Nobel laureate, Prof. Wole Soyinka, has called on security agents to be tactical in the handling of the ongoing protests, to avoid fatalities.
Soyinka made the call in a statement on Sunday while reacting to President Bola Tinubu’s address to the nation.
The Nobel laureate and global literature icon particularly cautioned against unprofessional conduct that could hurt protesters “who are merely asking for bread”.
According to him, a hard approach to the protests could lead to “more desperate upheavals”.
“Even tear gas remains questionable in most circumstances; using it is certainly an abuse in situations of clearly peaceful protest.
“Hunger marches constitute a universal S.O.S, not peculiar to the Nigerian nation.
“They belong, indeed, in a class of their own, never mind the collateral claims emblazoned on posters.
“They serve as summons to governance that a breaking point has been reached and, thus, a testing ground for governance awareness of public desperation,” he said.
Soyinka said the tragic response to the hunger marches in parts of the country constituted a retrogression that took the nation backward.
“It took us even further back than the deadly culmination of the watershed ‘Endsars’ protests.
“It evokes pre-independence – that is, colonial – acts of disdain, a passage that induced the late stage pioneer Hubert Ogunde’s folk opera ‘Bread and Bullets’, earning that nationalist serial persecution and proscription by the colonial government,” he said.
He said that the nation’s security agencies should explore alternative models for security intervention.
Soyinka said that time was long overdue to abandon, permanently, what he called the “anachronistic resort to lethal means”.
President Bola Tinubu had, in a nationwide address, urged protesters to embrace dialogue.
“Under the circumstances, I enjoin protesters and the organisers to suspend any further protest and create room for dialogue which I have always acceded to, at the slightest opportunity.
“Nigeria requires all hands on deck and needs us all — regardless of age, party, tribe, religion or other divides – to work together in reshaping our destiny as a nation.
“To those who have taken undue advantage of this situation to threaten any section of this country, be warned,” he said.
According to Tinubu, the nation’s democracy progresses when the constitutional rights of every Nigerian are respected and protected.
“Our law enforcement agencies should continue to ensure the full protection of lives and properties of innocent citizens in a responsible manner,” he said.
