PRISONERS ON STRIKE

By: Muneer Yaqub

I never really got the wisdom entrenched in that Asa’s Song, “Jailer.” She’s one Nigerian singer whose discerning insight I pretty much adore. With her music, adorned by a beautiful voice, she addresses issues of social concern, much uncommon within the musical firmament. Studded in her music are riddles; to decipher them requires some brain-racking. I’ve listened to “Jailer” over and over, the subtlety of its constituent puzzles didn’t crash off my head, until a couple of days ago.

“I’m talking to you Jailer/ Stop calling me a prisoner,” she said, leaving me in the umbra of her partial eclipse. How could one possibly decline their ‘hard-earned’ epiphet, their identity? I wondered, unknowing the answer was not far-fetched.

So, it happened that a few days ago, on August 21, Inmates across American Prisons embarked on a nationwide indefinite strike. In protest, they’ve declined food; Hunger-strike. They’ve resorted to staying indoor, boycotting work.

But what’s more fascinating is that these Comrades (as they call themselves) have also doled out a long list of demands. A 15-item list, without the meeting of which the strike may not end. They lament how they are being treated as ‘second citizens,’ the inconducive life that they live, the low wages that they earn, their gym centers lacking ‘enough’ facilities, and so on.

The walls they say have ears. From within the confines of those walls of theirs, I could hear the echos of some lines from Asa’s ‘Jailer:’ “You don’t care about my point of view/ If I die another will work for you/ So you treat me like a modern slave…Mr. Jailer!” And there goes their plight.

When I learned about the strike, I was moved. It’s only in a society where ‘first citizens’ are well-to-do would there arise a bunch of others, refusing to be addressed otherwise. When, in a society, Prisoners begin to kick against their title and its stereotypical attachments, a fragrance of development is perceived. Standard of living in America is so high that the incarcerated ones now realize that they have rights. They feel they are being sidelined, maltreated, excluded from the world of choice. Such is the fate of societies where everyone matters, where egalitarianism and equalitarianism prevail, where governance works, blazing a the path to development.

Each time I think about this and I look around, I shake my head, in pity. This is Nigeria, an irony of its own self. There are three classes of citenzenry in Nigeria: The rich political Elite, the abject Prisoners, and the Dead. The average Nigerian Masses are the ‘abject Prisoners’. They are no more than those American Prisoners— if not less. Thus, the real Nigerian Inmates, inhabiting our various prisons, are not alive; they don’t exist; they are the Dead, the living dead!

I’ve seen Nigerians who, were there to be a visa lottery to any of American Prisons, or in the UK, I bet they would gladly embrace it, without hesitation. Many would rather spend the rest of their lives there than continue to bear the brutal inhumanity that has crippled our nation. They’d rather rot in an American jail than to continue to hope hopelessly for good governance, than to keep believing in a cruel government peopled by selfish, self-centered politicians.

The minimum wage of an American prisoner is a Dollar per hour— $24 a day. An average Nigerian, according to studies, lives on less than $20 a day. Now tell me, who’s worse? The American inmate has a bedspace of his own; the average Nigerian passes his night under-bridge. The former gets fed at least twice a day, yet, whines, demanding varieties; my countryman languishes in the nutritional uncertainty of the country’s reality. Low access to advanced medical services as cancer therapy, X-ray, etc is dubbed ‘poor health condition’ in American jails; the average Nigerian ‘Freeman’ suffers lack of basic healthcare, dies because health workers are not paid salaries.

I’ve had chances to visit Nigerian Prisons so my times, but I never did. I couldn’t just bring myself to imagine the kind of scenery to be encountered. Each time I try to browse my memory and somehow bump into one, my heart trembles, my eyes drip, the holocaust of fury in me roars. Even if Prisons are meant for criminals, and such treatments are supposed to serve them right, they sure are not the only occupants of them. How about innocent souls, victims of our biased laws? How about the Awaiting-trials, held hostage for years, with shattered hopes for justice?

How about the impoverished man, who stole some drugs for his laboring wife because the hospital did not have drugs, caught and jailed; while the Commissioner for Health who siphoned the health fund is within the comfort of his office, enjoying?

They are all there in our Prisons, treated like animals, forsaken in the limbo of oblivion. They are stucked in a world of slavery, not modern, worse than that of the colonial years. Prisons are meant to be ‘Reformation Centers,’ ‘Correctional Facilities,’ as they are called overseas. In Nigeria, they are ‘Deformation Centers,’ ‘Oppresional Facilities.’ So that when a pickpocket gets in, he returns a notorious armed robber.

So, if American Inmates protest over low standard of living, clamoring for a better life, and what we ‘free’ Nigerians, first citizens of our own country, are agitating for are not dissimilar, then the only difference between them and us is freedom. And even that is negotiable.

On August 21,1971, a Californian Prisoner was killed while trying to escape. He,  George Jackson, a Prisoners’ Rights Activist, was gunned down, while holding some inmates and warders in hostage, in a bid to flee and be free. This is perhaps what fueled the protest. A few other ‘Comrades’ too lost their lives in the same manner. They feel it’s injustice, and have rose up to condemn the act, to tell their government that they are not slaves, not Modern-Slaves, but human beings, entitled to certain rights.

But what happened to our own Prisoners? Why are they not lamenting? Why are they not chanting: “Soli Soli Soli! Sooolidarity foreeever!” Why are they not ‘fighting for their rights?’ Perhaps because where Freemen are still agitating like prisoners, fighting for rights, going on unwilling hunger-strikes over piles of salaries yet unpaid; then even Prisoners don’t think there’s any life anywhere, much less a better one. Apparently, they have accepted their fates.

But it doesn’t matter. We can still make it work. We can still make the government know thanks those people are not slaves, they are not dead. They could still come out better, and better our society. Interestingly, many of our great icons are ex-convict. At least, I know of Wole Soyinka, Bola Ige, et al, who were —albeit unjustly— jailed, and returned stronger, impacting on our society. In fact, some of them wrote their books from within those walls.

Our convicts are humans, much like us. They deserve better treatment; they are entitled to some fundamental rights. They should be reformed, not deformed. They should come out better, not worse. “If you walk into a market place don’t throw stones,” Asa warns, “If you do you might just hit one of your own.” Our people are in there, dear Leaders; you may also end up there some day, hopefully. So, prepare well, what may later become your retirement home!

My name is Muneer Yaqub, and I’m advocating for the Nigerian Inmates!

_Muneer Yaqub is a student-journalist and Human Rights Advocate, from Usmanu Danfodiyo University, Sokoto._
dacaliphate@gmail.com