A group of human rights community had gathered in Lagos to celebrate the giant strides of one of them Dr Adewale Peter Jude Balogun who passed away after surgery complications last year.
Newsconnect reports that a day of Tribute was organised to honour him at St. Thomas More Catholic Church Hall, Opposite Sports Centre, University of Lagos (UNILAG), Akoka, Lagos .
The wife of the deceased Dr Ayeni Balogun in an interview with Newsconnect at the event said Comrade Balogun fought, saw and conquered.
While describing the democracy her husband fought for, Ayeni said;
“It is unfortunate that we are still where we are by now. I am happy to see youths here today, it means there are people to follow-up from where my Husband stopped.
“There is still hope for Nigeria, there is still hope for the masses, as long as we have people like you, ready to fight for your rights, ensuring that people can talk to power and tell power the truth, so that the right things can be done, so that we can have a better society, society that my generation dreamed of.
“We hope that it will materialise in our own lifetime. The sufferings of our people would come to an end and the right people will be put in power, and the masses themselves are sensitised enough to vote for the right people.
“What we have now is nothing but money politics. That will not take us anywhere. Considering the current state of economy, the middle class and the masses are almost the same.
“I am happy they will now come together and ensure the right thing is done during our lifetime I hope”.
Some of the attributes she wants young activists and politicians to emulate from her late husband’s character include listening ear, compassionate heart, and not destroying voices that are not praising you for not doing the right things. Again, she said;
“We need a change from the money politics that we have, but again it starts from me and you. When we talk about Government, Who is government ? You and I are government whether you like it or not.
“So it is those that we vote for that represent all of us. So we all have a role to play, I pray we rise to the challenge and do the right thing for a better future for the nation”. She said.
Nike Ransome Kuti also described the struggle of Dr Balogun in an interview with journalists at the day of Tribute.
She said;
“He had been part of the fight of what we called Democracy in Nigeria. He was part of the Pro-democracy movement. The group of people with courage who stood firm to get the Military out of power.
“Once the Military was out of power, he now started to work with the various civil society groups and Nigerians who wanted good for Nigeria to try to entrench democracy.
“We come from a background of a Military mind set where people in power think they are in control and they don’t understand that they are accountable to the citizens of this country. That they are required to live by certain standards in accordance to the constitution.
“Dr Balogun spent the last few of his lives trying to entrench what we would call true democracy”. She said
Towards inspiring young people in becoming comrades, Nike said young people have to envision where we all have the same rights.
Where we are all entitled to the same standard of Education. Where we are entitled to the same standard of health.
“We have to fight for it as young people because nobody is going to give it to you on a plate. The people in government right now enjoy a special elite life style. They corner the resources of this country and live in luxury instead of developing our country.
“If the money we generated in our country was used to develop our country, our country would be such a great nation. If you look at other countries that leaders have invested in their country, places like Singapore, Malaysia, you would see the difference between the country that they have with the country that we have today.
“We haven’t even began to start. The first step for young people to envision how they want their country to be. Having done that, then you work towards it.
“If you sit down pray to God or you are on Twitter ,or you are a warrior and you don’t actually come out and organise unfortunately things are going to get worse.
“We need to find the strength to come out and start organizing with people who want a better Nigeria”. She said.
The Chairman of the Tribute Organizing Committee Comrade Lanre Arogundade who is the Executive Director National Press Center and Former Chairman of Lagos State Council of Nigerian Journalists reiterated the vanguard role Dr Balogun played in the struggle for democracy in Nigeria.
In an interview with Newsconnect at the event. Lanre talked about the significance of honoring him and the message participants should take home.
“We felt we should honour him publicly, he wasn’t loud about his contributions, he was always there. Many people didn’t know. The struggle of Medical doctors in the 1980s, the struggle for democracy.
“If we look at what he was doing for us at Center for Constitutional Governance (CCG), essentially it was for us to have a better country. A country where citizens rights respected, where Government is held accountable, where we have freedom of expression and all that.
“Regrettably, most of these dreams of his which he fought for we can’t say we have realised them at this point in time, these problems still remain with us. We are still not happy that when citizens go out to complain these problems, the reaction of government or security agencies is to clamp down the tension and treat them as enemies of the state.
“Certainly they are not enemies of the people. This event is to remind us about where we are and to challenge us to fight for good governance in our country because we believe that would be a better way to immortalize a person like Dr Adewale Balogun.
“The message I want people to know is that you can make impact without making a noice, you can make enormous sacrifices. Enormous sacrifices, there can never be progress.
“These were the things that he did, for which he is being celebrated. For me the takeaways from here is that his struggle has not been in vain, even though we say we have not realized his dreams. He led a life of impact and the footprint is there for us to see”.