Oluwasegun Oke

I am a proud member of “Revolution Now” campaign that is now widely known in Nigeria, because our Founder was illegally arrested by the present government for treason of which they insisted was punishable under the law of the federal republic. It is noteworthy to state herein that his antecedent says otherwise, in the sense that he had always been into private practices since he graduated from the University. This was the reason Nigerians no matter their differences in tribes, ages, religious and political affiliations stood up in unison to condemn the dastardly act. But it took three weeks before the aforementioned massive solidarity movement swept across the four cardinal points of the federation. Initially, he was languishing in an unknown detention, with no access to the public media on his present health conditions nor the lists of violations behind the accusations leveled against him. His name is Omoyele Sowore, the President of the online news agency, Sahara Reporters. Thus as a further power-show to subjugate his mandate which was to set Nigerians free by inciting a revolution, his followers which I am part of, were being tracked down, forced out of their hidings and taken to military prisons. Although before the matter escalated, I had been advised to go into hiding, so I woke up early in the morning and took a bus back to my home town in Ondo State. While In the speeding bus, tears rolled down my eyes because my morale was at the lowest point, like an innocent fugitive who has no clue what tomorrow holds. The second worry on my mind was why I was the one causing panic and distress to my poor mother. Meanwhile the previous day, I had called my workplace informing them that my younger brother would be representing me in taking orders for medical items and other duties thenceforth until further notice. But I could not open up about the main reason behind the decision. After two weeks of unprecedented public outcry over the illegal detention of our Pro-democracy activist, Mr. Omoyele Sowore, the government was shamefully brought to its knees and a trial date for our former presidential candidate was scheduled. He was in handcuffs and guarded by heavily armed men of the Department of State Service (DSS), as he alighted from the police van and was led into the courtroom. Watching him on the television set while in exile in my hometown made the second tear to roll down my cheek, but he was smiling and waving to the hysterical crowd with a Bible in his hand. And luckily for us, his case was taken up by the best lawyer in Nigeria, in the person of the Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN) Femi Falana. This was the point where I decided to come out of hiding, because I was home-sick and the lifestyle in my home town was way below the standard I was accustomed to. He was later granted bail on September 26, 2019, after the present government had exhausted all their antics and the well-documented military tactics in their good book. The moral of these political events was that, while others were enjoying their normal lives, we were being persecuted by the government because we decided to come out and exercise our fundamental human rights. All thanks to the president who was a former military ruler, we paid the ultimate price. And it must be stated that we always carry a banner of hope, but our sufferings made history and our President (Revolution Now) is now a household name for his courage and doggedness. He is the Mandela of our time, he was put through despair, not because he stole billions of dollars or because he went contrary to the Public Protest Act. We have always been a law-abiding group, and our modus operandi enshrines in its initiatives, that the needs of the common man must be prioritized selflessly by the ruling class before Nigerians can be said to be enjoying the dividends of our nascent democracy. I will end this write-up by chanting our popular slogan which explodes in the air whenever we are holding our meetings: Omoyele Sowore (Former Presidential Candidate) says: “Revolution Now!” Followers reply: “Power to the People!!” Omoyele Sowore reply: “Revolution to the People!” Followers say: “Nigerians must be free!!”. Follow our #RevolutionNow campaign on social media today.