In August 2014, I watched events in Fergusson, Missouri, United States with keen interest, the protests, riots, vandalism, and clashes with the police that greeted the police killing of the 18-year-old black male teenager, Michael Brown. The protesters reasoned that Michael had his hands up when a white officer, Darren Wilson, shot him. Whether he possessed arms was not necessary. The protesters demanded immediate prosecution of the officer. When the police department released a video trying to link Michael with shop robbery incident before the killing, little did they know that they were pouring fuel into fire.
Michael did not die in vain. His death had brought a lot of changes in police department. The Police have reviewed policy on officers’ possession of big arms. His burial attracted White House representatives and Obama personally sent condolences to the family. The event in Fergusson is a clear case of society blood drops not in vain. That is the first character of a mature society.
A human society is where government knows that every citizen exists wherever he/she is. A responsible society launches military rescue operation in another country without the country’s knowledge just to secure the corpse of a slain citizen. This is a society where citizenship matters. And where they do not succeed, they immortalize the event and ensure it does not recur. Nigeria is an animal kingdom and that is why reckless elements in the Nigeria police shoot and kill innocent Nigerians, label them criminals and go scot free.
When his son, Christopher, took his own life with a gun, Forres Holocom of Peoria, along with his wife Betty, formed ‘Children for Peace’ because he wants the memory of his son to be a force in the lives of others who could be victims of gun violence. Since inceptions, Holocomb has helped initiate peace walks in some of the highest crime areas to christening a programme to provide mentoring to children this summer.
Clara Feldman is one of the Jews who survived the Nazi Holocaust. Today she goes from school to school in New York to teach students about what happened to the Jews in Germany during the war. She applies the lessons to our modern world making it clear to students that they cannot remain silent about the violation of human rights wherever it occurs.
Tommy Pigage was drunk when he hit and killed Ted Morris of Kentucky. Ted was the only son of Mrs Elizabeth Morris. The death of her only son left Elizabeth stunned and angry. Tommy pleaded guilty and was convicted, and was ordered to give lectures to high school students on behalf of MADD (Mothers Against Drunk Drivers) on dangers of driving while drunk. One day Elizabeth went to hear Tommy speak. She heard him say with felt emotion that he ‘murdered Ted’ and should be behind bars for what he did. Elizabeth said, ‘I didn’t want my son’s death to be totally in vain. And in my heart, I knew that if he could, Ted would tell us to forgive Tommy’. Today, Elizabeth and Tommy are friends and they are preaching against drunk drivers because both are victims in different ways.
Casey Sheehan is the 24-year-old soldier who left Zacaville, just north of San Francisco, for Iraq and was killed less than two weeks later- one of the eight American soldiers who perished in an ambush near Baghdad on 4 April 2004. Before he left home, his mother Cindy Casey had offered to take him to Canada or even to run over his leg in her car so that he wouldn’t have to go. But Casey insisted he did not want to let down the buddies. Sixteen months later, his mother was camping in Crawford, Texas, demanding to see the president. ‘I want to ask him why did my son die?’ What was this noble cause you talk about?’ And if the cause is so noble when are you going to send your daughters over there and let everybody else’s son come home?’
Sheehan’s identity as a mother was central to the protest against war in Iraq. ‘To hear of another soldier being killed rips my heart open, because I know there is another mother whose life is going to be ruined that day. …And I said why should I want one more mother to go through what I’ve gone through, because my son is dead.’ In a personal introduction to Sheehan’s book, Not One More Mother’s Child, Jodie Evan describes her as ‘the mother we long for. She is nurturing, a she-wolf, a mother bear, unafraid when it comes to the protection of our children. She has empathy, she does not want another mother to experience the pain she is enduring losing a child needlessly.’
Sheehan actually took it a step further, effectively inventing a condition blending love of country, maternalism and feminism: she calls it matriotism. ‘Not everyone is a mother, but there is one universal truth that no one can dispute no matter how hard they try (and believe me some will try): everyone has a mother! Mothers give life, and if the child is lucky, mothers nurture life. And if a man had a nurturing mother he will already have base of matriotism she argued. ‘A matriot will never send her child or another mother’s to fight nonsense wars…she will march into a war which she considered just to protect her child from harm’
Nigeria is a country on fire. On routine basis, innocent Nigerians are dispatched to their graves in most horrible ways by depraved people who think they have divine mandate to kill. Every fraction of a breath bomb explodes and Nigerians- men and women, sometimes pregnant ones, adult and children twitch as they turn to corpses. Bombs severe limbs, tear open skulls, disgorge brains and viscera. We see villages looted, Christians cooked and pounded like yams just because they are Nigerians.
Some victims while dying slowly will be calling on God who appears to have deserted Nigerians. Some will be calling for human help where everybody is scared. Even the ISIS in Iraq has not come close to what Boko Haram is doing in Nigeria.
It is not surprising that tragedies befall Nigeria. What is surprising is that we do not learn any lesson whenever they occur. And because we do not learn anything, they repeat themselves. Who ignited the fire is of no use at this period. Every person who has died in the ongoing insurgency is someone’s father, mother, child, uncle, sister, brother, friend, guardian, neighbor, colleague, relative. Paul Ortiz, Veterans for Peace member and media coordinator for Gainesville Veterans for Peace, remarked that war has an impact, not only globally, but locally. And worst still, according to Oritz, “There’s a cost to a war that doesn’t end when the war ends.” The serious impact of war is that it rapes the future of content.
Whether we sign up to ‘Children for Peace’, ‘Mothers Against Drunk Drivers’, ‘Not One More Mother’s Child’, Matriotism’ Nigerians need to rise to save Nigeria. Democracies risk self-destruction, if moral wrongs are overlooked. We can no longer remain idle in the sight of a burning destiny. For Joseph Fletcher, there is actually one thing worse than evil itself, and that is indifference to evil. My worry is why should Nigerians die in vain? It will take our collective resistance to save this nation, politically and socially. We must adopt the slogan, Not One More Nigerian Again’.
