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There is a popular French ballad titled “The Girl and the Magpie”, a magpie flew into town and went straight to steal a golden spoon from the master of the girl, everyone in the village didn’t care to investigate, they were angry and pissed. Then they gathered in the town square and sentenced the girl to death, a few days later, the magpie flew back and returned the golden spoon. Nearly everyone in the town regretted their actions, they built a statue in memory of the girl. This ballad passes one important lesson as the Offa robbery, it is the danger of a single story.
Thomas Sowell raised the dangers of implicit assumptions, he said “assumptions that remain implicit can escape scrutiny, even by people who build a whole structure of beliefs and imperatives on the foundation of such assumptions”. He concluded that once there is a decline in these assumptions, the search for causation is often narrowed down into a search for blame. This is what is happening with the shocking revelations at the Judicial Panel of Inquiry on #EndSARS in Kwara State, where two petitioners narrated how they were tortured to implicate Bukola Saraki. Yet, some are still embarking on the unproductive vocation of revolving the several revelations around Saraki himself. Shouldn’t you get rid of those implicit assumptions that evaded social scrutiny?
Rather than asking important questions, questions that matter – that will reflect us as people who have not transformed “justice” to only “ideological attractive package”, the politics is resurfacing again. This should question the conscience of those that continuously ruminated and asked “what if your family member was among the victims?”, it is equally important to ask “if your family was among the victims, would you pick politics above the search for truth?”
One of the armed robbers named Adiku admitted to have single-handedly killed 22 people out of the 33 victims, he was the first to be killed and shut down by the police in a controversial and suspicious circumstances. Another one is Kayode Opadokun, a son to defunct NADECO secretary, a close associate of Bola Ahmed Tinubu. Cerebral and revered Pa Opadokun is a notable Offa indigene. Kayode Opadokun is no more in the news and only God knows his whereabouts. To this end, why are questions that require precise answers left out and the issue continues to revolve around Saraki?
The search for truth must not be narrowed down to searching for blame or taking sides, this means we are treating an important issue that remains a nightmare for the family of the victims as an intramural contest. This is sad and should be discountenanced.
Saraki case has taught us one important lesson: The cliché that “a clear conscience fears no accusation” is total nonsense. We need to realise and always remember that the law of conscience is important than that of government.
Power is transient and doesn’t corrupt anybody, what corrupts and is corrupting all of us is the fear of losing it. Rather than letting this fear demonise us and politicise important matter such as dastardly Offa Bank robbery, let us constantly interrogate our conscience. Indeed, it was a sad day for everyone in the state, may such never repeat itself in Kwara again.
Meanwhile, where are these robbers, why is the case stalked, why are the souls of our departed brothers and sisters yet to get the justice they deserve?
ISHOWO, Isiaq Oluwatosin
tosinishowo2015@gmail.com
Twitter: @Tosinishowo
