In the light of the recent dishing out of friend of Ndi-Igbo (or is it Biafra) award, I want to ask whether you think Wole Soyinka does not qualify for such an award taking into cognizance his role during the civil war. He spoke out and that even at a threat to his personal safety. He lambasted his tribe for their non charlance to the plight of the butchered Easterners, and moreso for joining Yakubu to prosecute an unjust war. He spent the best part of the war behind bars and emerged to write that damning masterpiece, "The man died" in which he implied that the man in his people died when they found injustice acceptable.
What is your take on this? I think he deserves an award more than Rimi whose achievement was sharing the same party with the old chameleonic Zik, the man that abandoned his people at their hour of great need. I hope the Zikist among us will spare me, this thread is really all about Soyinka
[ June 04, 2001: Message edited by: Ohafia Udumeze ]
___________________ Awo's political idea was based on the assumption that any town beyond Owo was Igbo or Hausa. Awo was not socialised; he was not a good mixer because he did not have the opportunity, which the secondary school offered. ~TOS Benson, Baba Oba of Lagos
Yes Soyinka deserves to be one of those publicly recognized as a friend of Ndiigbo. I 've always believed that if we can clone just a hundred of his kind, the Yoruba people would not have been overrun by Awo's brand of politics, and Igbo hating philosophy.
I would take you to task about Zik, I am not a Zikist, his misguided Pan Africanist outlook did not bode very well for Ndiigbo in Nigeria. Zik's pan Africanist world view was influenced to a large extent by a black American scholar by the name of W.E.B Dubois. Dubois wrote extensively about the nature of the black man, and the Berlin conference by the Europeans on the carving up of Africa. Zik was forced to play a parochial politics upon return from the United states to Nigeria.
As far as the Biafra/Nigeria war is concerned, Zik used his international Political capital to negotiate the end of the war. The final offensive planned by the British due to the growing international embarassment for them would have killed more Biafrans at the later stage of that war than had died to that point.
Zik, with the United States, Soviet Union, and Great Britain agreed to a speedy end of the war, the modalities were also ironed out such as...the "No Victor, No vanquished".
Though Gowon has been credited for that, the agreement to adopt such a stance at the end of the war originated far beyond Gowon.
The magnanimous behaviour of the Nigerian state after the war was not a sudden change of heart. The nihilism, and Blood-letting orgy was not tamed by the kindness of thier heart, it was the agreement that was reached in high places. Zik saw that Biafra cannot continue the struggle with one eye, one arm, and no leg....that was essentially the state-of-affairs at the time.
This explains why immediately two weeks after Zik arrived in Lagos in 1970, the war ended. Zik did what he did to save what is left of Ndiigbo from anihilation.
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The "no victor, no vanquished" continue to dog Ndigbo till today. A man whose people were being blatantly exterminated, yet he stood behind one Nigeria. Kwame Nkrumah schooled in the US back then, too. When Zik couldn't open his newspaper production business in Nigeria, Nkrumah allowed him to do so in newly freed Ghana. Let me not get on Zik's case.
Anyway, Wole Soyinka was a true Biafra friend, considering the part he played during the war. I'll take him twice over before I consider Zik. He earned and deserve the friend of Biafra award more than Jim Nwobodo, Ike Nwachukwu, and the list goes on, can be accepted as Biafra heroes.
posted
No doubt Soyinka is a rare breed whose consistent fight to uphold truth and justice mark him out as an exception to the norm.
He is indeed a friend; anyway what else do you expect when Soyinka, Okigbo and Achebe are friends? they were the literary trend setters of the wasted generation whose piercing voices unfortunately were ignored by the fraudulent and corrupt Nigerian state.
I hear you. Your erudition and eloquence is always compelling and I wish to confess that I'm a big fan.
I didn't know a lot about Zik's efforts, but I knew thathis absconding demoralized not a few Biafrans. There was a song in Ohafia in those days and it goes something like this " AZikiwe with bulging eyeballs decamped to Nigeria just because of nama...etc"
That was the memory we grew up with, and yet we all voted for him both in '79 and '83 because he was Igbo.
