punch Newspaper and The Guardian, and I must applaud The Premium Times.
The truth is readily available to those in search of truth, and as The Guardian said in its editorial; so many lies have been told, that the truth is becoming rather glaring for anyone that is interested in knowing the truth. Sanwo-Olu’s incoherence, and the several ahitophelian dimensions of his several versions of his personal role in the massacre, speaks volumes.
Let this generation of ingrates and accomplices be grateful for the likes of Omoyele Sowore, he is constantly ablaze in a quest to illuminate the path of blind fools as them, and without his selfless sacrifices, a lot of us might have meandered blindly without the clarity that his ministry has brought.
When we are all gone the way of the flesh, history shall yet recall our deeds and misdemeanors. Roles shall be assigned and the words that we speak today, our actions, and the inactions, all shall be recorded for posterity. There shall be heroes, and the villains shall be represented: newspaper headlines are not historical records. The collaborators, and the accomplices shall be known, and your shameless subjectivization of truth, shall be recalled.
All in the fullness of time.
DF
