Features
Why sell your freedom to bodyguards? Part 2
As previously narrated, people who have nothing to hide or be afraid of, do not have need for bodyguards.
Usually, when your conscience is clear, one does not see the need for bodyguards for protection against harm. I talked about the former Uruguayan President, who went on retirement and was living in a small town and was using an old small vehicle.
What will cause anybody to want to attack him to steal that vehicle which is unattractive? However, if he had looted the nations coffers and living an ostentatious lifestyle, obviously he would have cause to worry about the likelihood of someone attempting to attack him.
There is an adage that ‘what evil men do, lives after them.’ A lot of African leaders go about with a lot of bodyguards because of their evil deeds, ranging from looting of national resources, harassing of political opponents, human rights abuses and sheer greediness among others.
They, therefore, have no choice but to surround themselves with bodyguards all the time.
When bodyguards become a part of your life, it is like you do no longer have a private life. Your life becomes like that of a prisoner and the only difference is that you are not confined to a particular space.
Sometimes, a person being guarded has a somewhat restricted life. Depending on the degree of threat he or she faces, some places can be a no go area.
In some instances, bodyguards determine whether he should continue to stay or leave an event immediately.
Therefore, although a person being guarded is not in prison, decisions regarding his or her safety, is always in the hands of the bodyguards.
Secrets that should not be made public, comes out mainly through these bodyguards because they are always in close proximity with all issues both domestic and official.
A very interesting case study is the President of one of the Eastern African countries, who at the age of 81, still wants to contest the Presidential elections, claiming that he has one more project to complete so the people should vote for him for the last time.
This is a man who has difficulty in walking briskly and yet still wants to occupy the high office of the land. This is a man who has been the Head of state for 39 years and one would expect that his country would be heaven on earth and yet the reality is far from this picture.
He has rigged elections, harassed political opponents and has basically neutralised the opposition. Such a person clearly would fear for his life because he knows he has enemies.
Definitely if you trample upon the freedoms of people, at some point they would like to take revenge and so if you are the perpetrator, you would like to protect yourself by employing bodyguards.
Every human being naturally wants to be alone sometimes and would not want to be under scrutiny all the time, which is the exact opposite of life with bodyguards entails. There are certain phone calls that you cannot make or receive unless you are in your room at home or in the office.
When the average person can go to a public place to interact with friends without any worries, a high profile person cannot do that so in a sense you are in prison. Only difference is that, there are no physical walls around you.
When this realisation dawned on me, l do not envy high profile people one bit, especially Presidents because I love my freedom and would never exchange it for any kind of restricted lifestyle, despite the prestige that comes with being a high profile person. God bless.
By Laud Kissi-Mensah