EndSARS organizers turn to Bitcoin after conventional fundraising channels are disrupted
Nigeria's Feminist Coalition used Bitcoin donations to support the #EndSARS protest movement after conventional fundraising channels came under pressure.
During the October #EndSARS protests against police brutality, the Feminist Coalition raised and disbursed money for medical care, legal assistance, food and other support for peaceful demonstrators. As conventional payment channels became difficult to use, the group publicized Bitcoin as an alternative way to receive donations.
The episode gave Bitcoin a concrete censorship-resistance use case outside its usual investment narrative. Donors could transmit value across borders without relying on a single Nigerian bank or payment processor to approve the transfer.
The precise causes of every interruption to conventional fundraising were contested at the time, so the significance is not that Bitcoin 'caused' the protest movement or replaced the banking system. It is that activists turned to Bitcoin when access to familiar payment rails became politically sensitive.