I'm encouraged by the answers in the affirmative on Soyinka's suitability for an award. We may have to write him a thank you letter from this board at some point, if we form a quorum.
___________________ Awo's political idea was based on the assumption that any town beyond Owo was Igbo or Hausa. Awo was not socialised; he was not a good mixer because he did not have the opportunity, which the secondary school offered. ~TOS Benson, Baba Oba of Lagos
posted
Umuibe, One more time, i call for restrain on issue concering Zik. I am not a Zikst but we can not wash our linens in the public. This will be a big distraction for us all. Dont forget our proverb which says if you make yourself a laughing matter, who ever starts laughing will never stop laughing at you. Now back to the topic, Ohafia nnaa ndeewo, for all the interesting topics, we owe you alot. Wole Soyinka deserves a big honor from Ndi-Igbo, he is our very dear friend. We all know the great role he played during the war, even our enemies had to locked him up. He is an out standing humanbeing. Rimi as far am concerned is an enemy of Ndi-Igbo. Rimi is an opportunist who wants to ride on the back of Ndi-Igbo and get what he want out of Nigeria. The Igbo group that hang around him are also those Igbos who do care about us, but there pockets. Rimi is also a big spy on Ndi-Igbo, he bulldozes his way into very sensentive Igbo gathering and goes back to his people. Then they marshal out their plans on how to deal with Ndi-Igbo. Someday those so -called Igbo leaders, will have to answer questions regard their hangingout with Rimi.
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posted
Folks: Zik was an institution and there is no comparison to date. Let's focus on the topic in question--Wole Soyinka. Unquestionably, he was against all the injustices and spoke against the pogrom.
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Soyinka is one of the few Yorubas who truly deserve that award. lately though, it is not clear that Soyinka would exhibit the same courage he showed during Biafra. it appears that today Soyinka is an ethnic champion for Yoruba causes only. He committment to justice for all, including non Yorubas may have to be tested again.
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Obaseki: There is nothing like the truth. It is amazing how they carry Soyinka to high esteem despite the fact he has engaged in terrorist activities to proclaim a Yoruba republic. You have said it all, and it is only the truth that can set us free.
___________________ Yara Wasa Bature Posts: 502 | From: Owasso, Oklahoma USA | Registered: Mar 2001
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posted
Whoever derides Soyinka is out of touch and ignorant. Read his book "The Man Died" and deal with reality. No question, he has no blemish, for he has always stood for the truth and injustices in Nigeria.
The issue is whether Wole Soyinka deserves commendation for his efforts during the civil wars. I think we are all for an affirmative answer. If Wole is championing the cause of his ethnic group now, we have to view his actions based on the realities on the ground. Nigeria does not exist and keeping the country one has been the catch phrase of all the looters both their military and civilian wing.
It was Wole Soyinka who predicted recently that Aremu may well be the last head of state of Nigeria as we know it. I agree with him and it is my prayer that this time an Igbo man will not be used to scuttle the imminent disintegration.
I think it's a bit unfair to expect Wole to re-live his Biafran heroics all over again. Personally, I'd be ashamed if his age group will march to the war front again while we sit down and watch. I'm sure we all saw how our (ex)heroes threw Ralph Uwazurike to the dogs. Yeah times move on and so should we. The baton has been passed on, and it behoves us to pick it and run with it.
First fool no be fool, second fool na proper foolish~~ MI Okpara.
___________________ Awo's political idea was based on the assumption that any town beyond Owo was Igbo or Hausa. Awo was not socialised; he was not a good mixer because he did not have the opportunity, which the secondary school offered. ~TOS Benson, Baba Oba of Lagos
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If those who are parading themselves today as Igbo leaders had made as much effort as Wole Soyinka in supporting Biafra and speaking out against the atrocities meted out to them, the Biafrans wouldn't continue to be in the predicament they're in. He's done his universal love act for Biafra. He'll forever be appreciated by Biafrans. I'd recommend that after Biafra Actualization, that a major road be named after him, in appreciation.
