Happy Independence Day!!

My country is magnificent! It is a thing of beauty! It is a piece of moving, living art. It must not and cannot be criticized for any events that happen within her borders. It is a 52 year long epic. Were the full story ever to be captured in film the even the preview would be so marvelously exciting anyone with half a mind would be forced to see it. What news headline have we not obliterated? We have done it all. I fear that we have exhausted all possible avenues for excitement. If you have no idea what I am talking about then feast your eyes...

You can count a few pairs of legs here. It does not appear to be some organised lynching but a spontaneous lynching. This makes it all the more spectacular for an organised lynching is a common occurrence. It is much harder to get a group of completely unrelated people to observe a the beating, then stoning and burning of four teenage boys.

That's one of them burning.

They've started quite the blaze haven't they? We should make this a poster. I dare say that it would be just as popular as Thích Quảng Đức, the Vietnamese monk that set himself alight.

Had this been an impromptu burning I would have said that the mob was angry. I would have said that it was an irrational heat of the moment sort of thing but I don't even have that excuse. Like I said earlier, they beat them, and then they stoned them (the stones were not at all small, I would say they rocked them but it doesn't quite have the same flair.) and then they burned them.

This is the real Nigeria. A country where we complain about violence, injustice and corruption but it's all a farce because deep down (or maybe not even that deep down) we are all like this. We are the type to beat, stone and burn four young lads on a mere suspicion. It doesn't even matter what they did because I can't say that any man deserves this.

They say show me your friends and I'll tell you who you are. This phrase is infinitely adaptable. Show me your people and I will tell you who you are. The answer stares us in the face. We are Babarians, We are Animals, We are Nigerians, the purveyors of Jungle Justice and other such practices. The people scream do something! I say if screaming is all you're doing then you are obviously one of the above.

You need not do anything now. What you do need not be perceptible. You're not doing it for the praise of men, you're doing it for your safety, because you see it now don't you? I know that your vision may have been clouded before but it must be clear now. You are one of those burning boys. In the right circumstances anyone of us could be them. So save yourselves.

As always, Happy Days,
Afam