FRANK KOKORI 1943–2023 —The Last of the Citizen Patroits Goes to His Deserved Rest
“The Abacha regime is likely to go down in history as the most harassed government in Nigeria’s post-independence history!” — Eghosa E. Osaghae
Chief Frank Ovie Kokori fought on the people’s side and his death not only brings an era of civil society and popular activism to an end, but it throws in sharp relief the powerlessness of our citizens to fight the injustices and malpractice of governance by the government of this day.
It wasn’t always so.
From 1993–1998, General Sani Abacha held the nation under his metaphorical jackboot. Those whom his Chief Security Officer, Major Hamza al-Mustapha, perceived as enemies of state paid the ultimate price. In that dark age: Alhaja Kudirat Abiola, Alhaja Suliat Adedeji, and Chief Alfred Rewane met violent deaths in mysterious circumstances; a failed assassination attempt left Chief Alex Ibru with grievous bodily harm not limited to a permanent loss of sight in one eye; Chief Ken Saro-Wiwa and eight members of MOSOP were tried in a kangaroo tribunal in Port Harcourt for actions of a mob and executed without recourse to appeal; General Shehu Yar’Adua died in the custody of the state; and General Olusegun Obasanjo was cooling his heels in prison convicted on charges of plotting a phantom coup.
Abacha’s siege on our civil and opinion leaders was his draconian reaction to the popular demand for the reversal of General Ibrahim Babangida’s annulment of Chief M.K.O Abiola’s victory at 1993 presidential ballot.
“The country was at a dead standstill!” — Thomas Medley Program director, AFL-CIO African American Labor Center
It was at this moment, which Winston Churchill could have called “an hour of peril”, that Chief Kokori rose to meet the call for a man of courage. In July 1994, Frank Kokori as general secretary of NUPENG, in concert with leaders of PENGASSAN and NLC announced a national strike to protest the annulled 1993 election, and generally, Nigeria’s political direction under military rule. Oil workers, in the upstream and downstream sectors, left their pumps and joined the Nigerian people to sit at home. There was full and unprecedented compliance to this call for strike and the country ground to a halt.
This was historic.
It was the high point of civil resistance to the tyranny of our governments at any time since independence. The junta reacted with ferociousness and characteristic highhandedness. They used the police to break up peaceful protests and the secret service to harass opinion leaders, journalists, and moral supporters. They arrested Frank Kokori and Milton Dabibi of PENGASSAN and left them in jail without trial. Finally, they dissolved all the executives of the unions and appointed government agents to replace them.
Those “G-men” — if you will permit my pun — looted the coffers of the union with impunity.
Kokori Paved The Way For The Fourth Republic
In a roundabout way, we can say that the road to the Fourth Republic started in July 1994 when Frank Kokori convened a national strike. It was clear to the military usurpers of power that they could no longer treat citizens with so much contempt. It was time for the army to conclude their interminable, convoluted, and bad-faith transition to civil rule which Babangida started in 1985.
However, from those heady days of power the people have now descended into utter hopelessness. The trade unions never recovered from the Abacha crackdown. Fifth columnists infiltrated them and politicians in the khaki attire of unionists came to power. Comrade Adams Oshiomhole was elected president of NLC in 1998. He used the NLC to further his own political ambition. He has since served as governor twice: Now, he’s a senator.
Has Adams ever been on the side of the people?
On the page where McHenry records the events of the last day of the convention, September 18, 1787, he wrote: “A lady asked Dr. Franklin Well Doctor what have we got a republic or a monarchy — A republic replied the Doctor if you can keep it.” — Julie Miller, Library of Congress Blogger
What Happened to Our Civic Space?
Last month, Comrade Joe Ajaero, the incumbent president of NLC, went to Governor Hope Uzodinma’s Imo State on union business. Security agents slapped him around and tossed him outside the state boundaries. About three weeks later, the NLC and TUC called for a nationwide strike to protest government highhandedness and general hardship. It failed with a dud. There was no response.
The next time we saw the NLC president was in Senator Tinubu’s junket to the Climate conference in Dubai.
Senator Tinubu has unleased a siege directly on the Nigerian people by total state capture something not even General Abacha could do. There is no institution of state that has any kind of independence; not the police, secret police, judiciary, or civil service. The mass media has lost her dynamism and direction. PDP and the Labour Party lack the capacity and purpose to deliver effective opposition. The unions and civil society groups like NMA, NBA, NANS, are now a shadow of themselves. They no longer resist on the side of the people.
Massacre At Lekki Tollgate
“Nigeria’s younger generation should be positively disruptive to get power now but not through violence!” — President Olusegun Obasanjo
It’s difficult to place Obasanjo’s clarion call to the youth in any positive historic light. I hope he had begun the process of empowering the youth at the beginning of the Fourth Republic. anyway, three years ago, the youth mobilized on social media and converged at Lekki Tollgate in a peaceful protest against police brutality. Governor Jide Sanwo-Olu with help from General Buhari brutalized the protesters and dispersed them.
Twenty persons or more lost their lives.
Today the power of the social media has grown and there’s greater awareness of the responsibility of citizens. But it all seems limited to the social media. Senator Tinubu’s government seems to take some kind of perverted pleasure in aggravating Nigerians: They will provide all the lawmakers Prado Jeeps because of bad roads; give the Veep a “befitting residence” with a remodeling that comes with a 15.5 billion naira price tag; and for the climate change conference, mentioned earlier, more than 1000 persons accompanied the president to Dubai.
Plenty of outrage and response, but there is no structure or capacity to scale up action for change.
The death of Chief Frank Kokori at this point in our history seems like a mockery by the gods to remind us of just how much we lost. Kokori, keep your spirit alive in our midst lest we diminish your legacy. So long, happy warrior!
