Nobel laureate, Professor Wole Soyinka, has raised suspicion over President Muhammadu Buhari’s insistence to recover old grazing routes across the country.
According to him, it does not only suggest another way of bringing back the much controversial RUGA settlement, it also suggests the kind of hidden agenda that many people have talked about.
Soyinka said this in Lagos on Friday, during a parley with journalists.
He noted, “He doesn’t seem to hear things. Virtually the whole nation is screaming, ‘We don’t want any open cattle grazing; whether they go by the name; cattle routes or grazing reserves.’ Around the nation, we have opinions surmounting the antiquated modes of cattle rearing. Even the all-powerful, untouchable Miyetti Allah, patron of the Fulani herdsmen, has gone on record to say ranching is what they want.
“When all that has been settled in rational terms and then we hear a new version of RUGA. Why is this President obsessed about something being rejected right, left and centre?” The obsession is on such a level that even people who consider themselves rational like myself begin to wonder if this is really about cattle or an agenda that we don’t know about? Like the Yoruba will say, “Eleyi koja oju lasan (Roughly translated to mean an act that defies logic).’’
“The essayist also faulted the infraction letter sent to Channels Television by the National Broadcasting Commission for some comments purportedly made against Buhari by two guests who featured on a programme on the station.
He described the letter titled, “Notice of Infraction,’’ as one of the most outstanding semi-illiterate kinds of official queries.
“Decree 4 has no place in a democracy. It’s about time we emphasised and demonstrated that in both language and in act.”
Governors in the southern part of the country have also faulted anything that has got to do with open grazing.
They have a September deadline to stop this, although this does not seem to be feasible for many of the states.
