Nigeria’s literary icon, Chief Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie has disagreed with Nobel Laureate, Prof Wole Soyinka, saying while she has lot of love and admiration for him, dubbing vice presidential candidate of the Labour Party, Dr Datti Baba-Ahmed “fascist” over his „reasonable“ comments on the declaration of Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu as the ‘president-elect’ despite failing to win 25% of the votes in the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja, as constitutionally prescribed, was misplaced.
While talking recently with Seun Akinloye of ChannelsTV, Baba-Ahmed had opined that swearing in Tinubu on May 29th would be a slap on the constitution. He emphatically said that swearing Tinubu in „would be an end to our democracy.“ Since the constitution is the bedrock of democracy, many people understood what he was trying to say.
However, his comments had offended those who benefited from the outcome the Presidential Election, which includes the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), Tinubu’s party and the followers of the former Lagos governor. Soyinka on his part took a harsh swipe at Baba-Ahmed, calling him fascist.
But when asked on AiseTV’s Prime Time on Tuesday night, Adichie begged to disagree.
She said she would rather call INEC which „deeply cheated and disenfranchised the people”, fascist.
“There is an authoritarianism, which obviously is the basis of fascism, at the center of manipulating an election. Because what you are doing is that you are gagging people; you are forcibly taking away their voice. That is fascist.
“Fascist is all the violence that happened during the election.
“Fascist is the way the people remain silent about that violence.
“Fascist is a government that has not come out to address the very tangible and palpable discontent in this country.“
She added that she, like many Nigerians, are convinced that INEC failure to upload election results in real time had nothing to do with technological glitch.
The author of Purple Hibiscus regretted that INEC boss Prof Mahmood Yakubu had an opporutiny to emerge a hero of democracy, not only in Nigeria but across Africa. “But I think he wasted it spectacularly.
“I also think that the President Buhari missed an opportunity for heroism, maybe his last chance at heroism. I wish he had taken a page from former President Musa Yar’Adua, who was a really good man, a moral man.“
When asked about the bashing she is getting from the Tinubu Campaign over the letter she recently wrote to President Joe Biden, castigating the February 25 Presidential Election as “unforgivably flawed“, she said that she wrote the letter because, “I think it is important to preserve the truth. I think when something like this (election) happen, it is important to tell the story of what happened.“
Adichie, who is emerging as the new conscience of the Nigerian Nation, added that she has never been fazed by criticisms. “However it has been amusing to read juvinile fulminations from no-Juvenile people.”
Obviously, she was referring to attacks by Bayo Onanuga and Femi Fani-Kayode, spokespersons of the Tinubu Campaign.
Mr. Onunagu had dismissed her letter to Biden as “thrash.” While Mr. Fani-Kayode called it garbarge that “belongs to the bottom of public toilet.”
CHECKPOINTCHARLEY 