Soyinka urges Tinubu to reopen unsolved killings, assassination cases

Nobel Laureate Wole Soyinka has called on President Bola Tinubu to fulfill his promise to revisit unresolved cases of assassinations and extra-judicial killings across Nigeria. Soyinka made the appeal while speaking at the 28th Wole Soyinka Lecture Series in Port Harcourt, Rivers State, an event themed 'Reclaiming the Nigerian State through Accountability, Justice and Civic Courage.'

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That is why my remark is to remind you of that, that actually through me, paying honour to those who have been, who’ve lost their lives as a result of these deficiencies in the state and also the criminal participation, even indirect, of ours, the complicity in the decimation and the devaluation of our humanity.

Soyinka specifically demanded justice for victims of unresolved killings, citing the cases of Deborah Samuel, a student murdered in Sokoto in 2022 after alleged blasphemy, and Mene Ogidi, a 28-year-old man allegedly shot dead by a police officer in Delta State. He criticized what he described as "selective justice," noting the swift arrest of the policeman accused in Ogidi's case contrasted with the perceived lack of justice for Deborah Samuel's killers.

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I don’t want us to lose that sense that this session is dedicated to the martyrs, to those who have needlessly and avoidably have lost their lives, whom we all admit, the life of a human being constitutes the basic unit of any community, any structure, any system of governance.

The playwright warned against complacency, stating that perpetrators of crimes must be identified and punished regardless of their status. He highlighted the lecture series as a tribute to victims of state failures and injustices, including six policemen killed in Apo, Abuja. Soyinka expressed dismay that an alleged accomplice in Deborah Samuel's murder, who reportedly displayed the matchstick used to set her ablaze, had not faced justice years later.

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It’s dedicated to individuals, the youths, like Deborah, who was killed, who was butchered by her own classmate, hunted through the city, necklaced and set on fire. But that is not the crime. That really is not the crime.

"The crime is the silence of the rest of us, that such a thing is possible, and that the killers of that girl can actually go on television, hold up a match," Soyinka stated, underscoring the complicity he perceived in the devaluation of human life. He dedicated the lecture to martyrs and those who have lost their lives due to systemic deficiencies and criminal participation within the state.

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The crime is the silence of the rest of us, that such a thing is possible, and that the killers of that girl can actually go on television, hold up a match, and