“The Nigerian state has turned on its people” Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
“The protests were peaceful, insistently peaceful, consistently peaceful.”
Nigerian writer, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie writes on #EndSARS and the Nigerian government’s reaction to the protests.
Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie has lent her voice to the ongoing #EndSARS protest via an opinion published Yesterday in the New York Times.
Adichie shares in the opinion her personal experience of the unlawful extortion of Nigerians by SARS officers.
“SARS officers once arrested my cousin at a beer parlor because he arrived driving a Mercedes,” she wrote, “They accused him of being an armed robber, ignored the work ID cards he showed them, took him to a station where they threatened to photograph him next to a gun and claim he was a robber, unless he paid them a large sum of money. My cousin is one of the fortunate few who could pay an amount large enough for SARS, and who was released.”
She went on to commend Nigerian youths for finally taking a stand against the brutality and in an unconventional way that has made the agitation stand out.
“The protests signaled the overturning of convention — the protesters insisted on not having a central leadership, it was social rather than traditional media that documented the protests, and, in a country with firm class divisions, the protests cut across class,” Adichie wrote.
“The protests were peaceful, insistently peaceful, consistently peaceful. They were organized mostly on social media by young Nigerians, born in the 1980s and 1990s, a disaffected generation with the courage to act. Their bravery is inspiring. They speak to hope and to the possibility of what Nigeria could become.” She continued.
Adichie recognized the efforts of individuals and organisations that have supported the protests since it began, particularly the Feminist Coalition, a group of feminists at the forefront of the movement providing legal aid, security and food to protesters.
The hostile reception of the government to the protests was also condemned by Adichie. She cites the alleged attempt of the Nigerian government to shut down Feminist Coalition’s fund raising by accusing Flutterwave, the company through which the donation link was created, of accepting funds from terrorists. She further condemned the physical attacks by Nigerian officers on the unarmed and peaceful protesters across cities.
“The Nigerian state has turned on its people. The only reason to shoot into a crowd of peaceful citizens is to terrorize: to kill some and make the others back down. It is a colossal and unforgivable crime. The brazenness is chilling, that the state would murder its citizens, in such an obviously premeditated way, as though certain of the lack of consequences,” she wrote.
Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie isn’t the only African writer that has spoken on the #EndSARS protest. Just Yesterday, Wole Soyinka in an essay titled “Déjà Vu: In Tragic Vein by Wole Soyinka | #ENDSARS”, he decried the sporadic shootings of the army at the Lekki Toll gate protesters Tuesday night.
“At Lekki, where most of the affirmative action gatherings had taken place, soldiers opened fire on unarmed demonstrators, killing and wounding a yet undetermined number. One such extra-judicial killing has drenched the Nigerian flag in the blood of innocents – and not symbolically. The video has, in accustomed parlance, ‘gone viral’. I have spoken to eye-witnesses on phone. One, a noted public figure has shared his first-hand testimony on television. The government should cease to insult this nation with petulant denials,” he wrote in part.
Barely a week ago, a collective of African writers also spoke on the protests through an open letter. Similarly, they condemned the reception the Nigerian government has given the protest highlighting the irony that a protest against brutality is facing the same brutality.
“These protests are peaceful and are expressions of the fundamental rights of Nigerians, who should not be threatened by the military, the police or thugs while they go about the peaceable expression of their constitutional rights,” the letter reads in part.
Other African writers like Nnedi Okorafor, Lesley Nneka Arimah, Suyi-Davies Okungbowa, Chika Unigwe, Molara Wood, Echezonachukwu Nduka, Innocent Chizaram Ilo, Oyinkan Braithwaithe, Helon Habila, Otosirieze, and many others have also lent their voice to the #EndSARS movement.
Barely two weeks ago, 9th October to be precise, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie buried her father, Prof. James Nwoye. In a heart-wrenching essay published by the New Yorker, “Notes on Grief” she writes about her loss and recounts her grief since his death on June 10.
