Aka Ikenga, the Think Tank of Ohanaeze, on Wednesday, blasted Nobel Laureate, Prof. Wole Soyinka, over his comments about the Igbo voting pattern in the just-concluded presidential elections.
In a statement, the group said it “has noted with dismay the demonization of Ndigbo by a group of people who nothing positive to contribute to the peaceful conclusion of the presidential election. Ndigbo voted freely and without any fear or favour. To attribute it to greed or stomach infrastructure or even love of money is to carry on this malicious stigmatization to a ridiculous level.”
“Ekiti voted for PDP and it was called stomach infrastructure but not Osun that voted APC. Gov. Amaechi of Rivers and close friend of Prof Wole Soyinka lost his State and all South East and South South States and we are all categorised as people who put their votes where their stomach is and are suffering from incurable mindedness.”
“The statement from Soyinka is a sign that the quality of gun totting Wole of Ibadan has gone into oblivion! It is now replaced by that of man who must speak even when he has nothing to say. Truly the quality has died and is now replaced by something else. Wole Soyinka of old would have campaigned for people to vote freely. How come Ndigbo are the only people singled out by Soyinka. There are over 400 tribes in Nigeria but Soyinka did not single out any of them except Ndigbo for vilification in US. The election is over but we urge the purveyors of disunity to let peace reign”, the statement added.
Meanwhile, Prof Soyinka has refuted the statement where he was quoted to have given a damning verdict on the Igbo at a lecture he delivered at the Hutchins Centre, Havard University, U.S.A.
He said it was “demeaning, sickening and boring” to have to deal with those he described as cowards, who cannot fight their own battles but must fasten their pronouncements on others.
His words: “I have just read a statement attributed to me. My lecture at the Hutchins Centre, Harvard University, was video recorded. Anyone who believes what I am alleged to have said must be a moron-repeat, a moron.
“It is demeaning, sickening and boring to have to deal with these cowards who cannot fight their own battles but must fasten their imbecilic pronouncements on others.
“Only the mentally retarded will credit this comment attributed to me regarding the Ndigbo voting pattern in the last elections. I strongly suspect the author of this despicable concoction, and may make a further statement, once the source is verified.”
In the story on the pattern of voting by Igbo in the recent election, the Nobel laureate was quoted to have said: “Igbo remained unrepentant and resolute towards their strategic objective of secession at worst or a Nigerian president of Igbo extraction at best,” adding: “The climax of MASSOB’s war against the Nigerian state was the call for sit-ins and civil disobedience that shut down markets and public services, as Igbo stayed at home in a symbolic gesture to assert Biafran independence. The call was honoured by governors in the two principal Igbo states, though without fanfare.”
He was also quoted to have said that the Igbo have become predictable “with great accuracy, whom they will vote for in an election, because they tend to put their votes, where their stomachs take them; suffering, as it were, from incurable money-mindedness, as they would stop at nothing in their quest for personal financial gain.”
