Protest: Take It Back Movement campaigner dares Wike, insists on Eagle Square venue
The Director of Mobilisation of Take It Back Movement, a non-governmental organisation, Damilare Adenola, has maintained that the scheduled August 1 protest in the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), will hold at the iconic Eagles Square.
The protest against economic hardship, which is gaining traction on social media, has been slated to be held across the country, as well as the FCT..
Prices of food and basic commodities have gone through the roof in the last months, as Nigerians battle one of the country’s worst inflation rates and economic crises sparked by the government’s twin policies of petrol subsidy removal and unification of forex windows.
Adenola had signed a letter addressed to the Minister of the FCT, Nyesom Wike, seeking the use of the facility. The letter was dated July 26, 2024, and was broadcast on social media platforms.
However, the FCT minister said on Saturday, that he had not received the letter.
Speaking Adenola, on Channels Television Sunday Politics, the youth campaigner blamed the delay in the delivery of the letter on bureaucratic bottlenecks in government. He, however, said the minister would get the letter unfailingly on Monday ahead of the demonstration starting Thursday.
“It is possible that the receipt of the letter is being delayed by most likely bureaucracy in government or the minister is likely being insincere about receiving the letter, he said.
“If he (Wike) insists that he hasn’t received it, the alternative is that he was served by publication because many Nigerian ministries streamline what to receive or not. If he says he didn’t get it physically, then we could as well say that he was served by publication.
“If he says he wants it by Monday, we will serve him.”
“The truth is that the Eagle Square is a public property. When I saw the video of the minister, I was amazed because I saw the minister asking us to pay rent, pay security fees and all that. My question to the minister is this: how does the minister expect a greater population of Nigerian youths who are impoverished, who have no jobs to afford to exorbitant he is expecting us to pay?
“We are going to be at the Eagle Square on August 1st,” he said.
Adenola further said “it’s a double insult to tag the organisers of the protest as faceless”.
He said hunger is a great motivation for the protest and that the organisers of the protest need not be privileged Nigerians before they can express themselves.
“The organisers of the protest are hungry Nigerians; they are a host of unemployed Nigerians, they are a host of hopeless Nigerians who are roaming the streets. They are the out-of-school children spread across the country. These are the organisers of the protest and the greatest motivation of this #EndBadGovernance protest is hunger. People are really hungry,” he stressed.
“This is the idea of battered Nigerian people, this is the idea of hungry Nigerian people, this is the idea of hopeless Nigerian people.
“Young people are tired and need to express their displeasure against government’s malfeasance,” he added.
