“... The Nigerian state has turned on its people. The only reason to shoot into a crowd of peaceful citizens is to terrorize: to kill some and make the others back down. It is a colossal and unforgivable crime. The brazenness is chilling, that the state would murder its citizens,

in such an obviously premeditated way, as though certain of the lack of consequences...

It is anarchy, a friend told me. Nigeria is descending into chaos, another friend said. They may be right, but “anarchy” and “chaos” are different ways of using

language to shield what is fundamentally to blame — a failure of leadership. It did not have to be like this. The government of President Muhammadu Buhari has long been ineffectual, with a kind of wilful indifference.

The president himself has often telegraphed a contemptuous self-righteousness, as though engaging fully with Nigerians is beneath him. Twelve hours after soldiers shot peaceful protesters, Mr. Buhari still had not addressed the nation...

I think with a new kind of poignancy

about those who have been killed. think of their families brutally plunged into the terrible abyss of grief, made more terrible by the knowledge that their loved ones were killed by their country...Because they peacefully asked to be allowed to live.”

- EXCERPT FROM Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie: Nigeria Is Murdering Its Citizens

Read full New York Times Article here: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/10/21/opinion/chimamanda-adichie-nigeria-protests.html