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Tag: Soyinka

  • Fulani Herdsman Entered Soyinka’s Compound To Search For Missing Cow- police

    Fulani Herdsman Entered Soyinka’s Compound To Search For Missing Cow- police

    The Police in Ogun State have reacted to a viral video claiming that Fulani herdsmen had invaded Professor Wole Soyinka’s house in Abeokuta, the Ogun State capital.

    In an attempt to set the record straight, the police said a young Fulani man, Awalu Muhammad, whose cow had got missing entered Soyinka’s vicinity in search of the animal.

    “While the Fulani man was searching for the stray cow around Kemta estate where Prof Wole soyinka’s house is located, the Prof. himself, who was going out then saw the Fulani man with some of the cows and he came down to ask where the man was heading to with the cows. He there and then asked the fulani man to move the cattle away from the vicinity,” the police spokesman in Ogun, Abimbola Oyeyemi, said in a statement.

    Oyeyemi said the DPO of Kemta division, who heard about the incident quickly moved to the scene with his patrol team.

    It was said that the entire place was inspected by the DPO and it was established that it was just a case of stray cow, saying that nothing was damaged or tampered with.

    “It was therefore a thing of surprise to see a video trending on social media that the respected Professor Wole soyinka’s house was invaded by Fulani herdersmen with the view to attack or kill him.

    “The video is nothing but a calculated attempt by mischief makers to cause panic in the mind of people. There is nothing like invasion of Prof Wole soyinka’s house or any form of attack on his person,” he said.

  • Herders: Admit you are the matron of the cattle rearers association – Soyinka to Buhari

    Herders: Admit you are the matron of the cattle rearers association – Soyinka to Buhari

    Nobel Laureate, Prof Wole Soyinka, has urged President Muhammadu Buhari to order the Army to back Nigerians in flushing out killer herdsmen.

    Soyinka made the remark while urging Buhari to publicly renounce the activities of killer herdsmen across the country.

    The Nobel Laureate made the call in an interview with BBC Pidgin.

    Speaking on what he is expecting from Buhari, Soyinka said: “Address the nation in a very stern, unambiguous terms.

    “Say openly, yes, I know I am the matron of the cattle rearers association, etc.

    “I am a cattle rancher myself, it is a business and I run my business on business terms.

    “I do not run my business by killing people. I do not run my business by raping, displacing, torturing and I don’t run my business by occupying land that does not belong to me.

    “Whatever comes to you for illegal occupation or for trespassing in other people’s property is your business.

    “And I am ordering the Army, I am ordering all the security forces to back citizens’ efforts in flushing you people out.

    “I expect nothing less even at this stage.

    “This is the language I expect from President Buhari and as long as that language does not come, I must consider him quite complacent with what is going on because the buck stops at his desk.”

    Nigeria has been experiencing crisis between herdsmen and farmers across the country.

    This crisis had led to loss of lives, property destroyed and cattle killed.

    Only recently, the Eastern Security Network, ESN, had chased Fulani herdsmen out of Isiukwuato area of Abia State.

  • Wole Soyinka backs Kukah, says religionists twisted cleric’s Christmas speech

    Wole Soyinka backs Kukah, says religionists twisted cleric’s Christmas speech

    Nobel laureate, Prof. Wole Soyinka, has lashed out at those who criticised the Christmas Day speech of the Bishop of Sokoto Catholic Diocese, Rev. Fr. Matthew Kukah.

    The playwright said he had studied the transcript as reported in the media and found nothing in it that denigrated Islam. He, however, noted he was not among the most religion besotted inhabitants of the globe.

    Kukah in the speech summed up the country’s challenges ranging from insecurity, poverty to frustration under the regime of the President, Major General Muhammadu Buhari (retd).

    Soyinka spoke in a statement on Monday titled, “The Kukah offence and ongoing offensives.”

    He said, “One of the ironic features of religionists is, one is forced to conclude, a need to be offended. It is as if religion cannot exist unless it is nourished with the broth of offence. This may be due to inbuilt insecurity, a fear that even the ascribed absolutes of faith may be founded on nothing more than idealistic human projections, not grounded in anything durable or immutable. Hence the over prickliness, aggressiveness, sometimes even bullying tendencies and imperious posturing. This leads to finding enemies where there are none. In certain social climates, it degenerates into inventing enmities in order to entrench theocratic power.

