The embattled lawmaker representing Kogi West Senatorial
District, Senator Dino Melaye, has thanked Nigerians for standing by him during
his travails in the hands of those he described as the “State.”
Melaye, in a lengthy write-up posted on Facebook on
Monday, alleged that his trials were a plot by the “State” to silence him.
The lawmaker, however, said that he is now more resolute
in his convictions.
Melaye is being prosecuted by the Nigeria Police in two
separate courts.
While he is standing trial in a Lokoja, Kogi State,
court on charges bordering on gun-running, he is also on trial in an Abuja
court for attempted suicide, among other charges.
The senator wrote: “Someone once said that rock bottom
is good solid ground and a dead-end street is just a place to turn around.
“In the last few weeks, I have been taken to the good
solid ground at the rock bottom and they couldn’t go further. I have been
brought to the dead-end street, but with you standing by my side, I have turned
around and bounced back to the chagrin of those who sought to seal my lips from
speaking out against tyranny, politics of oppression and blackmail.
“They unleashed an endless barrage of physical,
psychological, metaphysical and emotional torture and assault on me, but
through the power of the Most High and you, the good people of Nigeria, we have
once again seen the triumph of truth over lies and good over evil.
“It was Edmund Burke who was quoted as saying that when
bad men combine, the good must associate; else they will fall one by one … in a
contemptible struggle.
“I am, of all men, a blessed man, to have courageous and
dependable people like you as my fellow soldiers in the struggle to free us
from the shackles of political strongholds and tyranny.”
He added, “The state unleashed its raw power on me and
released a 200-man-strong fully-armed policemen on a man without a knife or a
bullet. It did this because I called injustice by its name and called for
accountability. For this, they sought to break my spirit and destroy me
permanently.
“In their moment of reign, I was fully shackled. With my
hands tied to my back and hurled into a dark solitary confinement waiting for
the butchers knife, you, my people, stood by me. You came against a raging fire
and stood up against tyranny, lies, filthy lucre, injustice, persecution and
greed.
“While in the dark and unable to fight for myself, they
sought to take my mandate, which you had freely given to me, but you answered
back and quenched deceit in its wake. You stood resolute and unflinching and
defended your mandate to me.
“I thank you from the bottom of my heart. In their
attempt to break me, they have made me stronger.”
The lawmaker thanked all those who stood in his defence
and visited him “after I was injured and subsequently detained at the hospital.”
He said, “You have strengthened my resolve and hardened
my flesh against those who seek to devour and make meat of me. You have once
again proved to me the axiom in the saying that ‘in prosperity, our friends
know us; in adversity, we know our friends.’ I am very grateful. For your sake,
I remain unbowed.
“I know many of you worry about my safety and life in
this new dispensation where life is no longer sacred in Nigeria, but do not be
troubled. My bond of love for you, my good people, makes it impossible for me
to consider my self-risk, safety, comfort or opportunity in my unflinching
commitment to stand up for you, to stand up for truth and if necessary, die for
the truth and the emancipation of our people from the chains of poverty and
oppression.
“Though they raise spurious allegations against me, bear
false witness against me, though they seek to frighten me and lure me into
their bounty of evil, I will fear no foe.
“Yes, my traducers and torturers wish that I keep quiet;
though they seek to seal my lips, to silence my voice forever, I remain ever
more resolute and committed. I am committed to this cause for which I am a
politician; the cause of the downtrodden, to speak truth to power and stand
against oppression and injustice. On these issues, there will be no compromise.
I owe no apologies and I tender none.
“Like I have always said, ‘you speak the truth, you die;
you don’t speak the truth, you die. I have chosen to speak the truth, dead or
alive. Reverend Martin Luther King Jnr. once said, ‘Cowardice asks the
question: is it safe? Expediency asks the question: is it politics? Vanity asks
the question: is it popular? But Conscience asks the question: is it right?’
And there comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe nor
political nor popular, but one must take it because it is right.
“To my people, I promise you this and this only. I have
taken my position; I will not hold back, I will not hold my peace, I will not
be shut down, neither will I shut up, not as long as injustice and falsehood
continues to reign.
“As long as I will live, I will not bow to Baal.”
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