For as long as I can remember, my generation has tried to live their lives and come into contact with this farcical government as little as possible. However, now that our lives are on the line as a direct result of perpetual neglect of duty by people in positions of power, this thought flip has switched.
When young Nigerians took to the streets and the web in October 2020, the demand was simple and clear, to end SARS. The government stayed silent, acted lackadaisically and hoped the protests would end, but things didn’t go according to their plans. As protesters were brutalized and killed for exercising their constitutional rights, it galvanized the spirit of awakening among the youth.
The fatal shooting of scores of people by the Nigerian Army on the 20th of October 2020 at Lekki toll gate shook us to our cores. The goal of the government was to completely subdue this generation into silence with fear, intimidation and murder. But this coconut head generation of young Nigerians is bound on regrouping. The buzzword has been ‘restrategize’ and these youths are looking around them with a fresh perspective.
There is a lesson in every setback if you can focus less on the feeling of dejection. The lesson I see here is that the tactics of the Nigerian government to weaponize poverty is out in the open now. We should invest time in educating and looking out for the most vulnerable people in our communities so that they can feel a togetherness and see themselves as more than political instruments.
The blatant disregard for democracy has made young Nigerians put a pin on other structural rots they had previously ignored. Nigerian youths like myself have been uninterested in the doings of the Nigerian government because almost all of it is an obvious farce. I aspired to have as little contact with the vileness of those inebriated by government positions, but I have come to see that the effects of their neglect of public office are unavoidable to all Nigerians.
Read: The #EndSARS Protests Have Shown That A New Nigeria is on the Horizon
While perusing the EndSARS hashtag on Twitter I came across related hashtags like #EndbadgovernanceinNigeria #ReformNigeria #EndNASS #NewNigeria, etc. They didn’t have as much traction as EndSARS because it was the most pressing task, but they did really feel like a to-do list for new Nigeria.
Nigerian senators’ lavish salaries are a huge bone of contention. If you see Nigerian senators in the National Assembly, you would think that their [figure] salary is fake news. The ridiculous amounts of money they take home as allowances are also coming under scrutiny such as 1.2 million Naira a month each for Newspaper allowances, and hardship allowances. Nigerians do the hardship while the senators allow it to happen. It’s mind-boggling to know that these same senators had a hard time last year increasing Nigeria’s minimum wage to 30k. It’s the greed for me.
In 2018 the Minister of Aviation Hadi Sirika held a press conference in the UK announcing the government’s new $600,000 project, Nigeria Air. Nigerians clamoured at the obvious scam it was and predicted it would amount to nothing as usual. Till date, the $600,000 project is nothing more than an aesthetically unpleasing logo.
In 2018 the government reported that a snake had swallowed N36million of state funds, Nigerians saw this news for what it was but we bantered and let it go. In a similar wild fashion that same year, the government told Nigerians that a monkey carted away 70 million Naira from a senator’s farmhouse. These people don’t rate us at all and they believe there is nothing we can do about it so they continue.
In a leaked recording of the Minister of Transportation Rotimi Amaechi, said Nigeria is ‘hopeless and helpless’ and that ‘they don’t work in Abuja, all they do is share money’. I can personally attest to the second part of that statement because when I did my youth service in the National Assembly, there were more cash deliveries than actual work done.
There is also a chasm between how young Nigerians consider themselves and how the government considers young Nigerians. A day into the EndSARS protests, President Muhammadu Buhari launched a youth empowerment program where keke napeps were to be distributed to youths. Meanwhile about a week later Stripe announced its acquisition of Nigerian payment processing company Paystack for $200M. The ignorance is quite enlightening.
The first lady of Bauchi state distributed bags of water to young women as ‘start-ups’.
The thing that irks me about these things is how they come as distinguished and respected guests, then do the absolute least. Respect is on so high a pedestal in Nigeria that questioning your elders–regardless of how wrong or corrupt they are–will only lead to an apology for inquisitiveness.
When people in positions of power do tokenistic acts of benevolence they are celebrated for doing less than the bare minimum by a system that is comfortable with doing nothing.
Young Nigerians are capable of creating lucrative livings for themselves from their smartphones but the older generation cannot fathom what is capable in the boundless internet. That ex police chief who went on national television and justified profiling is an example of how older people vilify what they don’t understand.
The older generation see youth from the lens of theirs the world was analog; they expect us to crawl at their feet and beg them for favors, but we have bigger fish to fry and we literally can’t be arsed.
Young Nigerians are more eager than ever to steer the course of their futures which would mean gradually getting into positions where we can affect change on a large scale. On the road to the 2023 elections, young Nigerians are strapping their boots and sensitizing themselves on political processes so that these set of old rulers will never take them for idiots again.
“If you fight with all your might, there is a chance of life; whereas death is certain if you cling to your corner”
Sun Tzu
