UK councillor charged for saying Nigerians should be melted to fill potholes

Yesterday a UK councillor was charged over a post he made in 2024 where he said Nigerians should be 'melted to fill potholes'. The man is Adam Lowe, a member of the Green Party in Leeds. This is not a joke. He wrote that in a public forum and now the Crown Prosecution Service has decided to charge him under the Malicious Communications Act.

Let me tell you what this means. In 2024, when this was trending, I read the original post. It was not a slip of the tongue. It was a deliberate dehumanising statement. He said we should be melted like tar to fill the holes on British roads. The same people who clean their hospitals, drive their buses, work their night shifts. The same Nigerians paying taxes in that country. The Green Party initially suspended him but now they are standing by him while the case goes to court.

What bothers me is not just the racism. It is the casualness of it. That a public official could say something like that about an entire nationality and walk free for two years before any action is taken. And even now, some people in the UK are defending him, saying it was free speech. Free speech does not include calling for the melting of human beings. I want to ask my fellow Nigerians here, how many more of these incidents must we witness before we demand real consequences from these countries that preach tolerance but practice selective outrage?