Drum Out and Defund Stupidity and Insecurity in Nigeria —Final

Continuing from where I stopped in the first post. As I understand it, the debate about "defunding," among others, is about spreading funding to address the structural, systemic, social, and cultural issues that create the need for “excessive” policing. For lack of a better illustration, imagine that you spent $100 preventing people from stealing from a pot of rice due to hunger. Instead of addressing the hunger that drives people to steal food, you spent $300 on arms for those who protect the pot of rice. Advocates of defunding, among others (this is not the only thing they are asking for—see the previous post and resources on the subject), are asking that you spend the money on food, shelter, and mental health so that even if we don’t eradicate stealing, we can alleviate it.

Closely aligned to my definition in my previous post, stupidity is terrorists being bold and brazen enough to wear the uniform of a murdered victim to “peace” talks because “keri ya ne” there would not be consequences. Stupidity is citizens sick in the body and worried in their minds, contemplating between traveling or getting kidnapped or staying at home, and they come to your farm or home.

"Defund" means to stop showing sympathy and loyalty to the perpetrator more than to the victim.

To stop legitimizing harm as a response to these so-called “disenfranchised” by handling it with kid gloves.

It means to attach and execute real, unforgettable consequences that stop anyone from repeating or thinking of putting all of us in harm's way.

Defunding is meant to stop accommodating and tolerating evil in the name of "they are our brother." A fool at a funeral acts better than we have done with this stupidity.

The litany of terror, horrors caused, and failures and errors of the past and present approaches should warn us that we are dealing with a monster that we need to drum out and defund.

Fund security but defund insecurity.

Invest in the architecture of safety, which includes not only security but also various forms of security, such as food security and financial security. That people sit in wheelchairs waiting under the hot sun to collect peanuts that they call a pension is a threat to financial integrity.

My dad makes threats that we don’t understand and rarely carries out. My dad learned carpentry as a skill in his early adolescence, so he says things like “ma lu panu si o lara,". A phrase we have heard too often but rarely experienced. I can count on one hand, with the "inspiration/instigation" of his wife (my mother), how many times my dad had ever beaten me. But with Mum I knew the difference between "abara," “igbarun," and "igbati," if you don't know the intensity of this range of beating, I can tell your age.

I return one insurance policy; every Nigerian knows—pray.

I pray we find the political will to end this insecurity before it is too late.