5th April, 2023
Nobel Laureate, Prof. Wole Soyinka has revealed what he wants from Nigeria’s president-elect, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu after he has been sworn-in as president.
Soyinka, in an interview on Arise TV on Wednesday, said the only thing he wants from the incoming president is total decentralisation of power.
According to him, the incoming government should be able to devolve power to the various arms of governments-states and local governments.
He also wants a total reinforcement of the civil entity, that is the civil society in the various groupings.
In his words: “Decentralisation, that is all I want out of the incoming government, whichever it is, let us have a genuine, not rhetorical, but a genuine, practical, detailed decentralisation.
“The real devolution of power, more devolution of power to the various arms, various tiers of government, state, local governments, the reinforcement of civil entity, civil society, in the various groupings, that is the kind of structure which I want. You can summarise it in that one word, decentralisation.”
Soyinka also said nearly the totality of Datti Baba-Ahmed’s comments in his interview on Channels TV, were unbecoming.
He said the interviewer asked him several times, ‘What will you do if the supreme court judgement is against you, if the interpretation which you are offering about the constitutional aspect of this election, if it is against that of the supreme court, and he kept saying, no, it is not even open to analysis, because the word says ‘and.”
“He says the supreme court has better given his interpretation, I mean, this is trying to dictate to the supreme arbiter of the nation. Whatever you think of the supreme court, it is an institution, which we all revert to sooner or later, if not today, then tomorrow, if not about this election, maybe about the next election.
“But Datti kept saying, the supreme court has got in his wisdom to agree with me. That is what is known as fascistic language, it is not acceptable and for me, it alienates people. it alientates even supporters,” he stated.