Nobel laureate, Prof. Wole Soyinka got a lot of flak from Obidients in the past week, although the jury is still out on whether the opprobrium directed his way was justified.
Many influential persons expectedly rose in his defence, including former Deputy Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Prof. Kingsley Moghalu, and the APC media apparatchik.
At 88, Soyinka has seen it all. He won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1986, becoming the first African to win the coveted prize, and has taught in some of the most prestigious universities in the world. He also fought valiantly against military rule, even at great risk to personal safety, and was arrested and/or imprisoned on numerous occasions. It is therefore not unexpected that he commands enormous respect at home and abroad and is arguably Nigeria’s most-recognized academic globally.
However, irrespective of their intellectual stature, no human being is infallible. One noticeable fallacy in the narrative of those rushing to Soyinka’s defence is this unspoken yet loud undercurrent of the Nobel laureate’s infallibility. To accord respect to a deserving personality is one thing, to venerate them as a tin god that can do no wrong is another thing entirely. The latter appears to be what Soyinka’s supporters are doing.
One individual that displayed this undue veneration of Soyinka is Moghalu, who referred to the playwright’s critics as “uncultured and unlettered” but later apologised after he was mercilessly lambasted by Obidients.
Justified or not, the recent angst directed at the Nobel laureate by Obidients appears to stem from his frequent hobnobbing with the political class, some of which ended controversially, in the recent past. This literary genius has tried to cast himself as an impartial and dispassionate critic in Nigeria’s sociopolitical arena. Evidence, at least from the last decade or so, suggests otherwise.
In January 2016, months after he was sworn in as Governor of Rivers State, Nyesom Wike accused his predecessor, Rotimi Amaechi, of spending N82 million to host a three-hour dinner for Soyinka.
Speaking through his Commissioner for Information, Dr Austin Tam-George, the governor said that the state would demand a refund from the Nobel laureate if he collected cash from the N82 million.
Soyinka fulminated against the Wike administration in a statement, describing the controversy as “abominable distractions” and insisting that it was not his business to know how much was expended by his friend in hosting him. Many commentators faulted this line of thought, maintaining that it was Soyinka’s duty, as a social reformer he claimed to be, to be concerned if a state government that was owing salaries and pensions should expend such amount on hosting him to dinner.
Although Amaechi denied wasting taxpayer’s money in that manner, described the accusation as a “silly distraction” and challenged his successor to go to court to prove his case, the negative PR for Soyinka could not be missed.
Amaechi is not the only All Progressives Congress (APC) politician that Soyinka has frolicked with. In August 2015, he hosted then-Governor Adams Oshiomhole of Edo State and his new wife, Iara, to an exclusive dinner at his Abeokuta home. The Nobel laureate was full of praises for his guest whom he described as “a worthy ambassador” of the nation’s progressive community. Guess who else was at the event? Immediate past governors of Lagos and Rivers, Babatunde Fashola (SAN) and Rotimi Amaechi (again!) respectively.
At a lecture to mark his 76th birthday many years ago, were Fashola, Nuhu Ribadu, and other top politicians that were members of the APC’s progenitors or would later join the party.
It is also on record that the Nobel laureate openly backed the APC’s Muhammadu Buhari in his 2015 presidential run which caused a major shift in Nigeria’s political history.
So, his soft spot for the APC and many of its chieftains is not in doubt.
In a 2018 article published in THISDAY, a political commentator wrote, “This is not the fiery legend we once knew, and for some of us who still treasure the Soyinka of old, we should all help retain whatever memories of his past interventions that shaped our admiration of him. We should hold on to them and tell our children what they missed.”
It is therefore disingenuous to elevate Soyinka above criticism under any guise.