NIGERIA is suffering greater carnage at the hands of Islamist group, Boko Haram, than it did during a secessionist civil war, yet this has ironically made the country’s break-up less likely, Nobel laureate, Professor Wole Soyinka, has said.
Speaking to Reuters at his home in Abeokuta, Ogun State, Soyinka said the horrors inflicted by the militants had shown Nigerians across the mostly Muslim North and Christian South that sticking together might be the only way to avoid even greater sectarian slaughter.
“The bloodshed is now worse than during the 1967-1970 Biafra war when a secessionist attempt by the eastern Igbo people nearly tore Nigeria up into ethnic regions,” he added.
“We have never been confronted with butchery on this scale, even during the civil war,” Soyinka said in his front room, surrounding by traditional wooden sculptures of Yoruba deities on Tuesday.
“There were atrocities (during Biafra) but we never had such a near predictable level of carnage and this is what is horrifying,” Soyinka added.
“I think ironically the break-up is less likely now,” Soyinka said, adding that “for the first time, a sense of belonging is predominating. It’s either we stick together now or we break up, and we know it would be not in a pleasant way.”
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