Be steadfast, Soyinka tells Gov Ortom

The Nobel laureate, Prof Wole Soyinka has urged Benue State Governor Samuel Ortom to remain unperturbed despite attacks on him following his recent defection to the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) by the leaders of the All Progressives Congress (APC).

Soyinka also urged the governor not to be discouraged by the spate of attacks on his person and office following his defection from the APC to the PDP.

In a letter, Prof Soyinka said “as a leader of a people who took much of the earliest brunt of unleashed herdsmen savagery, and cried in vain for help, you have a moral right to seek the promise of an alternative haven of security for your people.

They remain your primary responsibility. We are all free to cavil over the actual choice of an alternative destination, but no one can deny the inalienable entitlement to such action, especially where provoked by disillusionment and a sense of impotence under existing association”.

Soyinka who commended Ortom for standing with Benue people in the face of intimidation and threats, encouraged him to remain steadfast.

“Coincidences are, by their very nature, suspect, and I certainly perceive the beginnings of a heavy-handed campaign of reprisals from ruling circles over your political decision.

This bodes ill for the nation. It goes beyond any immediately affected state and alerts us all to fascistic threats against a common democratic destination, and the basic right of free choice of political paths towards its attainment.

I can only urge you therefore to take heart, and remain resilient, unbowed, and undeterred”, Soyinka noted.