During one of my very short outdoor movements yesterday, I got to witness so many acts of unrest from fellow Nigerians in the city of Ibadan.
Banks were being destroyed. Roads were blocked. Cars were ruined. All these were happening in form of a protest by Nigerians against the current scarcity of paper money, fuel and electricity. I still don't know if any lives were lost in that particular protest. I genuinely hope it didn't get to that.
This isn't the first time we are seeing this type of reaction from Nigerians. I don't know if it's an issue with us being underdeveloped or if this is just how things work here, but these public display of violence and destruction of public properties has been the last resort that Citizens use to send a message to the government.
It says a lot about how awful things have been in this part of the world, right?
We truly live in a crazy world!
While you can make cases against the adoption of highly violent strategies like the ones I described above as opposed to dialogue, it's hard to not understand the fact that people are already pushed to the wall by the highly oppressive policies of our government. It's appalling. You sure don't want to imagine what it's like to have money in the bank, but you can't withdraw the money because of the very low volume of redesigned Naira which is in circulation.
The electricity issue is something we've been dealing with since antiquity. From the moment I learned how to spell my name, I've always been well aware of the poor electricity supply in the country. The issue of fuel scarcity and hikes in the price of fuel is also an issue which we may have to deal with till perpetuity. But this issue of Nationwide scarcity of paper money is a new type of issue.
Banks say they don't have the redesigned currency to give those that wants to make withdrawal. POS terminals are also low on cash. Even when you see a place to withdraw, you will end up sacrificing as high as 20% of whatever you are withdrawing.
Mannn, I'm gutted by what I'm seeing in this country. I saw a couple of video clips of people going unclad in banking halls to protest against this issue. All these are clear indication that Nigeria is already in distress. It's getting worse with each passing day.
Thanks For Not Missing Any Full-stop Or Comma
Thumbnail Image taken from Unsplash
