The Nigerian working classes have emerged onto the political scene. Ignored for decades by the elite led by President Muhammadu Buhari, they are sending shock waves through the ruling class and their imperialist backers. For over two weeks from 7 October 2020, tens of thousands of mainly young people throughout Nigeria have taken to the streets in mass protests against police brutality, centred on the notorious special anti-robbery squad (SARS). The protests spread spontaneously to at least 21 out of 36 regional states, from Kaduna in the north to Rivers in the south, and the Federal Capital Territory Abuja. It quickly developed into an anti-establishment movement under the label #EndSARS, demanding that SARS be disbanded. Protests in solidarity have also spread globally to where diaspora Nigerians live, with some making the links to the black lives matter (BLM) movement against police brutality in the imperialist countries.
Lekki massacre
The Nigerian government responded first by ignoring the protests and then with characteristic heavy and brutal repression. On 20 October, after a curfew had been imposed, a protest at the Lekki Toll Gate Plaza in upmarket Lekki, Lagos was attacked by soldiers who opened fire on unarmed protesters after blocking them in. The Lagos state regional government had earlier turned off street lights in the vicinity and removed CCTV cameras. Amnesty International claimed 12 people were killed. Witnesses said at least 15 people were killed, and that soldiers carted bodies away and prevented ambulances from accessing the injured. Lagos state Governor, Babajide Sanwo-Olu claimed that this massacre was carried out by ‘forces beyond our direct control’, that no one had died, then that only one person had died. The army has denied any killings took place and that Sanwo-Olu called in the military. The leader of the ruling APC party and ‘godfather’ of Lagos, Bola Ahmed Tinubu, said the survivors had ‘questions to answer’ about what they were doing there and ‘what type of characters’ they were.
Nigerian’s security forces have a long history of brutal repression, and by mid-April 2020 during the coronavirus outbreak, security forces had killed more people (18) enforcing lockdown than had then been killed by Covid-19 (12 people), with the Nigerian National Human Rights Commission accusing the Nigeria Correctional Service, the army, police and Ebonyi State Task Force of extrajudicial killings in a ‘sheer display of impunity and reckless disregard for human life’.
Government response
Prior to the Lekki massacre, the government pleaded with protesters to call a halt as their ‘voices had been heard loud and clear’, appealed to ‘parents and guardians’ to ‘speak to their children’. It also banned protests entirely in some regional states, ordered banks to shut down platforms for fundraising for the protests and promised reforms, including compensation funds and a ‘Judicial Panel of Inquiry and Restitution’ for victims of police brutality. It tried bribery with promises of youth empowerment and employment funds etc, whilst attacking the protesters using armed vigilante thugs, as well as regular security forces, live bullets, tear gas, water cannons, etc; and began a systematic campaign of criminalisation and disinformation suggesting the protests were being hijacked by ‘thugs’, ‘miscreants’ or ‘hoodlums’ for ulterior motives, and that the army was on standby to ‘protect’ the #EndSARS protesters.
On 17 October the army announced two-months of military and cyberwarfare exercises dubbed ‘Operation Crocodile Smile’ and threatened anyone jeopardising ‘national security’. Between 19 and 22 October, at least 10 regional states imposed 24-hour indefinite curfews. All curfews were defied by the protesters, but on 22 October, one of the main online organisers, the Feminist Collective, announced that it would no longer be raising funds for EndSARS protests, urging people to ‘stay safe, stay home and observe the mandated curfew in your state’. This effectively put an end to the street protests.
Not just SARS
SARS is only one of at least 14 national police units, with branches in all Nigerian states including the SSS (State Security Service), Special Inquiry Bureau (SIB), Special Fraud Unit (SFU), Special Protection Unit (SPU), Counter Terrorism Unit (CTU), Police Mobile Force (PMF), Intelligence Response Squad (IRT), Special Tactical Squad (STS), Force Intelligence Bureau (FIB), Force Criminal Intelligence and Investigation Departmentand (FCIID), etc. All of these units serve to oppress the impoverished Nigerian people and all are involved in extortion, kidnapping, unlawful arrests, torture, rape, and murder with impunity. The British College of Policing – the professional body for police in England and Wales – worked with the Nigerian authorities to train its security officers in 2019. Between April 2016 and March 2020 the British gave ‘strategic assistance to the Nigerian Police Force’ (The Independent, 24 October).
