Nigeria: Two popular protests, thirty-five years apart, same demands, By Ahmed Aminu-Ramatu Yusuf

The demands of the 1989 and 2024 protesters are virtually the same; they include protests against hunger, impoverishment, currency devaluation and the removal of subsidies. They basically reflect the miserable situation confronting the nation, which centres and revolves around the need for a democratic culture, development, social justice, and independence from the International Monetary Fund and World Bank.

President Bola Ahmed Tinubu and former military ruler, Ibrahim Babangida, share a lot in common. The latter shot his way to power, while Tinubu won a controversial presidential election, refereed by the Independent National Electoral Commission. Both are known to be manipulative and divisive. They believe that power is synonymous with wisdom, while money can purchase anyone and anything.

With money and power, they imagine that people in society, like zombies, can be ordered right, left, and centre. To them, money is the weapon and power is the goal. For egoistic reasons, they are capable of setting society ablaze to remain power.

Babangida, in his eight years in power, adopted the highly destructive Structural Adjustment Programme (SAP). Tinubu, since 29 May, 2023, has been unquestionably implementing neoliberalism. SAP and neoliberalism are the same.

They were both invented and imposed by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank (WB) and serve the same purpose of dehumanising and impoverishing the hapless populations of underdeveloped countries. Through the use of ‘witchcraft incantations’ and crude power, both institutions impose their policies on hapless countries – with crude, inhuman and racist ‘conditionalities.’

The conditionalities are aimed at rolling back the state in economic and societal development, and enthroning the private sector in the affairs of the state, the economy and society. The conditionalities include privatisation, de-subsidisation, commercialisation of social services, currency devaluation and mass retrenchment.

Since 1986, the conditionalities have led to de-industrialisation, primitive accumulation, retrenchment, hunger, poverty, insecurity, illiteracy, diseases, and hopelessness. They have also sharpened authoritarianism, subverted democracy, regressed development, disempowered the working people, and subordinated the Nigeria state to the IMF, WB and Western powers.

But SAP/neoliberalism have equally triggered popular struggles for democracy, development and social justice. It sparked the 1989 anti-SAP nationwide protests under Babangida. Today, 35 years later, it has sparked the ongoing #EndBadGovernance national protests under President Tinubu.

The demands of the 1989 and 2024 protesters are virtually the same; they include protests against hunger, impoverishment, currency devaluation and the removal of subsidies. They basically reflect the miserable situation confronting the nation, which centres and revolves around the need for a democratic culture, development, social justice, and independence from the International Monetary Fund and World Bank.

In 1989, the National Association of Nigerian Students (NANS), the arrowhead of the protests, demanded the immediate termination of SAP; the guarantee of full employment to all Nigerians; release of jailed electricity union leaders and labour activists; free education at all levels; increase in education funding, academic freedom, democratisation of the campuses, and termination of military rule.

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State reaction to the protesters, both in 1989 and 2024, was fierce. Many of them were arrested and detained. A great number were severely injured, maimed or killed. A few security personnel were also wounded or killed. Journalists were teargassed, harassed and detained. Properties were looted and destroyed by some protesters.

The #EndBadGovernance organisers are demanding the termination of IMF/WB neoliberalism; a stop to the privatisation or commercialisation of public enterprises; the reversal of petrol prices and electricity tariffs; an end to banditry, kidnapping and general insecurity; payment of N100,000 – not N70,000 – as National Minimum Wage; and the use of public funds for the public good.

Many of the placards carried in 1989 stated: “NO TO IMF/WORLD BANK!”; “SAP MUST GO!”; “WE ARE DYING OF HUNGER IN THE NAME OF SAP!”; “BABANGIDA MUST GO”. Those being carried in 2024 declare: “THIS HUNGER IS TOO MUCH”; “END UNEMPLOYMENT”; “END POVERTY”; “END HUNGER”; “END SUFFERING”; “END BAD GOVERNANCE”; “NA BECAUSE OF BAD GOVT. I NEVER SEE HUSBAND”; “NIGERIANS DESERVE BETTER!!!” “LET THE POOR BREATH”; “NIGERIANS ARE READY (TO DIE) FOR A NEW NAIJA!!!”.

