Nobel laureate, Prof Wole Soyinka, has said that Nigerians need to come together and deliberate on many things that have gone wrong with them as a people.
The pro-democracy activist stated that the country had reached a stage, “where a series of town hall meetings should be organised to ask ourselves retrospective questions about what has happened to us.”
According to the Guardian, Soyinka said this on Monday during the presentation and discussion of his book, “Chronicles From the Land of The Happiest People on Earth,” inside the British Library Knowledge Centre.
Soyinka said the country had degenerated into a situation where human dignity has been devalued by vices such as the kidnapping of the Chibok schoolgirls and the recent alleged ritual killing of Timothy Adegoke Oludare at Ile-Ife in Osun State.
Fielding questions during the event tagged ‘An Evening with Professor Wole Soyinka,’ he noted that the failure of leadership across Africa has made “some of us sell ourselves into slavery.”
He noted, “The worst part for me is that we have allowed the slave trade to continue for so long. Who could have thought we would reach the state where people will trick one another to be used for rituals? We need a series of introspective sessions to ask questions about what has happened to us as a people.”
He described Britain as “a shameless country for continuing to charge me for visa.”
Asked by the moderator what message he has for the future, he quipped: “All l will say is let us restore the loss of humanity.”
Yesterday’s reading was the second book Soyinka presented to a London audience in over a decade.
