Nobel laureate Wole Soyinka has said Nigeria is pretending not to know that it is at war.
In a statement on Saturday titled ‘The Endless Martyrdom of Youth’, Mr Soyinka said the country is on the brink unless an urgent action is taken.
Mr Soyinka’s statement came following the killing of three kidnapped students of Greenfield University by bandits in Kaduna and rising insecurity and violence across swathes of the nation.
Mr Soyinka, who said the nation is on the brink of chaos due to the unending bloodshed across the country, urged the nation’s leadership to seek assistance in the face of its apparent helplessness to curb the trend.
“One’s greatest fear, with this latest feat of cowardly savagery is that the nation must brace itself for a Beslan scenario, yet strive to avoid Nigeria become Africa’s Cherchnya.
“Those who have been proven weak and incapable must learn to swallow their vain pride and seek help. Again, this is no new counseling, but of course the dog that will get lost no longer heeds the hunter’s whistle. I envy no one the task ahead, terminating the toxic harvest of past derelictions.
“Blame laying is for later. Right now is the question of – what needs to be done, and done urgently. We keep avoiding the inevitable, but that very unthinkable now hammers brutishly on our gates, the blood ransom arrogantly insatiable.
“This nation is at war, yet we continue to pretend that these are mere birth-pangs of a glorious entity. They are death throes. Vultures and undertakers hover patiently but with full confidence.”
