It was Habeeb Okikiola also known as ‘portable’, who released a single to respond to the call by his supporters that he should join the #endbadgovernance protest that hit the streets across the country on August 1, 2024. In the single track, titled ‘Gba wire’, portable informs his fans that ‘poor man’s thinking yato si rich man’s thinking’, to show that he has moved from the street hustler to ‘star-boy’ and his new economic fortunes now condition his interpretation of social situations, thoughts and actions. He can no longer think like a poor man. If he is not poor and does not feel the hardship, why should he then protest on the streets? He sings and dines with the high and mighty even though his songs and philosophy is powered by his closeness to the streets. Portable’s gba wire confirms how positionality that is, social-economic status, political leaning, and ethnic bias among others affects the social construction of reality in Nigeria today. Portable, who has moved from grass to grace, shares the same view with some elite groups who felt that there was no need for a protest. Rather than coming out to protest, they reserved their rights to stay and watch since they are relatively better and some of them have stronger social support which is not widespread to the suffering majority. Such people never like to see anything that disrupts the flow of their enjoyment. The protesters, they assumed, must have been on the streets because of their poor mentality! They found it difficult to understand that fingers are not equal and that bad governance produces different effects in the lives of people differently. They could not appreciate the fact that the dog that has not eaten does not play with the one that has eaten.
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These elite groups (which includes the academic community), who cannot deny the fact that there is hardship and hunger caused by bad policies which ballooned inflation, unemployment, poverty, and insecurity statistics, flew an ethnic kite and asked that whoever wanted to protest should do so in their respective states of origin. When the protest commenced and the southwest coordinated it by not disturbing activities of whoever wanted to move. It went peacefully, though thugs still harassed peaceful protesters. In the southeast, the silence of the southeasterners was a protest against their continuous victimization and marginalization in Nigeria. They were not on the streets but their decision to stay off the street was a protest message very clear to the discerning minds. Contemporary protests now take different dimensions including nude, on-line, offline, one-man, group, strikes, and stay-at-home. The North that they said would not join the protest did and the uncared-for children, nurtured by religion and trapped by the tradition to remain on the streets showed their ‘a-loot-er’ spirit. They didn’t join the original protesters. They looted everything that was economically meaningful to them. However, they left books for the children of the elite to read.
Even Hisbah that would arrest every other thing was on leave. Even if all the police in Nigeria were drafted to the north, the population of these children will subdue them. All these happened despite federal government’s mobilization of resources to a few privileged elite groups to distance themselves from the protest. Same strategy was used during election season. That time, it was the politics of endorsements by different groups. All the groups that distanced themselves from the 2024 #endbadgovernance protest were never included in the original plan. #ENDSARS protesters knew that the state had compromised many of these groups. They shut the door at all compromised groups who wanted to join them to divide their ranks.
Even though portable did not join the protest, he characterized Nigeria’s politics as “ole gbe, ole gba”, roughly interpreted as the exchange of power between thieves lamenting that every day, Nigerians wake up to experience suffering (ojojumo la n jiriya). To him, therefore, it was inconceivable for anyone to think that he would protest in Nigeria, being a rich person. To him, rather than protest he would rather contest, “won ni kin lo bawon protest, e gbo se olowo ma n protest, ee ri enemy dey vex, kakaki n protest mo ma contest”. The rich man does not want to die, he said. But the poor has nothing more to lose. A protester went nude in Lagos. There was nothing to shame about again. He has been de-robed by bad governance even before the protest day. Portable noted that it was difficult to dare to fight for Nigeria through protest. According to him, Nigeria is Ok, but the citizens are not Ok. Thus, he counselled protesters to make money instead of burning tyres on the streets. (gba wire, ma lo sun tyre o, to ba gba wire o ma ra four tyres). If you make money, you will buy vehicle with four tyres, he thought. But portable didn’t interrogate how shrinking the economy has become with poorly conceived policies making it difficult to eat let alone to save to buy a car!
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You still don’t know why the children of the poor got angrier in the North? The National Bureau of Statistics’ multidimensional poverty data released in 2022 offers valuable insights. According to it, 63% of persons living in Nigeria (133million) were multi-dimensionally poor. Of this population of the poor in Nigeria, 65% (86million) live in the north while 35% (47million) live in the south. It is more ravaging in rural areas where 72% were said to be poor compared to 42% in urban spaces. It reported deprivations along healthcare, food insecurity, and housing. Child poverty was reported to be higher in the north-east (90%) and northwest (90%) and lower in the south east (74%) and southwest (65.1%). Today, the pain leaves no ethnic group behind whether you are in the èmilókàn group, because in 2024, majority have found themselves in the eni-tó-kàn-ló-mò (only those hit by hardship knows) group.
A good human society that wants to make progress must ensure that her people have five goodness of life which the late renowned sociologist, Akinsola Akinwowo calls Ire-gbogbo. Using the Orunmilaist perspective of understanding human society, there are five values which a good government must pursue ceaselessly for her citizens and residents.
These are: ire aiku (the value of good health till old age), ire-owo or financial security, ire-omo or the value of parenthood, Ire-oko (the value of companionships) and ire ibori ota (assured actualization of one’s potentialities as a result of man-made and natural obstacles). If all these values are not realizable, such a society, community or country cannot be described as a good human society. Bad governance would deny people decent salaries and conditions of service. It would deny the citizens world class health, education and road infrastructure. Bad governance will increase insecurities and with that life becomes short and the first value, which is to live till old age is not assured. Bad policies are man-made obstacles to the realization of life goals. Let those who think that President Bola Ahmed Tinubu can do no wrong just like they did under the immediate past President, Muhammadu Buhari know that the citizens are not asking for too much from their government. They want to live decently and enjoy the basic necessities of life. Even where properties were looted, it tells us how poorly we equip our security to secure critical infrastructures. The ‘a-loot-ers’ exposed the hypocrisy of governors in northern Nigeria and their political leadership. We should not wait until another protest happens. The time to act wisely to reduce the hardship in the country is now.
.Tade, a Professor of criminology, victimology and security studies writes via [email protected]
