Nobel Laureate, Wole Soyinka, has raised concerns about an alleged conspiracy to annul the 2023 presidential election, drawing parallels to the annulled 1993 election during the era of former military dictator Ibrahim Babangida. Soyinka expressed his apprehension, stating that there were individuals determined to return the country to the dark days of canceled elections.
The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) had declared Bola Tinubu as the President, with the former Lagos State governor securing victory with 8,794,726 votes in the 2023 presidential election.
Speaking on Channels Television on Wednesday, Soyinka asserted, “I am alleging that there was a conspiracy from the very beginning before the election to make sure the elections did not take place or that even if the voting did take place, that everything be reverted to what happened under Babangida.”
Soyinka highlighted the abrupt annulment of the results despite being calculated and in possession of international bodies and monitoring embassies. He contended that the situation had evolved beyond a contest between individuals and had become a battle between the interim political party and democracy.
Expressing his strong stance, Soyinka declared, “When you have a binary like that, I have no doubt or hesitation about what side of the barricade my position should be.”
The Nobel Laureate also criticized the comments made by the vice-presidential candidate of the Labour Party in the 2023 election, Datti Baba-Ahmed, as “disgraceful and menacing.” Baba-Ahmed had urged the Chief Justice of Nigeria, Justice Kayode Ariwoola, not to swear in Tinubu as the duly elected president.
Soyinka condemned Baba-Ahmed’s remarks, emphasizing that it was particularly disgraceful given the individual’s prior involvement in the political structure. He characterized the comments as an “ultimate signal” of someone advocating for the disregard of a system that had facilitated his rise to becoming a governor.
In October 2023, the Supreme Court dismissed the cases brought by Atiku Abubakar of the Peoples Democratic Party and Peter Obi of the Labour Party challenging the declaration of Tinubu as the winner of the February 25 presidential poll. The court ruled without merit on the opposition’s appeals, addressing claims of fraud, electoral law violations, and Tinubu’s eligibility to run for president.