on this day -- Soyinka

[Craig Clark]

Chris Karatnytsky  wrote:
 
> It has been reported that Wole Soyinka, the Nobel prize-winning
> playwright, has been charged with treason, along with 11 other
> Nigerian dissidents, by General Sani Abacha, the same butcher
> responsible for the execution of Ken Saro-Wiwa.  Soyinka, who
> lives in exile in New York and London, could face the death
> penalty if convicted.

To which Henry Musikar replied:

> Soyinka has likened his situation to Rushdie's. IMHO Soyinka's 
> activism (he suggested to Nigerians that they not pay their taxes
> when the results Nigeria's election were nullified) is of a different
> ilk. There are many writers that include politics in their works, but
> most don't take it to the people. Even most "crusading" journalists
> don't urge anything more direct than the possibility of a letter
> writing campaign.

Rushdie can hardly be accused of activism against those who now seek 
to murder him. My take on _The Satanic Verses_ was that it was not a 
critique of or an attack upon Islam, so much as a use of elements of 
Islam to explore questions of faith and doubt and the difficulties of 
establishing the truth in the late twentieth century. Let's also 
state the obvious here: even if I am wrong, even if Rushdie is a 
frothing-at-the-mouth anti-Islamicist, he deserves the right to live 
in freedom from fear. And yes, by the way, I DO extend that right to 
everyone. It is as wrong to terrorise the KKK or our own AWB as it is 
to support their terrorism.

Soyinka's situation resembles Rushdie's: I would not put it past 
the Abacha regime to try to send an assassination squad to take care 
of Soyinka. Our local mercernary outfit, Executive Outcomes, 
previously employed in the upholding of apartheid internally and the 
destabilisation of Angola and Mozambique externally, and now killing 
people for money in Papua-New Guinea, would probably take the job if 
the fee was high enough. And don't expect the Mandela government to 
take Soyinka's part too strongly. Abacha was supportive of the ANC in 
the days of its exile, so all he received from SA when Saro-Wiwa was 
executed was a slap on the wrist.

Steely - chase up the Executive Outcomes link for that story you once 
mentioned to me.

 
Craig Clark

"Living inside the system is like driving across
 the countryside in a bus driven by a maniac bent
 on suicide."
   - Thomas Pynchon, "Gravity's Rainbow"