On 11 October the inspector general of police Mohammed Adamu was forced to announce the ‘dissolution’ of SARS, and on 13 October, announced the setting up of the Special Weapons and Tactics Team (SWAT) to replace SARS. SARS members were simply to be redeployed to this and other police units. As a result, the protests widened to include calls for an end to SWAT, police brutality, bad roads, lack of electricity, ‘bad governance’, and for President Buhari to resign. The government announced the setting up of a judicial panel to investigate allegations of police brutality in Lagos, Ondo and Ogun states, and promised to draft new legislation to ‘establish a system of independent accountability’. Nigerians have heard all these promises of reform before: there have been ‘EndSARS’ protests since 2016, following which in 2017, 2018, 2019, February 2020, and 4 October 2020, SARS has been either ‘disbanded’ or ‘banned from carrying out stop and search operations’, only for it to continue operations and murders.
#EndSARS movement
The latest protest movement began online following a 3 October 2020 twitter video of a SARS police murder and theft in Delta state. The online movement is dominated by middle class forces, such as the Feminist Collective, who have raised almost $400,000 (147m naira) through Nigerian financial technology (fintech) firms such as Flutterwave, and Bitcoin, and is supported by other Nigerian corporate entities including Coca-Cola, whose employees have also been subjected to SARS extortion and harassment. Flutterwave’s CEO Tunde Lemo is a former deputy governor of the Nigerian central bank. Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey, as well as numerous Nigerian and international celebrities, also supported the movement. However, on the ground, the protesters are overwhelmingly working class, and have spontaneously organised across religious and ethnic divides. The protests show that these divisions are fuelled by the political class who use rent-a-thugs to maintain political and hence economic control, and that the divisions are not insurmountable.
Following the killing of Jimoh Isiaka in Ogbomosho, Oyo state on 10 October, the protests moved in earnest from the internet to the streets. The Lekki shooting and the abject response of one of the main organisers have now effectively shut down the protests. These middle class forces in the past have sabotaged all movements holding them back when the struggle should be escalated and politically deepened. Previous mass protests have been quickly put down after brutal repression by security forces (fuel subsidy protests in 2012), and/or have been sabotaged by middle class/trade union organisers after bribes, threats or other forms of coercion (September 2020). Not so easy this time. With no clearly defined leaders to coerce and with the widespread involvement of ordinary working class people, who are the main victims of police brutality, the government has been forced into making concessions such the judicial panels of inquiries and the arrests of some token SARS and air force personnel.
Poverty in an oil rich nation
Nigeria is Africa’s largest supplier of oil to the global capitalist economy, and a key regional ally of imperialism for maintaining ‘stability’ in the region. But despite decades of oil production, the country imports almost all the gasoline it consumes for domestic and industrial use. Only 40% are on the electricity grid which only produces 4000MW for over 200m people (the same as Edinburgh produces for 0.5m people), and they have on average 4 hours electricity per day with many months of power outages at a time.
In addition, over 40% of Nigeria’s population live on less than $1 a day. Unemployment is at 27.1%, and another 28.6% are underemployed, with young people (15-34 year olds) making up 35% of the unemployed and 28.2% of the underemployed. These youth made up the bulk of the EndSARS protesters. Into this unemployment crisis, in June 2020, the Nigerian government raised VAT by 7.5%, and increased petrol prices and electricity tariffs. As a reward for following instructions to ‘reform the power sector’, Nigeria got a $750m loan from the World Bank. In April 2020, the IMF approved a $3.4 billion emergency loan to Nigeria, to cushion the severe economic impact of the Covid-19 pandemic. Nigeria promised the IMF it would ensure the ‘final removal’ of the fuel subsidy which guarantees Nigerians cheap gasoline to power diesel generators for domestic use, before the IMF agreed to the loan. The IMF and World Bank direct the economy of Nigeria and have been pushing for decades for the ‘deregulation of the downstream sector of the petroleum industry’ ie the sell-off of public assets like refineries, and hikes in fuel prices, VAT and the removal of the fuel subsidy. Prices would now be determined by ‘market forces’.