    “In its own peculiar way, this is actually a rational proceeding. A perceived threat to a collectivity tends to rally even waverers round the flag. The core mission of faith custodians then becomes presenting religion as being constantly under siege. It all contributes to interpreting even utterances of no hostile intent as “enemy action.”

    “There is a deliberate, emotive displacement of central concern. It is calculated avoidance, diversionary, and thus, nationally unhealthy. Humans should not attempt to play the ostrich.

    He noted that Kukah’s Christmas message, and the ensuing offensives, could not be more fortuitous, coming at a time “when a world powerful nation, still reeling from an unprecedented assault on her corporate definition, is now poised to set, at the very least, a symbolic seal on her commitment to the democratic ideal.”

    According to Soyinka, some of the most extreme of the violent forces that recently assaulted the governance citadel of the world’s powerful nation sprung from religious and quasi-religious affirmations.

    He added that the condition still enabled many of them to be brainwashed into accepting literally, and uncritically, indeed as gospel truth, any pronouncement, however outrageous and improbable, that emerged from their leadership.

    He added, “It should not come as a surprise that a section of our Islamic community, not only claims to have found offence in Bishop Kukah’s New Year address, what is bothersome, even unwholesome, is the embedded threat to storm his ‘Capitol’ and eject him, simply for ‘speaking in tongues.’ Any pluralistic society must emphatically declare such a response unacceptable.

    “On a personal note, I have studied the transcript as reported in the media and found nothing in it that denigrates Islam but then, I must confess, I am not among the most religion besotted inhabitants of the globe. That, I have been told, disqualifies me from even commenting on the subject and, quite frankly, I wish that was indeed the case. Life would far less be complicated. However, the reverse position does not seem to be adopted by such religionists in a spirit of equity. They do not hesitate to intervene; indeed, some consider themselves divinely empowered to intervene, even dictate in secular life.”

    Soyinka stressed that everyone should be reminded that religion was upheld, and practised, not by robots, not by creatures from outer space, not by abstract precepts, but by human beings, full of quirks, frailties and conceits, filled with their own individual and collective worth, and operate in the here and now of this earth.

    “That makes religion the business of everyone, especially when it is manipulated to instil fear, discord and separatism in social consciousness. The furore over Bishop Kukah’s statement offers us another instance of that domineering tendency, one whose consequences are guaranteed to spill over into the world of both believers and non-believers, unless checked and firmly contained. In this nation of religious opportunism of the most destructive kind especially, fuelled again and again by failure to learn from past experience, we must at least learn to nip extremist instigations in the bud,” he said.

  • Soyinka laments insecurity, says Nigeria’s sovereignty taken over by armed groups

    Soyinka laments insecurity, says Nigeria’s sovereignty taken over by armed groups

    Prof. Wole Soyinka, has called for a national mobilisation to combat the menace of insecurity bedevilling the country.
    He also said Nigeria’s sovereignty had been taken away by Boko Haram terrorists, bandits and other criminal elements.Uuu

    In a direct reference to President Muhammadu Buhari, the Nobel laureate said the President could not end the country’s insecurity challenge, sitting down in Aso Rock.

    According to him, Nigeria has reached the “stage of desperation”. The government should be willing to “pay people to come and help us” in defence against Boko Haram insurgents, bandits, and other criminal elements.

    Soyinka said, “There are those on whose shoulders must be placed the primary responsibility and that include some former Heads of State who refused to see the inevitability of what we are going through right now.

    “I am very glad that the northern elite is now speaking up, boldly and practically, (and are also) now taking measures which they should have taken years ago. They’ve moved beyond the unbelievable policies of actually paying killers to stop killing. I don’t want to mention names, but some admitted that they were paying protection money to killers instead of dealing with that cancer in the only way they should, which is excision, to take out killers instead of giving them money.

    “You don’t appease evil, and we are dealing with evil; there is no other word, we are dealing with the proliferation, the enthronement of evil in society. And unfortunately, we have encouraged its manifestation, its proliferation, its entrenchment.

    “So, let them get away with the issue of sovereignty. If they have to pay people to come and help us, then call them whatever you want. Please go ahead because we’ve reached that stage of desperation.

    “But I will prefer a general mobilisation in which people are trained, farmers especially are trained to work with the hoe in one hand and the gun in the other hand, ready to protect their lives, their harvests and the rest of us.

    “We are not unique; history is full of those situations. I would like to see a national mobilisation. Let’s be practical.”

