[Lagos, Nigeria25.01.2012Prof. Wale soyinka]

Lagos, Nigeria
25.01.2012
Prof. Wale soyinka

Nobel Laureate, Prof. Wole Soyinka, has commented on the current security challenges in the country, especially the Boko Haram menace while insisting that the country was already heading towards 'secession' before the upsurge in activity of the deadly sect.

Soyinka said this during the Martin Luther King Day programme organised by the United States Consulate in Lagos on Monday. While blaming the government for its deliberate insensitivity towards the yearnings of the people, he posited that the rate of religious and ethnic violence is as a result of failure of government to moderate dialogue within its subjects. His words: What we are going through is progression towards a de facto break up. It is not a question of people calling for secession it a question people acting secession.

Boko Haram is acting secession by expelling people in their midst, who are Nigerians by declaring their intention to purge the entire section of the country completely of those who do not share their identity. They are already operating a de facto secession.

He said while people find the new wave of violence as out of the ordinary, the act of secession has been going for a while and it has only become violently expressed in recent times with the dastardly acts being perpetrated in many states of the north. He continued: When under a secular constitution, a state called Zamfara took the lead in declaring itself a theocratic state, in a multi-religious entity like Nigeria; you already have the beginning of a de facto secession. Zamfara was joined by a number of other states; in fact many states have been operating that system, so we already have a de facto secession.

While suggesting a way out of the menace, Soyinka said the people of Nigeria don t have a constitution and that the present constitution was drafted to favour the few people in government. He noted that it would do the country well to call the people together and deliberate on a national, workable constitution, while referring to the present one as unworkable.

What kind of constitution gives advantage to a small class of people? We are not saying they are not civilians, I am just saying there was a fundamental cheat in the fashioning of our constitution. It is unacceptable, it is an unworkable constitution, and it is costing this country an eye and a leg. “The constitution was not enacted under freedom; it was handed over to us by a consortium, a bunch of neo-colonialists, the new colonialists in military uniform. They worked out the constitution making sure they look after a small fraction of the party. The President of the Senate, who is he? Military! Many other areas, you ll find demobilised military men.

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