Children, students, youths, and the lumpen or ‘agberos’ were the marching forces in both protests. In all, the protesters are/were hungry, furious and fierce.

In 1989, a forty-three-year-old unemployed protester in Lagos said: “Life in heaven or hell should be more peaceful than here. This is worse than hell… I prefer death to living here.”

In 2024, Kano protesters chanted, in Hausa: “Rather than hunger to kill us, let bullets kill us.” Others chanted, “We want military rule.” Yet, others called on Nigerians, irrespective of their differences, to pray that God eliminates all those responsible for hunger, poverty, insecurity, hardship, and bad governance in the country.

Society understood, empathised and supported the protesters. In 1989, it was reported that in Benin City, “Wherever they (students) marched, it was as if the market women, school children, jobless (folks), and all shades of Benin residents had been waiting for them. They whole of Benin residents were up in protest.” It was the same in other parts of the country.

In the #EndBadGovernance protests, videos of marching crowds of protesters make the moving forest in William Shakespeare’s Macbeth a child’s play. The security personnel in the South toyed with protesters, and in other places, they played hide-and-seek as people defied the curfews imposed by states.

State reaction to the protesters, both in 1989 and 2024, was fierce. Many of them were arrested and detained. A great number were severely injured, maimed or killed. A few security personnel were also wounded or killed. Journalists were teargassed, harassed and detained. Properties were looted and destroyed by some protesters.

But there are some differences. The 1989 anti-SAP protests were organised by the National Association of Nigerian Students (NANS), and led by its ideologically motivated and organisationally disciplined leaders and activists. The NANS Charter of Demands was their ‘scripture’ then.

Babangida was frightened and horrified by the 1989 protest; yet he was composed and crude in suppressing the protests. Tinubu is intimidated, jittery and beggarly but violent in suppressing the protests. The government used thugs to counter the protests in some instances, even before they had begun. Its officials begged organisers to call-off the protest. Some religious clerics and celebrities were also used to stop or discourage the protests.

The 2024 #EndBadGovernance is organised by a loose coalition of organisations, dominated by youths, with ‘dedregulated’ leaders and activists, promoting different political tendencies and agenda. Rank-and-file students, not NANS as a body, actively participated in organising the protest.

In 1989, the military junta was not given any official notice or ultimatum for the protests, but in 2024 the government was given a one-month notice.

The 1989 protest was not supported in any way by the mainstream politicians. They were afraid that doing so would jeopardise their participation in the Military Transition to Civil Rule Programme.

In 2024, opposition politicians have expressed ‘support’ for the protests. Abubakar Atiku, for instance, described them as “noteworthy,” and “a pivotal moment for our collective voice to be heard.” He added that the protests, “have opened a vital channel for the public to express disapproval of government policies…” However, basically, the leading opposition politicians like Atiku and Peter Obi share the same economic policies, such as removal of subsidies, as the Tinubu administration has done.

The 1989 protests, lasted one week, while the 2024 protest is billed for ten days.

The #EndBadGovernance protesters were in places like Abuja and Lagos attacked by paid hoodlums who were often escorted, protected or encouraged by the security forces. In some states, the coordinators of the protests were overwhelmed by protesters, who were fired by hunger and the heavy-handed responses of government.

Babangida was frightened and horrified by the 1989 protest; yet he was composed and crude in suppressing the protests. Tinubu is intimidated, jittery and beggarly but violent in suppressing the protests. The government used thugs to counter the protests in some instances, even before they had begun. Its officials begged organisers to call-off the protest. Some religious clerics and celebrities were also used to stop or discourage the protests.

So, governments that fail to learn from the past, repeat its horrors.

Ahmed Aminu-Ramatu Yusuf worked as deputy director, Cabinet Affairs Office, The Presidency, and retired as General Manager (Administration), Nigerian Meteorological Agency, (NiMet). Email: aaramatuyusuf@yahoo.com