2023: I’m not Involved in Confraternity Video Mocking Tinubu – Soyinka
POLITICS DIGEST – Prof. Wole Soyinka has reacted to a viral video showing some members of Pyrates Confraternity mocking the ill-health of the presidential candidate of All Progressives Congress (APC), Bola Tinubu.
In the viral video posted on social media, some members of the Confraternity group were seen dressed in red and white attire yelling out critical remarks as they gyrated to a song that mocked Tinubu over the speech made in Ogun State ahead of the party presidential primary.
It could be recalled that the former Governor of Lagos State had during a controversial speech stated with Governor Abiodun and Ogun State delegates that ‘Emi lo kan’, meaning ‘It’s my turn to get power after President Muhammadu Buhari.
In the viral video, the members of the Pyrates Confraternity sang, “Hand dey shake, leg dey shake, Baba wey no well, e de shout Emi lo kan (Hands are shaking, legs are shaking. A sick old man is shouting ‘it’s my turn).
“Emi lo kan (2ce), Baba wey no well, him dey shout Emi Lokan (It’s my turn (2ce), a sick old man is shouting ‘it’s my turn”.
Reacting to the video, Soyinka, who was among the ‘magnificent seven’ that founded Pyrates Confraternity at the University College Ibadan, slammed the Pyrates for mocking Tinubu’s ill-health, saying he was not a part of the performance and he is not in any way connected to the feelings the remarks were intended to convey.
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He said, “The display acidly targets a presidential candidate in the awaited 2023 elections. Since the whole world knows of my connection with that fraternity, it is essential that I state in clear, unambiguous terms, that I am not involved in that public performance, nor in any way associated with the sentiments expressed in the songs.”
“Like any other civic group, the Pyrates Confraternity is entitled to its freedom of expression, individually or collectively. So also is Wole Soyinka in his own person. I do not interfere in, nor do I attempt to dictate the partisan political choices of the Confraternity.
“I remain unaware that the association ever engages in a collective statement of sponsorship or repudiation of any candidate This is clearly a new and bizarre development, fraught with unpredictable consequences.
“Let me make the following cultural affirmation. I have listened to the lyrics of the chant intently and I am frankly appalled. I find it distasteful. I belong to a culture where we do not mock physical afflictions or disabilities.
“Very much to the contrary. The Yoruba religion indeed designates a deity, Obatala, as the divine protector of the afflicted, no matter the nature of such affliction. This sensibility is engrained in us from childhood and remains with us all our lives. It operates on the principle of mortal frailty to which all humanity remains vulnerable.
“One of my favourite authors, about whom, by a coincidence, I had cause to write quite recently, was CLR James, author of The Black Jacobins, Beyond A Boundary etc. I called him my ideological uncle. He suffered from Parkinson’s Disease, but remained alert, lucid and combative for decades after the onset of the disease.
“We interacted politically at the Tanzanian pan-African Congress, the Dakar Festival of Negro Arts and a number of other cultural and political fora.
“We met frequently in his lifetime, dined together in restaurants, despite his challenge. it would be unthinkable, and a desecration of his memory to be part of any activity that mocked his affliction.”