    Reporters reported that at least 43 rice farmers were beheaded by Boko Haram terrorists in Borno State last November.

    Borno State Governor, Babagana Zulum, had consequently urged the Federal Government to engage mercenaries and the militaries of neighbouring countries, like Chad and Cameroon, to crush the over decade-old Boko Haram insurgency.

    Soyinka added, “From a self-protective point of view, it is a common problem; it is a national, collective issue. Don’t just sit there and think that you can solve it from Aso Rock; no. This now concerns even the lowest common citizens in this nation because that lowest, that most impotent individual has become a prime target. So, it’s a collective issue. I’m not surprised some governors now say let us reach outside help; I have also said something. I don’t say mercenaries necessarily, but this has gone beyond a Nigerian problem.

    “Instead of that, what do I hear? Somebody gets on the podium and say, ‘The sovereignty of this nation cannot be challenged. Please, don’t let us hear any more of that rubbish. The sovereignty of this nation is in the hands of the murdering herdsmen. The sovereignty of this nation has already been taken over by Boko Haram; it’s been taken over by ISWAP, it’s been taken over by those with absolutely no respect for what is called national integrity.”

    Soyinka also said Buhari’s nepotistic tendencies were outrageous, adding that the President appointed wrong people into the wrong places.

    Soyinka’s statement comes two weeks after the Bishop of Sokoto Catholic Diocese, Mathew Kukah, also accused the President of nepotism.

    Meanwhile, Soyinka also warned that the Western Nigeria Security Network, otherwise known as Amotekun, must not transform into another form of the disbanded Special Anti-Robbery Squad.

    The writer said Amotekun operatives must be trained in ethics to not end on the wrong side of history.

    Soyinka said, “Community policing, like Amotekun, is a recognition of the fact that the civic part of the entire national polity has got to wake up in not just its defence but also survival.

    “I have told them that anytime they want us to come and assist; we will come even if it is just on the ethical session so that as you are training them to defend us, we are also training their minds so that Amotekun does not become another SARS – very important. We must do everything together.

    “It is about time the public examined itself; what are we made up of? Are there those among us who, if they got into power, will behave exactly as those kinds of agencies which we are repudiating and against which we are protesting? There is no excuse for the brutality that occurred in the wake of the noise, rumour or reality of people being shot at the Lekki tollgate.”

  • I think it is best for my sanity to avoid Buhari’s Administration- Wole Soyinka

    I think it is best for my sanity to avoid Buhari’s Administration- Wole Soyinka

    Nobel Laureate, Prof. Wole Soyinka, has claimed he avoids talking about President Muhammadu Buhari, for the sake of his sanity.

    Soyinka stated this while answering questions on Kaftan TV.

    He described the new Lagos-Abeokuta-Ibadan standard gauge train as marvelous and long overdue.

    Speaking onboard the new train, Soyinka said he would not like to talk about Buhari government because he imagined it does not exist.

    When asked whether the new train was a plus to Buhari, he replied, “I don’t want to talk about Muhammadu Buhari’s administration

    “I think it is best for my sanity just to avoid that overall question.

    “I can take bits and pieces of Nigeria’s present predicament, but I think for one’s sense of balance, one must forget the existence of the Buhari administration.”

  • Uzodinma Vs Ihedioha: Soyinka denies being on team monitoring Supreme Court Ruling

    Uzodinma Vs Ihedioha: Soyinka denies being on team monitoring Supreme Court Ruling

    The Nobel laureate, Prof. Wole Soyinka, in a statement on Tuesday said that contrary to the widespread report, he had nothing to do with politics and any group, adding that those peddling wrong information about him should desist from doing so. Soyinka said, “A link to a report by one of the national newspapers on the Uzodimma vs Ihedioha electoral tussle has just been sent to me. “That report claims that I have been engaged to serve on a monitoring team regarding a forthcoming Supreme Court review of that case.

    “I know nothing of this development and I am not involved in any aspect of the tussle. “I know nothing of this Third Force Democracy whatever. I have no intention of participating in any judicial monitoring activity and demand to be kept out of any such false attributions. “Hopefully, someday in the distant future, it will be possible for the nation to regain the respect of the world in its democratic claims. “That time, alas, is not immediately apparent.” On Tuesday, a seven-man panel of judges of the Supreme Court adjourned ruling on the review of the earlier verdict of January 14 until March 2 after Ihedioha’s legal team ask for time to file all process of court.