Trying Times: Where was the Police???

Trying Times: Where was the Police???: Forgive me for coming in late, looks like the class already kicked off. But I just watched the video and that to me is the bravest thin...

Where was the Police???

Forgive me for coming in late, looks like the class already kicked off. But I just watched the video and that to me is the bravest thing I ever did in my life - managing to watch the video to the end. I can still picture my colleague crying like she knew any of them in the video. The first thing that comes to mind is the picture of these handsome guys. At that point I got myself saying to me - "all is vanity". Seeing them all smeared with mud, blood gushing from their heads, mouth, in fact i couldn't really get the details of all the fluid flowing from their body all thanks to the quality of the camera. 

Just yesterday I made a post on my facebook account of how everyone wants to be the first to spread the news. I mean some people had the opportunity to record all these while they were happening and the best they could do was to put them on the net so that everyone can watch. They probably were looking for hits or five seconds of fame or trying to drawing traffic to their blogs or channels or even websites. I will also want not to believe that there were journalists around who covered this incident. Thanks to the community too. They got rid of Criminals right? I don't think so. I am finding it difficult to believe that a community in this present age of social enlightenment will collaborate and mete such a subhuman treatment on their fellow human beings. As a Christian, sometimes I find it difficult to blame the people that Crucified Jesus Christ because somehow I still see us doing exactly what they did then. 

As a student then, I have had a first hand experience of how a host community feels towards students because I lived among the villagers. Sometimes, things as little (or as serious) as a student having an affair with a girl or lady from the village (I'm tempted to call her a village girl) could create a bountiful attraction of jealousy and comments from the people. That is not to say that the villagers were not hospitable. We are all humans and there has always been this feeling among them that you are doing this because you think you are superior to them (the fact that you are in school and they are not). I remember that particular clash sometime in our final year between our students and one of the host communities. A lot of gory tales were heard and at some point, the whole story got mixed with the community blaming the murder and injury of some students on the students and the students saying it was the other way round. At the end, peace was restored and the students went back to live among the villagers. Then I will say: "I will never live with those people". Meanwhile I was equally living off-campus in another village.... funny isn't it?

I remember also as a much younger person still in the secondary school, when a thief was caught in my neighborhood. In a bid to snatch a commercial motorcycle from the operator (who has just dropped him off), he clubbed him at the back of his head and got him unconscious. He was still struggling to get the motorcycle moving when someone who has been watching him from the bush, came out and gave him the same treatment. Before you could spell J-A-C-K, an angry mob had formed around him. This mob was particularly made of two groups of people; individuals who were angry because bike men (like we usually called them) will not carry them to their area at night because they were scared of the bikes being snatched, and bike men who were happy that they had caught one of the people giving them nightmares. Within a few minutes, this guy had started bleeding from more than 10 openings on his head and some people were already asking for condemned tires so they can give him the most common form of jungle justice. By this time i was already scared to the bone that something really  bad was about to happen. His saving grace was that police men from a nearby police station came around and took him away. Even at that, the angry mob were still saying that these might not really be policemen and that they might be part of his team that have come to take him away.

This now brings me to the question I have been asking myself ever since I heard,read and finally watched  this story. Where was the Police? Where were these men of the law who were always looking for the slightest opportunity to get you arrested and possibly make some money off you (the annoying part is that you are made to sign that you did not pay anything to anybody in the course of the bail). I had this experience at Area G Police station in Ogba when I was trying to bail a friend and I was fuming with anger and asking myself why I didn't come here with a camera. 

It would have taken at least one hour to club and stone these four guys half-dead before finally setting them ablaze and I ask myself: "where were these men?". Is the government and whoever is responsible trying to tell me that in a community where a big university as the University of Port-Harcourt is located that there is no Police station around? Or are they telling me that they were all on the road looking for Public transport operators to collect offerings from. Or did they just turn a blind eye to everything that was happening? Or were they scared of being lynched by the angry villagers? Or were they members of the village too? Or is the village so remote that there was no network available to place a call to the police men? Or were there no other students in that village to send an SOS call to the police to come and save their compatriots? Or did they think that the villagers were reducing the stress by helping  them take care of some of their numerous tedious tasks? Or did the government not have an SOS number to be called in the case of an emergency like this one? I have been asking myself a million and one questions ever since and I have not been able to get any answers. 

I think whatever justice will be doled out on these assailants will not be complete without finding out from the Police, their whereabouts while all these were happening. It really is funny that in this present day Nigeria, jungle justice could easily be meted out on anyone in a place as exposed as River state. After watching this video, it didn't matter to me anymore, what crime they had committed. The single fact that some people could be barbaric and callous enough to dole out such degree of inhumanity to their fellow human beings was to say the least, appalling.

My own suggestion of justice to the ever crying spirit of these young men and the hurting and grieving hearts of their loved ones, is to find the perpetrators of this act (even if it means the entire village), charge them with murder, try them in a court of law (even though i have lost faith in our judiciary), convict them of first degree murder and then sentence them to either death by hanging or firing squad or even the electric chair (if we have any) and then make sure that their execution will be as public as it can ever get. This will give the community a picture and an idea of what "Justice" is all about.

 This is my take on this issue. You might differ in your opinion, you are free to let me know