Nigeria’s SARS Protests Crowdfunded By Bitcoin

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Cryptocurrency is finding new purpose now that Nigeria has joined Belarus as a place where anti-government protests are being crowdfunded by Bitcoin. Belarus had setup a fund fueled by both Bitcoin and Ethereum a few weeks ago already to help citizens get rid of President Lukashenko.

Africa has seen the way this was organized and now Nigerian youths, who are protesting against the Special Anti-robbery Squad (SARS), are apparently copying this plan.

Dear Nigerian government
You really should be ashamed of yourself.
Buhari and Osinbajo need to be ashamed of themselves #EndSars #EndPoliceBrutalityinNigeria #SARSMUSTEND #EndSWAT https://t.co/vzYThGr9Y3

— Aisha Yesufu (@AishaYesufu) October 19, 2020

As Reuters reported yesterday, the anti-SARS protests in Nigeria are swelling ever larger, certainly after Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey last week announced his support and asked people to donate money.

Spot checks

The tech industry in Africa’s most populous nation claims that they are being singled out for spot checks which often result in them having to pay bribes.

Donate via #Bitcoin to help #EndSARS 🇳🇬 https://t.co/kf305SFXze

— jack (@jack) October 14, 2020

Mr Iyinoluwa Aboyeji, who is the co-founder of the payments firm Flutterware, that started the movement, claims his employees get harassed constantly. He stated:

This happens all the time to young people because they believe we are young and not supposed to have that kind of money.

Feminist coalition’s bitcoin account already has over 1 million in donations already. The government think they’re mad? Welcome to digital madness.

— Elon Mosque (@That_IjebuBadoo) October 13, 2020

As Nigerian banks started freezing the protesting group’s accounts, probably at the demand of the government who don’t want TV screens worldwide to show mass protests in Lagos, the protesters started fundraising in cryptocurrency, with Bitcoin being the most popular so far.

Nigeria is Africa’s largest cryptocurrency market. Just last month, the New York Times ran an article which claimed that Bitcoin had even dethroned the once mighty US dollar over there already.