Meanwhile Anyim, and his fellow saboteurs continue to say that Igbos are not marginalized. After the dawn of Biafra, this same sycophant and his evil minded supporters would want to be accorded same importance as Soyinka. They might as well ask for the moon...cause they ain't getting it.
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The playwright Soyinka that we know is still indomitable.
From BBC Online Thursday 14 June, 2001
Writer's City Of Asylum
Writers from around the world, who are under threat of persecution, may soon be able to find sanctuary in Nigeria.
According to The International Parliament of Writers, who run the City of Asylum programme, writers who have been persecuted for expressing unpopular views, will soon be able to seek asylum in Lagos. Arts In Action reports.
The Paris-based International Parliament of Writers has announced that Nigeria's largest city, Lagos, is to be it's next “City of Asylum”.
The writers given asylum will enter the country on a visitor's visa and will receive a home and a living allowance to enable them to work there in safety.
The parliament's former President, the Nobel prize-winning playwright, Wole Soyinka, has inspired the move. He has explained how the exhiled writer could use the time to 'recover, reclaim their lives and write if they can.'
Soyinka's Satisfaction A Nigerian himself, Soyinka, was arrested in 1967 following the publication of an article that he had written calling for a ceasefire in the country's Civil War. He was accused of conspiring with the Biafra Rebels and was held as a political prisoner until 1969.
Given his onetime imprisonment at the hands of Nigeria's former military leaders he inevitably feels some satisfaction at the news of Nigeria's participation in the programme. He comments:
'There's a kind of delicious poetic justice, a sense of vengeance. Not just I, but many writers have suffered in Nigeria.'
'To have a City of Asylum in Nigeria gives me a sweet sense of vengeance and satisfaction.'
Parliament Of Writers: The International Parliament of Writers was set up in 1993 in part as a response to the fatwa issued against the novelist Salman Rushdie.
The threat to Rushdie's life was issued by Islamic Fundamentalists who believed that the author had defamed Islam in his 1989 work, The Satanic Verses. The incident highlighted the perceived need to protect writers freedom of speech.
Explaining the work of the group, Wole Soyinka comments:
'It goes out to identify writers who are in danger and it has even taken part in extraditing them out of danger…It works side-by-side with PEN International and Amnesty International, straddling creative and human rights.'
From Las Vegas to Lagos Lagos joins a growing number of cities, including Berlin, Barcelona, Venice and Strasbourg, who are already participating in the programme.
Last year Las Vegas was named the first US City of Asylum - a decision, which delighted Soyinka who, claimed:
'The writer is rare who's never written purple prose. Las Vegas is purple prose writ large.'
Speaking on the future of the project, Soyinka expresses his hopes that one-day places such as Robben Island will also participate.
South Africa's Robben Island became an international symbol of the fight for human rights when former president, Nelson Mandela was jailed there for 18 of his 27 years in apartheid prisons.
Of his plans for the City of Asylum project, Soyinka comments:
'We are still running for Senegal and Dacca where we have had a positive response. My dream was to establish the very first [City of Asylum] on Robben Island and I met with the council and we toured the facilities there. We are still hoping… just look at the symbolism of that.'
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Wole Soyinka is a rare breed. He is a good man and I agree that a road even a state should be named after him when Biafra is actulaized. If his people copied him there wouldn't be any gap between Yorubas and Igbos who occupy the South. We are not ready to forget the wicked things that Awos did to us and we'll never forgive them. Wole Soyinka deserves the highest award. He spoke out against genocide and didn't care whether the people were Igbos, Ibibios, Efiks or not. He is a friend of biafrans and he deserves a great honor. If we had people like him in Rwanda the genocide wouldn't have happened overthere, if we had people like him Nigeria, Nigeria would be alot better.
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