Wole Soyinka, renowned playwright and professor, says it is “not the business of any stupid Nigerian to open his or her mouth” to challenge his right to say he was leaving the United States.
On November 2, Soyinka had said he would destroy his green card if Donald Trump became president of the United States.
“If in the unlikely event he does win, the first thing he’ll do is to say [that] all green-card holders must reapply to come back into the US. Well, I’m not waiting for that,” he told students of Oxford University, England.
“The moment they announce his victory, I will cut my green card myself and start packing up.”
Advertisement
Trump’s surprise emergence as president-elect opened the playwright up to public scrutiny, and there were series of calls for him to promptly fulfill his pledge.
Although he revealed last Thursday that he had already torn his green card, he hasn’t hidden his disdain for the behaviour of the “noisome creatures” whose problem he said was “ignorance”.
Speaking at a press conference in Lagos on Monday, he reserved even more scathing words for his critics.
Advertisement
“If I decide that I want to leave the United States and I want to leave it in a particular way, that’s my business,” he said.
“It’s not the business of the Internet; I don’t know what the excitation is all about. As the saying goes, why do Nigerians wail louder than the bereaved? What is your business?
“What is the business of any stupid Nigerian to open his or her mouth to challenge my right to say I am leaving? Did you get the green card for me? Do I eat in your house? The arrogance of some Nigerians is overwhelming. I don’t interfere with you, why would you interfere with me?
“One had the impudence to write that he needs a video to reassure him that it’s been done. Video? Are you mad? I don’t know you, I don’t respect you. Do you think I am here to entertain you? They want cheap thrill.”
Advertisement
Soyinka said he had begun plans to move out of Nigeria, the residency operated by his foundation.
“I am going to move the residency operated by my foundation out of this country, I have already begun to make arrangements. It is my property, I can do what I like with it,” he said.
“Maybe I should not be exiting the United States, maybe it’s Nigeria I should be exiting from because how can the people on behalf of whom one have struggled for all one’s life can be so slavish in mentality as to start querying the right of their champion to free speech?”
Advertisement
12 comments
And the moment arrives.
That we would not appreciate a social referee – whom would not be emphatic over whom emerges as champion – but would engage conscience and fortitude, to steer our potential for generational best practice.
We are disconsolate.
I guess the Prof has finally lost it. It is a lesson in not saying what you do not mean. Or else how would he have been different from Donald Trump himself. And he uttered the most nonsensical sentence of his life by saying “….how can the people on behalf of whom one have struggled for all one’s life can be so slavish in mentality as to start querying the right of their champion to free speech?”
Whose champion abeg…. this man is suffering from an over bloated ego. And he better come to the full realization of himself fast… Mtchewww
Not only an over bloated ego from his side, but the people have also been worshiping a false “god”.
Double calamity so to say.
Your comment. This is the lion and the jewel.
Every Nigerian is facing one challenge or the other and I wonder if all of us decide to go public with such issues whether we may still have time to do other things. Prof Soyinka should keep his personal problem to himself and stop insulting our sensibility. America as a nation has Soyinka in their millions, there is nothing about him that makes him superior than other Nigerians, after all his son is benefiting from the Nigerian system as commissioner in Ogun state.
Prof, spare us the grammar and help to proffer solutions to our problems as a patriotic Nigerian.
did i hear him say “how can the people on behalf of whom one have struggled for all one’s life ….”. Please tell me, oga professor, how have you struggled for the people abeg? Besides, who told you that you are champion to free speech? champion ko, free speech ni!
I expected it
It’s true, we can nt takeway d fact dat Professor Akinwande Oluwole Babatunde Soyinka is one of d best playwright nd poet in d world. Awarded d 1986 Nobel Prize in Literature, d first African to b honored in dat category. Soyinka has been a strong critic of successive Nigeria governments, especially d country’s many military dictators, as well as other political tyrannies. However i strongly beliv d professor got it all wrong in handling d recent issue. Pls Prof, dont allow ur emotion take d better part of u.
A beg, make una leave the prof alone.
He missed it the first time when he could not vote for Hilary.
The second time when Trump won.
He is allowed to wail louder than Americans that voted after all Hilary also lost in Biafra..
Obi
You put yourself on the spot joor, making mouth like a typical yoruba man
Only Irrespectful Children Speak To An Elder Like. Pls Stop!
The comments made here highlight the very issues that irk Professor Soyinka. It is clear to me that the Professor singled out those who have challenged him on his statement of intent to destroy his green card in the event of Trump’s win. The essence of the statement was to spotlight the extraordinary ‘change’ in the government of the United States and the implications to Nigerians and other immigrants. As a’champion’ of the rights of the downtrodden, he was calling attention to the insults and degradation inherent in the plans of Donald Trump. He meant that it was unacceptable and expected that reactions should reflect the gravity of the situation. Instead, those who have the new found liberties of the internet to say whatever, chose to use it as opportunity to query his integrity…