recoome:

This man is a silly & shameless pig, Nigeria has not yet been able to recover from the cultism which he pioneered in universities and is now ravaging the entire system, yet he has the nerves to comment on national issues, he should tell us how to solve the cultism problem before commenting on the nation, it's only in a country like ours that criminals are left to roam the streets with freedom, when he should be rotting im kirikiri with that his irritating beard !

recoome:

This man is a silly & shameless pig, Nigeria has not yet been able to recover from the cultism which he pioneered in universities and is now ravaging the entire system, yet he has the nerves to comment on national issues, he should tell us how to solve the cultism problem before commenting on the nation, it's only in a country like ours that criminals are left to roam the streets with freedom, when he should be rotting im kirikiri with that his irritating beard !

recoome:

This man is a silly & shameless pig, Nigeria has not yet been able to recover from the cultism which he pioneered in universities and is now ravaging the entire system, yet he has the nerves to comment on national issues, he should tell us how to solve the cultism problem before commenting on the nation, it's only in a country like ours that criminals are left to roam the streets with freedom, when he should be rotting im kirikiri with that his irritating beard !

recoome:

This man is a silly & shameless pig, Nigeria has not yet been able to recover from the cultism which he pioneered in universities and is now ravaging the entire system, yet he has the nerves to comment on national issues, he should tell us how to solve the cultism problem before commenting on the nation, it's only in a country like ours that criminals are left to roam the streets with freedom, when he should be rotting im kirikiri with that his irritating beard !

Ymodulus:

in reply to the boded your father is the naughty person silly pig. My problem with nigeruan authorities is letting mad dogs have access to net. I blive u should be from d north. Illiterate

Ymodulus:

in reply to the boded your father is the naughty person silly pig. My problem with nigeruan authorities is letting mad dogs have access to net. I blive u should be from d north. Illiterate

recoome:

This man is a silly & shameless pig, Nigeria has not yet been able to recover from the cultism which he pioneered in universities and is now ravaging the entire system, yet he has the nerves to comment on national issues, he should tell us how to solve the cultism problem before commenting on the nation, it's only in a country like ours that criminals are left to roam the streets with freedom, when he should be rotting im kirikiri with that his irritating beard !

As I said, I don ‘t want to go into details. I don’t believe very much in negative campaigning for instance. I think what we need to see now is to encourage all the candidates and to assist them in putting their best foot forward so that the electorate can actually see what it is that they will do; how they will execute such positive projects on behalf of the nation but having said that, infact, I don’t like to deal with personalities. I would like to deal with parties. I’m totally implacable in my position that the governing party, the PDP of this nation has failed this nation abysmal and that it is in the interest of this nation to get rid of the PDP government and allow others to show what they are capable. So, it is not an issue of personalities. It is an issue of this time really to get rid of the ruling party. Their failures have been monumental.

How do you assess the quality of presidential aspirants for the 2011 elections?
All of them have negatives and positives because there are human beings and those who have been in office before are naturally far more exposed, you know their blemishes and flaws than those who have not had a stand in office. I’m not going to go into individual assessments here beyond that general remark. I just want to say to people that[b] it is not so much an issue of personalities as policies and ideologies which are adhered to and which are expressed in the action by some of the aspirants and frankly, it is time to do away with the past to really strike out a new and different direction[/b]. I keep saying to youths, not that I glamourize them or romanticize them.

Some youths are a little bit sometimes even more corrupt than the aged and so on but there comes a moment in a nation’s life when an opportunity comes to strike in a completely new direction and I keep reminding youth that look, you are over 50 per cent of the electorate of this nation, so why don ‘t you take a risk, invest in the possibilities of serious, genuine change especially when those possibilities are backed by past record.

Just turn in a completely new direction. I make no bones to the fact that I’m solidly behind the candidate of somebody like Nuhu Ribadu simply because he represents what I call the watershed possibilities of change and change in a positive way because of his past record when he held office as a public officer, how he acquitted himself there and also because of my personal knowledge of him. One thing, which I want to stress here, is that that pernicious, opportunistic and totally corrupt political arrangement called zoning is absolutely dead. The word zoning has always been an obscenity in a nation like this. There are certain countries with certain histories where you can talk about zoning being an arrangement for harmony; for egalitarian distribution and participation of power and so on. That situation does not apply in this country and those who mouth zoning, zoning are just political opportunists who have their own private agenda.

One good thing about this election is that zoning has been not just killed but has been interred with an iron stick driven through its heart and electorate should just completely forget all about zoning and go for the most likely candidate to provide that positive change that is needed in the country.

recoome:

This man is a silly & shameless pig, Nigeria has not yet been able to recover from the cultism which he pioneered in universities and is now ravaging the entire system, yet he has the nerves to comment on national issues, he should tell us how to solve the cultism problem before commenting on the nation, it's only in a country like ours that criminals are left to roam the streets with freedom, when he should be rotting im kirikiri with that his irritating beard !

