Accord presidential candidate, Professor Christopher Imumolen has advised Nigerian youths not to allow the victims of the Lekki Massacre die in vain.
It was probably the worst day in Nigeria’s history when an unspecified number of youths protesting police brutality were cut down at their prime on October 20, 2020.
Scores of unarmed youths were savagely murdered by a hail of bullets from the guns of soldiers commanded by the government of the day to sweep the Lekki Toll Plaza — venue of the protests — of so-called ‘unscrupulous elements’ in an incident that has continued to elicit reactions.
Thursday, October 20 marked the 2nd year anniversary of the sad event, with symbolic gestures like peaceful marches, speeches, and laying of wreaths staged as memorial to the fallen heroes.
Even though the Nigerian government has continued to deny complicity in the sordid #EndSars protests, the yearly ritual of remembering these dead Nigerians has gained more currency amongst a section of the country’s prominent, young persons as they try to preserve the legacy and significance of that day.
Nigeria’s youngest presidential candidate, Professor Christopher Imumolen is also one amongst these upwardly mobile celebrity youths who was determined not to let the day pass without making his views known on the matter.
In a statement credited to him, Professor Imumolen who is reputed to have earned two Ph.D degrees in separate disciplines advised his fellow youths not to allow the deaths of those he described as heroes to be in vain.
He insists that the biggest honour the country’s young population can pay their dead colleagues is to continue to uphold the very tenets of a struggle that ultimately cost them their lives. Otherwise, their deaths would be seen as meaningless.
One way Professor Imumolen recommends Nigerian youths can honour their fallen counterparts in that heart-rending saga is to ensure that they adopt and vote in a young candidate into office as Nigeria’s president in next year’s general elections.
According to him, a candidate of youth extraction is that man who will be better placed to help them actualise their deepest desires and aspirations in today’s Nigeria.
“If only the victims of the Lekki Massacre knew some of you would move on so fast and start campaigning for the same bad government, they’d have stayed at home,” he said.
And quoting a popular proverb, he said, “Fighting in ignorance is likened to setting self on fire to create illumination for the blind.”
He would, therefore, call on the youths to rise to the challenge by actively taking part in the process that would usher in a new generation of leaders with the requisite capacity and knowledge to reposition Nigeria on the path of sustainable growth and development.
“Nigerians, let’s fight for Nigeria and be free forever. The assurance of the prosperity we all seek for our dear nation is not only in the collective sacrifice we make today, but in the rejection of the old order through the ballot.
“We must do what Jerry Rawlings did in Ghana, but this time, not with guns but with our voter’s cards to sanitise the system and usher in a glorious era of peace, love, prosperity and harmony,” he further said.
