Reports of a meeting surfaced. We have to find the tweets for you to see what happened. Screenshots detailing a Zoom Meeting held online with some of the loudest voices on Twitter. We heard this news and we do not understand what the meeting was for.
For the past 6 days, we have been on the offensive, showing up at places, raising our voices, arms and placards. We have been feeding each other, sleeping on roads, trooping home and going back again to do the same thing until we get what we want. And then there is a meeting and we are suddenly on the back foot.
Our voice was divided. The little hour we spent arguing for and against doused some of the flames from our online protesters. Emotions sense are disappointment, betrayal, relief and some sort of self-awareness has been generated.
The #ENDSWAT hashtag went off the trending list for a while and now most of the online speakers are working hard to get the hashtag back up. There was also the publishing of a document detailing the activities and the jurisdictions for a new unit called SWAT (Special Weapons and Tactics). The name in itself is not creative and one gets the sense that this was hurriedly put together to appease somebody. Who? Not the people asking for reform. The last thing they want is anything special.
All we asked for is the disbandment of SARS (Special Anti-Robbery Squad) and to take them off the road. That is all we asked. No one wants to see the SARS Officials on the road and get harassed by them. This is all that was asked of the government and instead of meeting these demands and taking these SARS operatives off the roads, they have resorted to paying a force of touts to go and quell the protests in Abuja. This is just the latest of the the incidents. There have been many crimes against peaceful protesters within this past week that we cannot count.
I want anyone reading this to know for a fact that WE ARE NOT CRAZY. WE WILL NOT BE GASLIT. WE ARE BEING THREATENED. Someone wants to take our voice. I daresay a group of people with ample resources want to keep us down and make sure that something like this never happens again. All I am asking, the #ENDSARS #ENDSWAT #ReformTheNigerianPolice Proponents to do is to never let up. This fire has to grow before anyone can control it. We will lose things. I am beginning to believe a lot of us will die. But then, we have been dying anyway,
Don’t stop tweeting. Don’t stop gathering. We have to protect each other. We are all we have left.