News of wrongful detention and thoughtless execution of human lives have plagued the specially constituted Nigerian police unit- SARS in recent times.
While at a bus stop in 2015, I witnessed a scene. It was of a young guy who was dragged out of the bus by men in black tees and jeans. They had stepped out of an unmarked bus , caressing the guns in their hands as they scanned through the bus stop in an obvious search for a prey.
The young guy stood out in his dreadlocks and tattooed arms- a perfect victim. He was pushed around while questions were hurled at him.
“Wetin dey your bag” You be yahoo boy” “Open your phone”.
His voice was shaky as he tried to provide answers .The clothes in his bag were emptied on the ground while everyone looked on with no clue on how to rescue him. He was later thrown in the unmarked bus and whisked away. A wild guess would be that he was stripped off every valuable object he possessed or driven to an ATM to withdraw money to secure his release.
His story is one of many other stories. Some live to tell these stories while others have been wasted- shot at and gone forever.
This is why the Tech community Should Care
The telling signs and reason for harassment is usually a contemporary hairstyle, an iphone or macbook and/or a nice car.
Techies are known for their unconventional lifestyles. A software developer has no need for “professional” suits or crew haircuts. A techie is more likely to interact with foreigners and use apps that are supposedly synonymous to fraud. This means that many techies fall within the range of what is termed unacceptable dressing, hence, becoming subjects of wrong social profiling and police harassment.
Microtraction‘s Yele Bademosi shared a very troubling experience on his twitter page.
Many names have become hashtags with no reasonable resolution. This is not the first time people are protesting. The #Endsars conversation is one that started about four years ago. At every point, the police and Federal Government always release a statement that states that the unit has been disbanded , only for them to resurface. At the peak of the lockdown, the Nigerian police reportedly killed more people than the Coronavirus did, using more force than needed to exert the pandemic lockdown restriction regulations.
Anyone following closely would know that it was only a matter of time before the youths ,whom are the most prone to this kind of harassment and danger, revolted again.
Nigerian Celebrities have come out and protests have started happening in different parts of the country. As always, social media is championing the cause as the #EndSars hashtag becomes the number one trending topic in the UK and No 2 in the US.
What Has the Tech Community Done So Far
Since the beginning of the protest, techies have acted very commendably . They are are rallying around the protest and supporting in the best ways possible.
Flutterwave, the payments solution company started an internal fund which is now open to members of the public to support victims of police brutality and protesters.
Others have joined in the street protest . The President of Nigeria has not addressed the agitated protesters. We’ll keep you updated as this movement progresses.
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