Nobel Laureate, Prof. Wole Soyinka, has stated he doubts President Muhammadu Buhari is in charge of running of the nation going by the level of insecurity and killings over herdsmen crisis.
Soyinka spoke on Thursday on an Arise TV programme monitored by The Nation.
He said if the Commander-In-Chief of the Armed Forces were indeed in charge, the insecurity situation won’t have degenerated to what it is.
Soyinka said: “Buhari does not appreciate the situation, he doesn’t understand, I see no evidence that he understands how grave the situation is.
“I have said it again and again. I don’t believe he is in charge because it is not possible in my view for a head of state, a commander-in-chief of the armed forces to say he is presiding over a nation and things get to this level.
“Something is critically wrong within the leadership of this nation and that is where we civilians must come in, we must pick up the slack for our own situation, for our own salvation.
“What happened to me in this incident is typical of what happen to millions in this country and we cannot just sit still and say we are relying on central help when obviously it is not coming.”
He also said cattle breeding was not criminal but the act of trampling on the property of others is.
He also urged the governors of the region to embrace modern ranching which he described as a “commonsensical approach” to ending the menace.
He said: “Cattle breeding itself is not criminal, it is when you encroach on other people’s rights even to the extent of displacing them, humiliating them, dehumanising them, raping the women, and killing them. That is when it becomes a crime against humanity and must be dealt with very firmly.
“But even in dealing with it, we must separate the wheat from the chaff. We all live with Fulani friends, colleagues and we have the responsibility to continue to stress that it is not the entire Fulani are guilty of these crimes.
“The leadership of Miyetti Allah has said again and again that it is 90 per cent responsible for the condition we find ourselves.
“We’ve got to make leaders like that take back their words, apologise to the nation and even be subjected to some form of restitution to the whole nation…That is the only way towards peace.”
Credit: The Nation