I guess we all know by now that there was an attempted coup in Turkey last Friday, right? Turkish President, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan was away from the City on holiday, and top Military Officers decided to carry out a coup and overthrow a democratically elected president! Ha! In this day and age???
The President got wind of it, left the hotel were he was, and went into hiding. The hotel where he was got attacked soon thereafter, in an attempt to seize him, I believe. What happened next was what got me marvelled.
From his hiding place, he was able to address the citizens through his PHONE on radio, as the coup plotters had seized the state television! He got them to move to the streets of Turkey and protest and protect their government! I saw pictures and videos of the events and I could only ask myself, what if this happened in Nigeria? The citizens were getting crushed by the Military tanks, yet they stood their ground. They fought for their democracy. They realised that the power to make a change was in their hands, and refused to be intimidated by the Soldiers. His supporters outnumbered the soldiers massively and despite being shot at, they stayed put, waving the Turkish national flag and shouting their solidarity for their President. There was no discrimination according to political party, religion, tribe, age or gender. Turkey was theirs and they defended her together irrespective of their political differences, as the opposition parties joined in the protest.
Imagine if there was an attempted coup here in Nigeria? I can already imagine what will happen. To start with, the top Military personnel will probably recruit only officers from his tribe into the coup plot, then the officers from other tribes will feel left out and sabotage the whole operation. Next, when the president gets wind of the coup and calls on the citizens to defend our democracy, how many of us will answer? Will the Igbos not say that the President is an Hausa man and a Muslim? PDP will say that the government belongs to APC, not them and therefore won't make any attempt to defend it. With the way we abuse and ridicule our President, we forget that Nigeria is not Buhari's, but ours. If the country is good, we benefit, if bad, we suffer together irrespective of tribe, religion or political party. Maybe the opposition will engineer the coup so that the Military will take over and later on hand power over to them (the opposition). I'm sorry to say this, but if there was an attempted coup in Nigeria, they will most likely succeed. Fortunately and unfortunately, the disunity among top military will probably not enable them plan a coup.
In Friday's attempted coup in Turkey, I saw a people that were aware united and knew the powers they wield as citizens. Their President might not be popular among everyone, with his Islamic views and policies, but they know that the power to remove him lies with them, the citizens, and their votes, not the military. Here, we don't know the power we have as citizens. Democracy is government of the people, for the people, by the people. If we actually believe that the government is 'by' us, then we can change the status quo. If we elect a leader and he/she doesn't live up to our expectation, come next election, we vote the person out. Simple! In order to do that however, we need to be united. Tribalism, religious bias and intolerance should be eschewed if we're to make any headway as a nation.
Have a blessed week ahead.
Hugs...
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