Interventions XII: Baiting Igbophobia: The Sunny Igboanugo Thesis, Bookcraft, Ibadan, February 2024, 149 pages
Nobel laureate, Wole Soyinka is one of Nigeria’s foremost writers and thinkers.
For about six decades, WS (as he abbreviates his name) has published dozens of books. Baiting Igbophobia: The Sunny Igboanugo Thesis is the twelfth in the Intervention series in which he periodically offers his thoughts on current issues. This latest book in the series focuses on the 2023 Nigerian general elections.
The book is mostly a strongly-worded, finely-penned riposte to a September 19, 2023 article titled “Soyinka, Obi, Tinubu: When repayment of mafia debt is inescapable” by Sunny Igboanugo.
In the piece, Igboanugo accuses Soyinka of being indebted to the “mafia don-like figure”, Bola Tinubu, Nigeria’s current president, whose presidency emerged from that contentious election. Soyinka believes that Igboanugo is “a successful mentor to perhaps hundreds of thousands in the wide open field of Cyber-fascism.”
Many Nigerians alive today have probably never witnessed anything like the 2023 general elections. Hardliners became estranged from kith and kin and starved loved ones of food and funds because they had pitched their tents in different political camps — or so they said on social media.
Alluding to the polemical differences that emerged in the lead up to the elections, Soyinka writes; “accustomed as one has been to the orgiastic plunge into indecencies in the pursuit of power and position, the presidential elections can boast of having broken past records… Not even the life-and-death desperation of sides in the war of Biafra secession has harvested such a crop of diseased narratives.”
Igboanugo’s thesis has a basis in history, for Soyinka and Tinubu had a close relationship during the pro-democracy struggle of the 1990s. In the book, Soyinka discusses the economic toll his exile from Nigeria had on his family and the ingenious economic schemes he devised with allies, including Tinubu, to sustain the pro-democratic struggle.
Igboanugo writes: “He (Soyinka) also told the world how Tinubu it was that got him a letter of recommendation with which he then approached the government of Taiwan for the rice contract that supplied his daily bread.”
This is a reference to the 5th Bola Tinubu Colloquium which held in May 2013 where Soyinka shared a story with the audience.
In referencing that story, Igboanugo poses a question: “So, what would you not do for someone who fed you when you were hungry and probably saved you from… starvation and even death?”
WS insists that his detractor has got the facts of the matter wrong because it was he who wrote “the formal letter (that) introduced Bola Tinubu… to the Taiwanese and other governments and trading consortiums as resource seekers for the overthrow of a murderous tyrant.” before proceeding to, in his usual humourous style, inform Igboanugo that “rice has lately been superseded by agbado.”
Igboanugo asserts further in his piece that “He (Soyinka) narrated how Remi Tinubu, the supportive wife of the former Governor of Lagos State, now President, provided him with pots and pans and other household utensils to start life anew.”
This prompts Soyinka to wonder whether “a neighbourly reach out between spouses after a devastating struggle should seriously be cited as a debt, even in an election at a “Sorority Club.”
WS believes he is in bad odour (to borrow a phrase from his essay, Climate of Fear) with Igboanugo and “Obidients” because he refused to support Peter Obi, the rallying figure after whom they are named.
He is also perplexed by Igboanugo’s accusations of Igbophobia and to counter it cites his open support of Kingsley Moghalu’s candidacy in the 2019 presidential election.
Soyinka expresses angst towards the Obidients, especially their name. “Its numbers should require no urging to rid itself of, especially in a society that had squirmed for decades under the jackboots of the Masters of Obedience — the military.”
He isn’t a fan either of Yusuf Datti Baba-Ahmed, Obi’s running mate, whom Soyinka writes “went on air to threaten the unknowable if the (election) tribunal did not do his bidding.”
To Soyinka Obi/Datti are bad losers – “You gave it a valiant try but you FAILED. Not disgracefully or dishonorably – but failure is failure.”
Ultimately, the Soyinka versus Obidients rift is mostly an intergenerational spat even as their derision of Soyinka’s Nobel Prize for Literature continues. Many, including Obidients, will argue, however, that it’s a fight for justice.”
Soyinka’s parting shot to his detractors, including Obidients is a simple one: “My pen is mightier than your sword.”
***Bolaji Olatunde is a Nigerian writer and author of six fictional books; four novels and two plays. Catch him on X (FKA Twitter) @BOLMOJOLA
Updated at 9.46am on Sunday July 14, 2024.
