Nobel Laureate, Professor Wole Soyinka, has called on the Nigerian Broadcasting Corporation to lift the ban placed on Eedris Abdulkareem’s new song Tell Your Papa, which criticises President Bola Tinubu through his son, Seyi.
NBC banned the song from being played on radio and TV stations, calling it “objectionable.” The action has caused public anger, with many Nigerians saying it attacks free speech.
Soyinka, in a statement from New York University, Abu Dhabi, on Sunday, said the ban was a clear return to censorship and a danger to freedom of expression. He said, “Courtesy of an artist operating in a different genre – the cartoon – who sent me his recent graphic comment on the event, I learnt recently of a return to the culture of censorship with the banning of the product of a music artist, Eedris Abdulkareem.”
The Nobel Laureate warned that any government that only listens to praise-singers is heading for failure. He said freedom of speech must be protected at all costs.
Soyinka added, “I have yet to listen to the record, but the principle is inflexibly etched on any democratic template. It cannot be flouted. That, surely, is basic.”
He also joked about how the ban might have helped Abdulkareem. “The ban is a boost to the artist’s nest egg, thanks to free governmental promotion. Mr. Abdulkareem must be currently warbling his merry way all the way to the bank. I envy him,” Soyinka said.
He noted that this is not the first time artists and critics have been targeted. “We have been through this before, over and over again, ad nauseum. We know where it all ends,” he added.
Soyinka also referred to cartoonist Ebun Aleshinloye, who drew a cartoon in response to the ban and shared it internationally. “Let’s simply go the whole hog!” he said sarcastically. “Ban the artist, ban the association, ban the cartoonist too.”
He stressed, “Any government that is tolerant only of yes-men and women… has already commenced a downhill slide into the abyss. Whatever regulating body is responsible… should be compelled to reverse its misstep.”
Soyinka also spoke about the recent killing of 19 people in Edo State by a mob. He linked the violence to a larger problem of impunity and lawlessness.
He remembered the 2022 killing of student Deborah Samuel in Sokoto, whose suspected killers were freed. “The horror is not in numbers but in the act itself,” Soyinka said.
He called for justice, saying, “The culprits are in plain sight and so are witnesses. There can be no excuses. My heart goes out to friends, colleagues and families of victims and traumatised survivors of this senseless slaughter.”
