Do you know what our leaders did to their people on this day? They killed us with our flags raised above our heads and this is a sacrilege. We protested against injustice and they responded with more injustices as they killed more people and destroyed properties because they possess absolute power in a democratic country.
We spoke up about getting beaten by thugs sent by them, they rather protected the thugs in expensive bullet proof cars and even our police vans and watched them cause us more harm. Our hearts are saddened in this perilous time and by the unscrupulous attitudes of our leaders.
For years we have showcased the different ways our society has attempted to hide our horrifying history. We tried to cover up the history that is supposed to be told, we hide the disasters and endless miseries caused by our leaders, we present beautiful pictures of our society and paraphrase people’s lived experiences so they suit our consciences. Just like most media stations are doing in the midst of this protest, they are busy sugar coating barbaric actions of leaders, telling lies to protect those bastards, yet we all say we are patriotic citizens. Shame!
I do not want this terror of history for generations to come which is the reason I am narrating this story. I want them to know the story of some brave people who came out to fight for justice for the lives of family and friends killed on a daily basis by the FSARS and how they were killed by our leaders in the midst of the protest. I want them to see how miserable and hopeless they made us.
Youths wanted to put an end to police brutality and what did they get? They got the worst form of death from their supreme leader of which is silence. He kept mute and laughed at us and even plotted schemes to stop us from fighting for our rights.
The day Nigeria Massacred her people
On the 20th of October 2020, they switched off the lights and turned off the cameras, they even came at night so no trace of their ills can be seen by people especially the international communities, then they opened fire on a large number of peaceful protesters at Lekki Toll Gate killed many and afterwards took their corpses and hid them from the people just to cover their abomination forgetting that they can’t really hide the obvious.
There is blood on our flag now and we won’t ever forget the bloods of innocent protesters who came out peacefully to exercise their rights. I do not know how our leaders are going to sleep and walk freely knowing that they sabotaged their own people, our flag is now stained and our nation bleeds.
They burnt our cars, destroyed properties, shot innocent protesters and injured them, they sent thugs after us and even plotted a prison break just so they silenced the youths for the numerous injustices done to us. One who felt he was making so much sense threatened the founder of twitter for helping us fight our course. This is indeed madness! Our leaders have lost it! We need help!
We thought we would undo the wrong done on us for years by our leaders, we decided to spend days in the streets just so our government intervenes, we thought like a mother they would hold us close and say sorry for failing us and be ready to make amends, but no; motherland killed her people and soaked their blood on her cloak. What happened to our supreme leader? President Muhammad Buhari, we elected you to protect us but today you murdered your own people and this is a shame.
We were told that whenever we see the military coming towards us aggressively to harm us we should raise the flag and they won’t hurt us, like my friend said the metaphor we read in literature is what we saw on that flag soaked with the blood of innocent protesters, “Indeed metaphors write themselves”. Our leaders deceived us, they lied to us.
It was just a protest, a normal protest people do in their countries to trigger change. It was a protest to better our nation, to correct and restructure our society. Youths, mothers, children, fathers even the disabled assembled to make heard their voices, yet our leaders cared less. They are happy seeing us suffer and die. They do not care because they are not affected.
When Achebe said “There Was a Country”, he was talking about the devastating civil war in Nigeria of which he served as war emissary and today the same country has destroyed many lives, not because they were in support of any party or are advocating for division but they only cried that the government should stop the police from killing them and better our society by enacting better policies that accommodate the general public and not a few.
I could go on to talk about this hell of a country but remember I only write to narrate the incident of this day. The white on our flag is now stained with the blood of the innocents, the Nigerian flag is now Green and Red, the red represents the brutal killing of the masses, war,denial, corruption and silence of our leaders. Let it be known to you that on this day in Nigeria our supreme leader was nowhere to be found because we cried for help but he never came to our rescue.
Peace to our fallen HEROES.