You travel round the world, is Nigeria’s image better in the international community than it was may be, eight years ago?
I don’t think the image has improved. Between governance and 419ners, I’m afraid the Nigerian image has not been improving lately

Controversy trailed the imprisonment of Chief Bode George and his thanksgiving after release. What do you make of the whole drama?
I don’t really want to talk about that matter it’s just that I think those who run the affairs of this country; who are supposed to set moral examples; who are looked up to should be a lot more circumspect about the way they try to turn convicted individuals into heroes. This is what we saw in the public acclamation accorded to Bode George when he came out of prison. Naturally, he is not somebody I admire politically. His record in governance and under the military is nothing to speak about and I do know a lot about that. At the same time, as a human being who has undergone this travail, I sympathise with him. I think that he has a right to go to a church or wherever he worships and thank the Almighty and his family for having survived the ordeal. Beyond that, it becomes public obscenity when the president sends representatives. Things like that set very, very bad example but then in this nation, villainy is always rewarded.

Do you think Nigeria is winning the war on corruption or the situation is worse?
We have seen the example in the public rehabilitation of a convicted individual. We’ve heard of certain moves being made to try and obtain pardon for other individuals. I believe that plea-bargaining which resolved certain trials of corrupt governors as a two-edged sword. Whenever you confess to some of your deeds, you give back some of the looted money and then, you are given a small slap on the wrist. I see it as a two-edged sword. On the one hand, I cannot condemn it outright because you begin to save yourself the labour of prosecuting, spending time and with the possibility of the accused getting away on technicalities. So, there are positive aspects to plea-bargaining but if it is overused, then people get to develop a frame of mind because they say, well, instead of stealing 100, I will steal 1000 and then when I’m aught, I will plea bargain with 500 and I just go in for a few months. It is a very dangerous thing. I don’t want to be pontifical about it.

I know the difficulties and tortuous ways of legalisms but I think examples need to be made. We are not just talking of material corruption; we are talking of political corruption. For me, the deprivation of human beings – citizens of their rights even ranks higher in my view than material corruption because there, you are reducing your fellow human beings to ciphers; to zombies in their own society. You are robbing them of their civic dignity and our failure to punish vigorously political corruption also feeds materials corruption because when people are politically corrupt, they want to get to office so that they can be materially corrupt and they use the proceeds of materials corruption to perpetuate themselves in office and the vicious cycle goes on. So I would like to see a far more vigorous way of dealing with those who have been proven to be politically corrupt in this nation.

How do you assess the Jonathan presidency?
As I said, I don ‘t want to go into details. I don’t believe very much in negative campaigning for instance. I think what we need to see now is to encourage all the candidates and to assist them in putting their best foot forward so that the electorate can actually see what it is that they will do; how they will execute such positive projects on behalf of the nation but having said that, infact, I don’t like to deal with personalities. I would like to deal with parties. I’m totally implacable in my position that the governing party, the PDP of this nation has failed this nation abysmal and that it is in the interest of this nation to get rid of the PDP government and allow others to show what they are capable. So, it is not an issue of personalities. It is an issue of this time really to get rid of the ruling party. Their failures have been monumental.

2011 elections flawed—Soyinka
By EMERSON GOBERT, JR.
Saturday, April 16, 2011
• Prof Wole Soyinka
Photo: Sun News Publishing
More Stories on This Section

Nobel Laureate, Professor Wole Soyinka has taken a critical look at the Nigerian polity especially the current general elections and the war against corruption.
Soyinka, who spoke exclusively to [b]Saturday Sun early in the week, [/b]also gave insight into the political crises in the Margreb, Middle East and Cote d’Ivoire, submitting that Laurent Gbagbo would have conceded to popular reasoning if he wasn’t a monster.

recoome:

This man is a silly & shameless pig, Nigeria has not yet been able to recover from the cultism which he pioneered in universities and is now ravaging the entire system, yet he has the nerves to comment on national issues, he should tell us how to solve the cultism problem before commenting on the nation, it's only in a country like ours that criminals are left to roam the streets with freedom, when he should be rotting im kirikiri with that his irritating beard !

Alj Uche:

he is igbo

biachwest:

Wole soyinka waited till the last minutes before he expose his insigth on the nass elections.why?.
because he dont want to flip flop?.
We recognice his personalities as a well respected person but beside that he should prove his intelegencies at most when it is needed.
Dont wait to gather ingredients from other peoples insigth before you pour out urs insigth to public.
that is called expo

Dede1:

You are being more than a fool for posting this nonsense. It is only in a cesspit such as Nigeria that a mere noble prize laureate could not be subjected to any form of criticisms.

Dede1:

You are being more than a fool for posting this nonsense. It is only in a cesspit such as Nigeria that a mere noble prize laureate could not be subjected to any form of criticisms.