NIGERIA HAS A TORTURE PROBLEM

NIGERIA HAS A TORTURE PROBLEM

Nigeria has a torture problem but the sad thing is that we like to cherry pick. We act like saints when we are the problem. I have watched with keen interest the recent debacle in Kwara State, so barbaric. Children were beaten because they drank alcohol at a party and in a bid to correct them they beat them. But larger than the Kwara incident we have a culture of torture. It is only in Nigeria that a woman will say her husband loves her when he beats her; it is only in Nigeria we beat in the name of religion, we cast out demons by beating people.

The elites who attended Cambridge beat and slap their househelps at will. Even politicians beat their constituents in the name of correction. So what we should be saying is how do we stop this culture of dehumanization in Nigeria? There are very many highly successful men and women that are being beaten everyday but they can’t come out to talk about it. Some of them will argue that nobody will believe them so they decide to suffer in silence. Only last week a lawmaker was stripped naked and beaten in Rivers State. Everybody and anybody can be beaten. I am sure you remember the scenes of how the former Inspector General of Police, Tafa Balogun, was manhandled by the same police officers he once presided over. So it has become a cultural thing in Nigeria. The question is: how can we change it?

Rufai Oseni, rufaioseni@gmail.com

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