By Emeka Obasi
Prof. Wole Soyinka will soon clock 90, we must continue to celebrate his past and throw the present into the forest of infamy. Some of us tend to forget that WS is a dramatist and will continue to write about everything, until his last hour.
Anyone who expects the Nobel Laureate to ignore Peter Obi, Leader of Opposition, is living in Mars. Soyinka holds the Obidients in awe and the only way to attract global traffic is to flow against the tide. That explains why the Lion of Ake chose to build in the bush when others flocked to choice areas.
At the University College Ibadan, while students were busy studying in the classroom, Soyinka and his friends chose the other side, to found the Pyrates Confraternity (National Association of Seadogs) in 1952. His ways have been different from cradle.
As a boy, he ambushed and thoroughly embarrassed his parents, Samuel Ayodele and Grace Eniola Soyinka, before the Ransome Kutis in Abeokuta. The mother was the daughter, of the only daughter of Rev. J. J. Ransome Kuti.
Little Wole who was never allowed to wear shoes even when his parents could afford them, sought to know why he was denied that luxury when his cousins, including Olikoye and Fela, children of their hosts, Rev. Israel and Mrs Funmilayo Ransom Kuti, had shoes.
That scene initiated by Soyinka, earned him a first set of shoes, from Mrs Ransom Kuti. The drama continued when a scheme was worked out on how to wear the shoes outside the home of his disciplinarian dad. Wole had a name for his mother, he called her Wild Christian. Dad became Essay, coined from his initials, S.A.
Obi has been to Soyinka’s house. You would think that the playwright would shut him out. They regaled themselves with gists. Ever since that August visit, the senior citizen misses the politician so badly. Little wonder he keeps talking about his visitor.
I will not join my Igbo Brothers to crucify Soyinka. For the support he rendered during the Civil War, I remain eternally grateful. While Federal troops plundered Biafra, the Egba man was in jail, for our sake. At nearly 90, I just see him as an old man who has lost touch with reality. It is natural.
While Soyinka supported Biafra, Col. Olusegun Obasanjo led the Third Marine Commandos in a bloody battle. This sounds dramatic, to the professor, that the same war Commander is dining with Obi and receiving an Igbo Guard of Honour, in the United Kingdom.
However, Soyinka, born into a Protestant family has adopted protest as a weapon all through his time. He has forgotten that Obasanjo has since moved ahead and even got an Igbo wife as part of post Civil War Reconciliation.
General Yakubu Gowon, who put Soyinka in jail during the war has also moved on. In 2004, the former Nigerian Head of State was in Abeokuta for the playwright’s 70th birthday celebrations. Gowon hit the nail on the head. “Soyinka’s problem is that his mouth ‘wowo’ ( his tongue is poisonous).
Wole Soyinka
Methinks, those who detained Soyinka during the war injected him with anti Igbo vaccine before he was released. The change is obvious. Anything Igbo irritates the good friend of Chris Okigbo and erstwhile buddy of Chinua Achebe.
This same Soyinka who stormed a radio station in 1965 with a pistol, to protest electoral irregularities has not raised his voice against the confusion created by the Independent National Electoral Commission, in 2023.
When Gen. Muhammadu Buhari executed the trio of Bartholomew Owo, Bernard Ogedegbe and Lawal Ojulope in 1985, Soyinka was outraged. “I feel that I have been compelled to participate in a triple cold – blood murder, that I have been forced to witness a sordid ritual, that I am horribly degraded, permanently mutilated,” he screamed.
After the execution of Gen. Mamman Vatsa, a fellow poet, in 1986, Soyinka’s voice was louder. “ Execution of this kind contributes to the brutalization of people in the society. There is no question about that. Executions of this type only lock up permanently the blood cycle which we want to end,” he said.
Buhari came back in 2015, as president. He further dehumanised the people and nearly destroyed Nigeria. Soyinka was voiceless, choosing when to react and picking his words. The vibrancy turned cold, reminding many of the book, The Man died, authored by WS.
Babangida found Soyinka after executing Vatsa. And IBB also found a job for the critic. The Federal Road Safety Corps, came into being. Instead of checking the government, Kongi and his men were checking motorists, mounting road blocks, from Abeokuta to Abuja.
Soyinka is a great writer, he has written his name in gold. I know that Golden moments also disappear. A man who has spent most of his life fighting for a better society may not have the required strength to sing Aluta Continua, at 90.
The problem with the Labour Party presidential candidate is that he does not make enemies. Obi sees Soyinka as an elder and accords him full respect. Expect them to sit down together tomorrow. The old man forgets easily these days. He is forgiven.
Obi and the Obidients may be dealing with the pirated copy of the man who won the AGIP International Prize on Humanities, became Member of the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters and crowned it with 290 dollars Nobel Prize in Literature, all in 1986.
