Killing me, Igboho, Kanu won’t end agitation for good governance – Sowore

Rights activist and a former presidential candidate of  African Action Congress, Omoyele Sowore, shares his experience on activism, politics and other issues with ABIODUN SANUSI

What has been your experience in activism so far?

It is an experience that has lasted more than 30 years. It has been constant harassment, bullying, torture and abuse because I am one of the few young persons who stood up during the military rule. I stood up fighting against environmental groups in the country against oil companies; I stood up fighting against corruption by civilian administrations in the country. I stood up against every government in the last 32 years, and I was expelled twice from the university, I was in detention eight times before I left for the United States of America. I got harassed at the airport and have been detained several times after I returned from the US after 20 years in exile. I’ve been physically assaulted, a police officer broke my nose, and I have been shot at. My younger brother was murdered under circumstances that are still unexplained till date. My bank account was frozen, social media accounts were created and attempts were made to destroy Sahara Reporters, a platform that I set up for news reporting. They’ve come after me in every way they could in the last 32 years.

How come you have not been deterred by all these?

Everybody has a purpose and that purpose is driven by a serious conviction. I knew from day one that I was entering into uncharted unchartered territory and I was going to be up against very powerful people in the society both in the private and public sectors. So, I somehow acquitted my mind for it. For instance, when I was in the university, I was up against secret cults, and the school authorities joined them and almost got me killed in 1994. I was attacked in broad daylight there. It wasn’t just enough to confront them because of their spread, their network; they went after me in every considerable way. However, my conviction has driven me this far, and I believe that life must be lived with a good purpose.

 Some are of the view that you went too far by convening a protest to hash-tagged RevolutionNow. What did you want to achieve with such action?

I wanted to empower the people in our society to think radically about changing their conditions because I just couldn’t believe that after 62 years of independence, after over $1tn from the sales of hydrocarbons – crude oil, Nigeria is still in shambles and we cannot even boast of proper elections, and people have no right in their own country to aspire to greatness. When I came back in 2018, I started running for office; most people did not know that before 2018, I had fought against military rule, participated in all kinds of resistance for distant activities against misrule in Nigeria. So, the intention was to mobilise people to go to the barricades to fight off oppression to the point that it became necessary for them to put an end to the people holding them to ransom in government, that was the intention and that intention was made known to the government publicly through the media and it was also made known to those who abducted and detained me. I swore to an affidavit in court in my statement that it was my intention and it is well-known.https://googleads.g.doubleclick.net/pagead/ads?gdpr=0&us_privacy=1—&client=ca-pub-7167863529667065&output=html&h=280&slotname=7746968165&adk=25267292&adf=3070490758&pi=t.ma~as.7746968165&w=999&fwrn=4&fwrnh=100&lmt=1645973400&rafmt=1&psa=0&format=999×280&url=https%3A%2F%2Fpunchng.com%2Fkilling-me-igboho-kanu-wont-end-agitation-for-good-governance-sowore%2F&flash=0&fwr=0&rpe=1&resp_fmts=3&wgl=1&adsid=ChAIgN_skAYQmqX4_I6k2p44EjkA0djmowMEpZrDBl2Z23U3DTW5Otba-ilJ0fd-aR5OxiLnIGiuS3QN4AxV0ctd3Jo1pl-HkiF5zKY&uach=WyJXaW5kb3dzIiwiMTAuMC4wIiwieDg2IiwiIiwiOTguMC40NzU4LjEwMiIsW10sbnVsbCxudWxsLCI2NCIsW1siIE5vdCBBO0JyYW5kIiwiOTkuMC4wLjAiXSxbIkNocm9taXVtIiwiOTguMC40NzU4LjEwMiJdLFsiR29vZ2xlIENocm9tZSIsIjk4LjAuNDc1OC4xMDIiXV1d&dt=1645973693601&bpp=2&bdt=908&idt=310&shv=r20220223&mjsv=m202202090102&ptt=9&saldr=aa&abxe=1&cookie=ID%3D9cb2402792052330%3AT%3D1645973691%3AS%3DALNI_Maey5g5lfoy2PHRtLBWtIxdHhDIFw&prev_fmts=999×280%2C300x600%2C0x0&nras=1&correlator=5175463430671&frm=20&pv=1&ga_vid=225013905.1645973691&ga_sid=1645973694&ga_hid=829443050&ga_fc=1&u_tz=-480&u_his=4&u_h=768&u_w=1366&u_ah=728&u_aw=1366&u_cd=24&u_sd=1&dmc=8&adx=5&ady=2981&biw=1349&bih=600&scr_x=0&scr_y=783&eid=42531397%2C44750773%2C44756431%2C44758226%2C21067496%2C31062930&oid=2&psts=AGkb-H8Yg1cwm5kZws0Hes7orOFlUCxz4CRnKUU9Xm0Q3iata4ah3J9pQIR5Mie-YSbyaPDI7m50bLHQk5yh%2CAGkb-H-e9cZ_HuW7_2v4rk2Z35a0Oh1udkZL7xOlqJd9OrDqe0R_RwHN9iUSBDsHkVwajIwhcf9I07B3IxUqpA&pvsid=3532772563182272&pem=5&tmod=495106627&uas=3&nvt=1&ref=https%3A%2F%2Fpunchng.com%2F&eae=0&fc=896&brdim=0%2C0%2C0%2C0%2C1366%2C0%2C1366%2C728%2C1366%2C600&vis=1&rsz=%7C%7CpeEbr%7C&abl=CS&pfx=0&fu=128&bc=31&jar=2022-02-27-14&ifi=2&uci=a!2&btvi=3&fsb=1&xpc=WsEjoTTZZ9&p=https%3A//punchng.com&dtd=45387

