Nobel Laureate, Professor Wole Soyinka, has questioned the
Federal Government’s handling of the farmers-herders crisis in the country.
Soyinka wondered why the Federal Government was yet to ban a
cattle group, Miyetti Allah, while it had already proscribed the Indigenous People
of Biafra (IPOB), a group looking for the secession of the South-East from
Nigeria.
Speaking to Channels Television’s Newsnight, a pre-recorded
program, which airs every Monday, Soyinka said Nigeria must always put the
country’s history in perspective so as to understand security challenges.
“My temperament doesn’t accept that anyone should chase me
out of my God-given earth. So, it is a temperamental thing as well,” Soyinka
said.
“The idea that you can unleash terror on me because you want
my little patch of territory or you want my soul, that is you want to subjugate
me, you want to turn me into a slave. Well, I would sort that out first.
“And then I will make up my mind whether I want to leave. So
each outrage, unfortunately, has the opposite effect. Whether the outrage is
taking place in Benue, Kaduna, or is taking place in Owo. Or whether it is
taking place right here on the (Ogun state) border – we have also been
subjected to this lunacy, of the subjugation mentality which some minority
people hold. And I find it very difficult to accept to be chased out of my own
entitled portion of the earth.
“Many people just either do not know the history or do not
understand the purpose of history. And then there’s a different group also who
are very selective about history; they know how to distort or misuse history.
“Take, for instance, when the incursion of the Fulani
herdsmen began, and the Miyetti Allah. Their spokesman said, I think it was in
Borno. We once ruled this place, and we can take back our land anytime we want.
I remember that statement; I have never forgotten it. In the midst of the
trauma of these people, somebody comes gloating and then citing selective
portions of history. I said this person should be arrested and locked up, who
says he wants to repeat his history of conquest – he is admitting either
knowledge, before or after, or support, anyway. Is not there anything like hate
speech anymore? Why are you proscribing IPOB without proscribing Miyetti
Allah?”
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