Femi Falana,SAN

Femi Falana

Between March 2022 and December 2024, no fewer than 105 Nigerian citizens including children were killed in stampede over distribution of rice and sharing of N5,000 stipend. The details are set out below:

1. On May 22, 2022, more than 30 people were killed in a stampede in Port Harcourt Rivers State during an overcrowded church charity event where food was being distributed.
2. On March 22, 2024, two students of the Nasarawa State University, Keffi died during the distribution of palliatives while 23 were hospitalised. The tragic incident occurred following a stampede at the university’s convocation square. The convocation square was the venue for the Nasarawa State government’s distribution of palliatives to the students.
3. On March 25, 2024, seven people, including an eight-year-old girl, were killed in a crush at a charity event in Bauchi. It was a businessman in Bauchi who had invited residents to collect N5,000 each. Police confirmed that seven people – four adult women and three girls, aged between eight and 55 – were killed in the incident in the Jos Road area of Bauchi city, though some locals have put the death toll higher.
4. On April 7, 2024, 9 persons died during a stampede that occurred at the residence of a senator in Sokoto. The stampede happened as residents struggled for palliatives being shared at the home of the lawmaker.
5. On December 19, 2024, 35 children were confirmed dead while 6 others were injured during the Children’s Christmas Funfair tragedy that occurred in Ibadan, Oyo State. The children were crushed to death during a stampede that occurred as the event was about taking off at the Islamic High School, Basorun, Ibadan.
6. On December 21, 2024, at least 10 people, including children died and several others sustained injuries during a stampede at the Holy Trinity Catholic Church in Maitama, Abuja. The incident occurred as thousands of residents scrambled to receive palliatives distributed by the church. The event, organised to relieve struggling residents, drew over 3,000 people, mostly from Mpape, Gishiri Village, and other nearby settlements
7. On December 21, 2024, at least 12 people were confirmed dead in Okija town, Ihiala Local Government Area of Anambra State, during a scramble for Christmas rice. An estimated 32 others sustained varying degrees of injuries in the stampede, which occurred during the distribution of rice organised by a local philanthropist.

In all the aforementioned cases, the victims and casualties were poor and disadvantaged citizens who had been reduced to beggars by the poverty induced by the neoliberal economic policies of the Federal Government. Thus, in searching for food and meagre palliatives, the victims lost their lives in a stampede that occurred due to the inadequacies of the security forces to control and manage crowds in the country.

There is also a sociological dimension to this national shame of episodic loss of lives in stampedes triggered by mass hunger in the land.

This should not be ignored. Here we are talking of the unpardonable lack of respect for the dignity of the poor on the part of the members of the middle and upper classes involved in charity. If you want to give a poor man food or money,  for heaven’s sake,  it should be done with utmost decency and demonstrable humanity.   You can be generous to the poor and respect them at the same time.  For instance,  instead of asking frail men and women to assemble at a poorly organised venue to hand out  N5,000 to each of them, the money could simply be transferred electronically to their bank accounts or the accounts of those the beneficiaries can trust.

To be sure, there are alternatives to the dehumanising display of generosity prevailing in society. After all, no member of the elite would invite other members of his class to lunch by throwing the food. Neither will a member of the upper class elect to give support to his middle-class friends by asking them to queue for envelopes of money before the camera.

The vulgar exhibitionism and egregious humiliation of the poor in the distribution of humanity have assumed a sickening proportion. In this regard, government officials, private organisations and individuals are all culpable.

Besides, the concept of palliative has been grossly distorted even by public intellectuals discussing the problem. The word palliative has a medical origin. So by definition, the giving of palliatives should not be interpreted to mean the cure of the underlying malaise of the poverty and misery of the people. Palliatives are meant to give temporary relief to pains and other symptoms of the problem.  To start extent, palliatives serve a critical purpose  The cure, of course, is the socio-economic transformation of the country by employing the instrumentality of pro-people policies.

Doubtless, the class prejudice inherent in the humanitarian culture in Nigeria should be ideologically confronted.

Meanwhile, since the individuals whose criminal negligence led to the avoidable tragedies are members of the ruling class the federal government and state governments have not gone beyond sending condolence messages to the survivors and the family members of the casualties. Therefore, the Alliance on Surviving COVID-19 and Beyond has resolved to mobilise lawyers to institute civil suits to ensure that the survivors and family members of the casualties are adequately compensated.

ENOUGH IS ENOUGH!

Femi Falana SAN,

The Chair,

Alliance on Surviving COVID-19 and Beyond

(ASCAP)

December 22, 2024.