The mere mention of revolution gives the impression that you and your supporters were planning to remove the government from power. Did you not think of that before convening the RevolutionNow protest?

We were trying to put in place a process that would give Nigerians real governance. This cannot be called a government because there was no election in 2019; nobody could call what happened in 2019 an election. The use of soldiers, ballot snatching, fictional figures should not be regarded as an election; that was a selection.

Are you saying you do not know that the only constitutional way of changing a government is through an election? Were you calling for the illegal removal of the Muhammadu Buhari regime with your action?

If a thing is going to be legal, it has to pass through constitutional means, and election rigging is not constitutional, it is illegal. Any regime that is against the people is neither a legitimate nor a legal regime. When people say the word ‘constitutional,’ which constitution are they talking about? Is it the 1999 Constitution that was put in place by the military? That is not a legitimate constitution in itself. However, my focus here is not on the paper called a constitution, but on the legitimacy of the regime. The biggest democracy you can have anywhere in the world is the democracy of the people which can happen through an election or a revolution.

Some are of the opinion that you were calling for the sacking of the Buhari regime due to your failure to achieve that via the ballot. How would you react to that?

If that were to be true, I would be in prison by now. But this government cannot even conduct a trial against me. I have been going to court since 2019 and they brought only one witness and they have not been able to prove any of their lies against me. They took me to court, detained me for five months, and after I was released, they took me to court with the claim that they wanted the case to be proactively held, and to date, there’s nothing. The judge who started the case resigned, saying she doesn’t want to have anything to do with it anymore. She left the case and they assigned it to another judge and I am going to be re-arraigned on March 1, 2022. People should stop believing in hearsay when the regime itself can’t even prove those allegations.

But you were one of those who campaigned for Buhari prior to the 2015 elections. Was it because you and those who said he was the best in 2015 never knew he would rule this way?

That is not correct. If you or anyone could provide just one evidence of where I appear in a campaign for Buhari, either a video, or where I spoke on radio, wrote an article, granted an interview, or engaged in any of the processes that could be regarded as a campaign – where I campaigned for Buhari, please, publish it as a journalist.

What were your expectations of him then before the 2015 elections?

Since I was admitted into the University of Lagos as a freshman, I have taken a position to fight against oppression, and ensure democracy, and that is why a lot of people refer to me as a pro-democracy activist. So, when elections come, or even before elections when most people are sleeping, or during elections, I always take a permanent position to ensure that people who are elected into office perform their duties, and when they don’t, I turn against them. I organise and campaign against them, protest against them, because my expectation is for democracy to continue to be positively relevant in the lives of people, not for democracy to become a burden to the people. When the Buhari regime came, people had expectations of him that he would do better, and those of us who are always at the barricades started fighting against him immediately the same way I fought against the government of Goodluck Jonathan when he was engaging in corruption. The same way I fought against (Umaru) Yar’Adu when he was sick and the cabal was trying to impose him on Nigerians.

That was the same way I fought against the (Olusegun) Obasanjo regime when he was planning a third term. It was the same way I fought against the regime before him and I was arrested in 1998 at the Nigerian Universities Games when I led a protest against the military over the expulsion of students, and it was the same way that I fought against the (Sani) Abacha regime when he tried to force political parties in the country to endorse him as the only candidate, and that was the same way I fought against the Ibrahim Babangida regime when he refused to hand over power to late Chief MKO Abiola in 1993. So, is anything different in terms of my consistency and character in fighting for good governance? It is not true that I campaigned for Buhari; I have never campaigned for any presidential candidate. The only candidate that I have ever campaigned for in my life was myself when I ran for office between 2018 and 2019.  Also, I have never voted for anyone else. Since I was born, I voted for the first time in 2019.

 In 2021, a court ordered the Department of State Services to pay you the sum of N2m as damages for seizing your mobile phone at the point of your arrest. Has the money been paid since then?

They didn’t pay the money, and they are yet to return my phone since then. This is a lawless regime, we served them the statement of the court and they have not paid the compensation nor returned my phone since the judgement was given in 2021.

Have you made any moves to ensure that they pay for the damages?

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