Uzoma Okere is a well-known name now in Nigeria and beyond. Before now, she was just your regular 27-year-old girl privileged to drive a car in a country where many 27-year-olds don’t even have admission to a school or a certificate or a job. Many who knew her probably didn’t know that she is the daughter of the sergeant-at-arms at the National Assembly, a retired Colonel, Emmanuel Okere. Now we know.

Miss Okere didn’t ask for these few weeks of fame. She had clocked off from work and was behind the wheels of her car, returning home to slippers and supper. Then palaver crossed her path. The name of this palaver is a military convoy, sirening behind her on a road called Muri Okunola Street in Victoria Island, trying to clear the way for a Rear- Admiral, Harry Arogundade.

Like all roads in Lagos, Muri Okunola Street is a narrow road and when the traffic is thick at the close of work, all narrow roads become even narrower. Miss Okere apparently did not scamper out of the way for the military big wig, may be because there was no way to go or she simply didn’t think any road user, siren or no siren, military or no military, had a higher right to use of the road than she had. She didn’t know she was walking the knife-edge of danger. We note that all men have the capacity for cruelty but I suspect that military training wakes up this capacity with military alacrity. So it was that the navy men felt that this bloody civilian needed to be taught a lesson. They beat her black and blue and tore her shirt, leaving the two round objects under her shirt sticking out.

An innocent bystander who saw the drama and had technology in his hands went to work. Before long this tragic sitcom was on the internet and on other media. The next day or so, the Lagos State Governor, Babatunde Raji Fashola, was interviewing the young lady, forehead heavily bandaged and promising that she would get justice. The matter is now before a  court in Lagos but the uproar is not about to go away.

This is because the navy made a public relations boo-boo in the first place. It claimed that the lady was brutalised because of provocation, and also that the lady grabbed the horse whip and lashed the navy fellows. What level of provocation could warrant that level of brutalisation? And what had her shirt got to do with provocation? Or did her shirt provoke their lust?

I have seen photographs of the girl and she’s not built exactly like a tank. I wonder how such a fragile-looking girl would twist the arms of a trained military man, and grab the horse whip from him. If there is such a weakling in the Nigerian Navy, then we have many things to worry about.

The public is provoked by this incident and they have said so. The reason is not because Miss Okere is young or is a woman or is the daughter of the sergeant-at-arms at the National Assembly. It is because brutalisation is the known face of the Nigerian military. This is considered an act of impunity because it happens all the time, under the military, under the civilian, in towns and cities, in villages and hamlets. There are many unreported incidents in Lagos. These uniformed fellows believe in the casual acceptance of violence as a way of life. They have turned Lagos and some other cities into an urban combat zone. Luckily, this is not the case of the unknown soldier.

I understand that Rear Admiral Arogundade was not at the scene of the incident. Those who know him say he is a nice man and that he bought a new shirt for Miss Okere. This is not an act of philanthropy or altruism. It is an act of repentance. He must go further. The naval ratings who brutalised Miss Okere are his agents and he is vicariously responsible for their actions even though he may not have asked them to do what they did. He must apologise to Miss Okere. As for the ratings, we await the decision of the military authorities.

I see that the Navy Spokesman, Commodore David Nabaida, has been going to various media in a bid to limit the damage done to the image of the navy. The unfortunate thing is that he is not offering what the public wants to hear: apology. He is saying all the wrong things. Now listen to this: “The lady (Miss Okere) attended Navy Secondary School, Ojo, her father was a colonel in the Nigerian Army, why should anybody subject her to that (brutalisation)? We have mothers, sisters and daughters. We are not animals.” What has her being an ex-student of a navy school got to do with anything? Or her father’s profession or rank? Don’t we have inter-military conflicts from time to time? Or do military men brutalise only people who did not attend their schools?

The military men who beat up defenceless civilians are obviously not animals but they behave as such. The uniform is no licence for brigandage. The authorities must call them to order for the very people they brutalise are the ones who put food on their tables and uniforms on their backs.