Betrayal and sabotage
On 16 September 2020, the Nigerian Labour Congress (NLC) and Trade Union Congress (TUC) gave the government a two-week ultimatum to reverse the increases in electricity prices (from N30 to N62 per kWh) and the removal of fuel subsidy, or else it would embark on a nationwide strike on 28 September. At midnight, 28 September, the NLC and TUC suspended the planned strikes after the government promised ‘palliatives’ ‘details to follow in two weeks’ to ‘ameliorate the sufferings that Nigerian workers may experience’. A previous attempt in 2012 to remove the fuel subsidy brought 10 million people onto the streets in mass protests (see FRFI 225, Feb 2012). The NLC, after calling an ‘indefinite strike’ when it looked like the protests were gaining steam, then engaging in ‘fruitful’ negotiations with the government, called off the January 2012 strike ‘to save lives and in the interest of national survival’. In 2002, the NLC suspended a strike protesting against an 18% rise in fuel prices, ‘as a mark of respect for the court order which declared the strike illegal’. Nigeria’s labour organisations have a long history of betrayal and sabotage. The Nigerian government admitted privately to the union officials in September 2020, that ‘its hands were tied’ and it would ‘incur the wrath of the IMF and World Bank’ if it reversed the price hikes (Vanguard, 27 September 2020).
Should EndSARS mobilise for elections?
In a speech two days after the Lekki Toll Gate Plaza massacre in which he paid tribute to police who have lost their lives in the uprising, Buhari claimed that the promptness with which the government ‘accepted the demands’ of the EndSARS protesters had been ‘misconstrued as a sign of weakness’. This was a direct threat against the protesters. The promptness was a sign of how scared the ruling class was, but the lack of a central organisation of the protesters is a weakness also holding the movement back.
Buhari convened a meeting of the National Security Council (NSC), a body of ex-presidents and security and intelligence chiefs, on 23 October with the ‘security situation in the country’ top of the agenda. Unelected dictators like General Yakubu Gowon, genocidal president during the 1967-1970 Biafra war, and booted-out, useless former leader Goodluck Jonathan, are members of the NSC and attended the meeting. Nigeria’s youths and the EndSARS protesters are now being urged by some middle class forces to prepare for the 2023 elections. But what is the point of elections when these parasites still call the shots decades after leaving office?
A huge political step forward
The government has now ordered the ‘immediate mobilisation of all police operational assets and resources to bring an end to the wanton violence, killings, looting and destruction of public and private property, and reclaim the public space from criminal elements masquerading as protesters’. However the violence is not ‘wanton’ and the people responsible are not criminals: at least 47 police stations, were attacked and/or burnt to cinders, including 27 in Lagos and 12 in Anambra. Security and civil defence offices, customs offices, banks, TV stations, government buildings, the homes, shopping malls and businesses belonging to the elites (governors, senators), in 16 states have been attacked, burnt down and/or expropriated by ordinary people. In addition, at least five prisons have been attacked and about 2,000 prisoners set free. According to Nigeria’s National Bureau of Statistics, 72.5% of prisoners in Nigeria between 2011-2015 were jailed without trial or sentencing. Most of Nigeria’s prisoners are innocent and should be set free.
Many warehouses packed to the ceiling with food, medicines and masks, donated by the private sector Coalition Against COVID-19, to help victims of Covid-19, have been discovered, and expropriated by the masses in Lagos, Ilorin, Calabar, Plateau, Kaduna, etc. Rather than distribute the beans, noodles, sugar, salt, garri, rice, pastas, vegetable oil, to starving people who lost their livelihoods due to Covid lockdowns, palliatives meant for the most vulnerable 3.6 million households were hoarded by the corrupt government for politically connected beneficiaries. Similar capitalist corruption was evident with aid meant for Boko Haram terror victims and Niger Delta victims of Royal Dutch Shell oil pollution being looted by the Nigerian politicians. Youths are now combing the streets looking for more warehouses. The EndSARS protests in Nigeria may have been terrorised off the streets for now, but the masses have taken a huge political step forward. No more ‘Oga said’ deference to ‘your elders’, and one-track ethnic divisions narratives. People are openly questioning the salaries of senators, governors, traditional leaders and taking matters into their own hands.
Justice for the victims of the Lekki massacre! End police brutality! IMF and World Bank out of Nigeria! US and British imperialism out of Africa!
Charles Chinweizu
