The #EndBadGovernance protests entered its fifth day in Ibadan, the Oyo State capital on Monday despite the appeal made on Sunday by President Bola Tinubu for protesters to stop their demonstration against hunger and hardship in a nationwide broadcast.
The protest which commenced on Thursday August 1 across the country, continued in Ibadan on Monday at the main gate of the University of Ibadan.
Chairman, Oyo State chapter of the Joint Action Front (JAF), Professor Ademola Aremu and the acting national chairperson of Socialist Party of Nigeria (SPN) Comrade Abiodun Bamigboye, led the Monday’s protest which had some activists in the state participating.
Aremu, while addressing journalists, maintained that the address by President Tinubu lacked solution to the problems confronting the country.
He added that all the achievements highlighted in the broadcast failed to individually and collectively translate into any meaningful improvement in the life of the working people across the country.
Speaking further, the university don maintained that the address was an indication that Tinubu was unwilling to accede and attend to any of the demands of the protesters.
He stressed that the group will commence immediate discussions and engagement with the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC), the Trade Union Congress (TUC), the media and the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA), towards building a pan-Nigerian movement of the working people that will be determined to challenge the Tinubu-led administration and force it to accede to the demands of the protesters.
He said, “Today, Monday 5th August, 2024, makes it the third day, our coalition organised peaceful protest here in Ibadan, Oyo State to render a support to the call for a nationwide mass action against hardship and hunger tagged “#EndBadGovernance protest”.
“Our decision to organise peaceful protest on the 1st and 2nd of August, 2024 was to dare all odds and express our support for the call for nationwide protest.
“This is a victory for the Nigeria working, but suffering people. It has clearly shown that Nigerians are not slaves who would be told to surrender their fundamental and democratic rights to resist anti-poor policies. It has also demonstrated that no elected office holder is greater than the citizens of the country.
“Again, the peaceful character of the protest, especially here in Oyo State, has obviously defamed a false narrative that the working people cannot successfully organise a peaceful protest without it degenerating into violence.
“So far the protest against hardship here in Oyo state as well as in a number of states across the country have been acknowledged to be quite peaceful except in few states like Kano, Bauchi, Yola and Katsina where the protest which equally started in a peaceful manner turned into violence with over 10 persons killed by the security agencies in the process.
“This to us is another gain of the protest, except that none of the demands of the protest was addressed in the President’s national broadcast. As far as we are concerned, the national broadcast is just a mere justification for all of the neo-liberal policies responsible for the huge scale of pain and pangs Nigeria working people are going through at the present time.
“Asides this, we note that none of the planned projects enumerated in the national broadcast has the potential to bring any significant relief and respite to the masses of the Nigeria working people.”
He however noted that beyond the current #EndBadGovernance protest, Nigerian workers “require a bigger, broader and disciplined movement of the working people and youths for a better Nigeria.”
