This Sowore vs DSS wahala, by Charles Kaye Okoye

Today, I will give my view on this standoff between Sowore and the DSS.

People had expected me to say something. Kachi Ugwu personally came to my wall to ask why I was still mute. I assured him that I don’t usually run with trending issues that I don’t understand quite well yet. And it’s because I usually defend whatever position I put out here, and need to defend from the position of knowledge.

While the debate raged hotly, following the purported video of the arrest attempt on Sowore by the DSS, I took time to read various reactions.

One powerful reaction I read that day was by Max Collins who insisted that the DSS could not have attempted arresting Sowore and violating the sanctuary and sacredness of the court. He believed that our DSS is not so crude; he pointed out that Bichi, the current DG would never be so careless, especially in view of the summary dismissal the invasion of the NASS earned Daura, the former DG.

For those who will say that it was Osinbajo that sacked him, let me quickly remind them what the DSS is to the President, so they should understand that the VP could never have sacked without the head of the secret police without seeking the opinion of the president himself.

So, Max Collins made sense!

I also listened to Barr. OC Okocha. He decried the invasion of the courtroom, but insisted that the DSS had the right to rearrest anyone on fresh charges even if it was only a day after the person was granted bail. By the way, OC Okocha is a Port Harcourt based lawyer, a Wike-man and avowed critic of Mr President. So, his admission that the DSS could rearrest is enlightening. I will forgive his rant on the invasion of the court room; at least all of us thought it was exactly what happened from the video.

Today, I and millions of other Nigerians have a clearer picture following the press release by the DSS. It has become clear that they didn’t invade the court room to arrest Sowore. Falana, at least, admitted this, and owned up that he was informed by the service of their intention to arrest his client after the court session and outside the court of course.

So, our hasty righteous indignation must have been misplaced! Still, it is excusable because we were all fooled by that video.

I however kept asking myself why there was no attempts by other DSS operatives to rescue their man was was trapped and swooped on by the supporters of Sowore as depicted in that video. To me, something didn’t add up. The team of DSS could not have been outside, while one of their own was being pummeled in the court room.

Today, the jigsaws are falling properly into place!

First, Sowore resisted arrest, and was aided in the act by his supporters.

Secondly, his own case had ended; again, Sahara Reporters admitted this when they said in their earlier headline: “DSS Trying To Rearrest Sowore After Court Had Adjourned His Case”. So, it was obvious that it was Sowore who rushed back into the court room, and disrupted another ongoing court session.

Thirdly, he hoped to blackmail the security operatives, and whip up sentiment. And he succeeded. But like Lauretta Onochie said, when those who sided him based on the wool he pooled over their eyes eventually know the truth, they will abandon him. And this is true. Some have already realised he only play-acted and have washed their hands off him.

And for those who think that Sowore is insignificant and poses no national threat, I disagree completely with them. He might not be such threat now again, but if the DSS hadn’t been proactive and botched the “revolution now” when they did, by arresting him, we can’t tell how much the movement could go out of control.

Hasn’t he been punished enough?

Personally, I would think that Sowore has been punished enough and should be allowed to go.

But….

Has he behaved like someone who has learnt anything yet, and is a bit remorseful?

We trivialize Sowore’s case because we are probably looking at the man, Sowore, and not at those that might have been behind his move, those that might have committed funds to the cause, their potency, and what their actual intentions were and how they had planned to have it successfully executed.

Sowore went to the UK, had meeting among others with Nnamdi Kanu, who, whether you like it or not, is enemy of the state. This meeting was for a purpose, and it was strategic; to recruit thousands of angry IPOB boys into this cause. Sowore posed with Kanu and shared the pictures. It was an endorsement by Kanu, and a message to his boys to join.

This was at a time the Shiites were marching and were being shot and killed, still they were not deterred. They were a willing tool for Sowore, and the clown knew it.

Add these to the bitter losers of the election, the embittered and disappointed members of the society who had thought that PMB was already history, and who didn’t want to imagine the prospect of another 4 years with him on the saddle.

Sowore knew what was brewing!

Sowore knew that the nation had been heavily doused with petrol and that a soft strike of a match would have it up in flame and get it burnt down.

Sowore had actually planned a movement that would get rowdy, uncontrollable, violent, and invariably lead to the security shooting the “revolutionary marchers”, and with that, the “revolution now” would snowball into proper revolution! It is happening all around us! Algerian president had resigned in April, just 2 months before Sowore’s call. His resignation followed weeks of bloody mass protest termed Hirak or “Revolution of Smile” Sowore and his backers knew and wanted to replicate the same thing in Nigeria.

Sowore and his backers knew about Venezuela, and wanted to replicate the same experience here by ensuring that things spiral out of hand, to get foreign governments to withdraw support for a president that defeated him in an election.

Note that this year alone, apart from the Algerian president, the Bolivian president, Evo Morales, has also resigned after weeks of mass protests; the same fate has befallen Iraqi prime minister, Adel Abdul Mahdi.

Do we have to talk about the Arab Spring of the 2010 and 2011 that swept away leaders of Tunisia, Egypt, Libya and co!

All these revolutions didn’t take people with two heads to succeed. It took ordinary people who were not even as powerful as Sowore to achieve them. So, we fool ourselves when we think that Sowore is merely an insignificant noise maker. No! All it takes to achieve a revolution is an unruly crowd, who could be mistakenly shot at, and would bay for blood and say “Kill us all, if you can”.

Sowore knew this, and banked on it.

Do I feel for him?

No!

You don’t lose elections, and then choose to set the nation on fire or attempt to depose the same man who defeated you by chanting “Revolution Now”!

Maybe I would have felt for him if he had shown that he has learnt his lessons after spending over 120 days with the DSS.

Maybe, I would have felt for him if his misguided supporters had really come to realise that they misled this young man, and admitted that their attempt was ill-contrived and totally wrong.

We trivialize Sowore’s case because we see him wrongly as an activist and not as a bitter presidential candidate that lost an election, and insisted on removing at all costs the man that defeated him.

And for the DSS? I concede that they know many things that I don’t know, and that they owe the president and the nation some responsibilities, and that in discharging these responsibilities, what should guide them should not be public perception, but rather intels at their disposal. Therefore, it doesn’t matter how we view their action; what matters most should be the result, and keeping the nation safe.

Having said this, however, I wait to hear the fresh charges that would be preferred against Sowore, which neccessited his rearrest. If the rearrest is due to his breaching some of his bail conditions, then I will join those who insisted that they should have approached the court instead to ask that court revoke his bail. That’s the proper thing to do.

For us all?
I will only advise that we control our emotions a bit and get the true pictures of things before taking our stand. The knock on the DSS was too much.

*Okoye, a fantastic writer, author and public affairs analyst, is a respondent on the list of The DEFENDER’s contributors.