Nobel laureate, Wole Soyinka, has responded to criticisms he received from supporters of the Labour Party (LP) regarding his comments about the party’s vice-presidential candidate, Datti Baba-Ahmed. Soyinka had criticized Baba-Ahmed’s remarks, which he claimed contained “fascistic language”.
Baba-Ahmed had said that the country had no president-elect despite the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) announcing Bola Tinubu of the All Progressives Congress (APC) as the winner of the election. Baba-Ahmed argued that Tinubu would be leading an unconstitutional government if sworn into office because he had not met the requirements of the law.
Soyinka was one of many stakeholders who knocked Baba-Ahmed over his comments. In a subsequent statement, the Nobel laureate said he warned Peter Obi, presidential candidate of the LP, that his supporters, dubbed ‘Obidients,’ may cost him the election. However, Soyinka’s comments elicited anger from the ‘Obidients,’, especially on social media platforms.
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Soyinka responded to the criticism he received from the ‘Obidients’ in a statement on Friday, in which he accused the LP of sowing seeds of fascism and generating a climate of fear. He asked the LP supporters to refrain from attacking and embrace fair hearing in situations of conflict.
“It would appear that a record discharge of toxic sludge from our notorious smut factory is currently clogging the streets and sewers of the Republic of Liars. It goes to prove the point that provoked the avalanche EXACTLY! The seeds of incipient fascism in the political arena have evidently matured. A climate of fear is being generated,” Soyinka said.
“The refusal to entertain corrective criticism, even differing perspectives of the same position, has become a badge of honour and certificate of commitment.
“What is at stake, ultimately, is – Truth, and at a most elementary level of social regulation: when you are party to a conflict, you do not attempt to intimidate the arbiter, attempt to dictate the outcome, or impugn, without credible cause, his or her neutrality even before the hearing has commenced.
That is a ground rule of just proceeding. Short of this, Truth remains permanently elusive.
“The ensuing cacophony has been truly bewildering. It strikes me as a possible ploy to smother recent provocations by other, far more trenchant issues, such as revelations of declarations of a religious war.
“If so, let it be known that I have long declared war against religious fundamentalism, the nature of which justifies the butchery, kidnapping, and enslavement of students in the name of religion.”
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