Nobel laureate Prof. Wole Soyinka has said that President Bola Tinubu’s nationwide address on Sunday failed to address the atta3ks on #EndBadGovernance protesters by security agencies.
Soyinka made the observation in a statement on Sunday following Tinubu’s address to the nation. The #EndBadGovernance protests continued on Sunday, marking their fourth day, as demonstrators voiced their frustrations over the country’s deepening economic hardship, escalating poverty, and ineffective governance.
Soyinka said, “I set my alarm clock for this morning to ensure that I did not miss President Bola Tinubu’s impatiently awaited address to the nation on the current unrest across the nation. His outline of government’s remedial action since inception, aimed at warding off just such an outbreak, will undoubtedly receive expert and sustained attention both for effectiveness and in content analysis. My primary concern, quite predictably, is the continuing deterioration of the state’s seizure of protest management, an area in which the presidential address fell conspicuously short.
Such short-changing of civic deserving, regrettably, goes to arm the security forces in the exercise of impunity and condemns the nation to a seemingly unbreakable cycle of resentment and reprisals. Live b¥llets as state response to civic protest – that becomes the core issue. Even tear gas remains questionable in most circumstances, certainly an abuse in situations of clearly peaceful protest. Hunger marches constitute a universal S.O.S, not peculiar to the Nigerian nation. They belong indeed in a class of their own, never mind the collateral claims emblazoned on posters.
