Activists called for a nationwide protest on the 12th of June been Democracy Day, a day that symbolizes Nigeria’s transition into civilian rule over 28 years ago, this person decided to say no to bad governance, insecurity, and poverty in president Muhammed Buhari’s administration. What did they get again? misery.
The Peaceful Protest on Democracy day
I kept hearing her scream, “why are you still watching this nonsense on democracy day, this is so brutal these people have no conscience”. Sincerely, she got my attention, I couldn’t even look at her face, the rage was just too obvious. I have been watching the news lately, Channels News and Arise Respectively and I do not know if this consistent act of watching the news especially seeing the situation of our country is okay for my mental health.
Let me describe what democracy day was, in Nigeria after the president gave his speech, I saw a group of peaceful protesters, who felt that it was time that we have a change in our nation, I saw them match peacefully with their placards, and less than 2 hours into this protest we saw police and army vans patrolling the vicinity and all that came to my mind was, “dear lord please not today, no one should die because of a peaceful protest”. Shortly after saying this prayer, we saw the policemen already throwing tear gas at protesters, and the next moment they were arresting them and beating them.
The protest took place in some states of the country, Ibadan, Osogbo, Abeokuta, Abuja, Port Harcourt, Lagos and etc.
The protest at Ojota, Lagos State was so peaceful “started peacefully and in an organised manner, with demonstrators chanting pro-democracy songs”.
“The police were deployed in large numbers here in Lagos and in other parts of Nigeria in anticipation of trouble on this day,” “When the demonstrators breached the first line of defense of the police, the second and the third, the police started firing tear gas at them and journalists and it was so wrong.
Was this called for? I guess their gathering was intimidating to the police, because what really led to the provocation? The brutality was not necessary, but yes, the commissioner of police said he was never informed about the protest and so the police are not in support. The police are meant to protect the interest of the people but now they are against the happiness of the people just because of a few individuals.
Why mobilize policemen and army to harm peaceful protesters, insecurity is the order of the day, killings, kidnapping, Boko haram, and the rest but no one mobilized the police to tackle those issue but yesterday a day we commemorate democracy our government fought against, how do I make this make sense. on different the government of Nigeria has backed her people, we witnessed same on the End SARS protect and this. In a democratic nation we do not even have a voice this is so not normal. Why do I perceive the gradual entering into a tyrannical system?
