Soyinka is 90! Our very own teacher, playwright, poet, novelist, hunter, philosopher, rebel, musician, essayist, literary stylist, cultural beacon, social engineer and public intellectual has defied all odds to breast the tape of his 90th year.
If you ask, what’s in a number, you may attract the riposte, what’s NOT in a number. In their own esoteric way, numerologists break 90 into 9 and 0 and postulate that Number 9 brings us the energies of completion, universal love, inner-wisdom, and compassion while 0 adds its own vibrations of eternity and infinity – a reminder that we have access to infinite resources within ourselves when we remain connected to our spiritual essence.
A little over 50 years ago, many people who analysed his trajectory as an activist of the ‘talk-and-do’ hue, swore that the young Soyinka was destined to die young without even the remote possibility of having a nice-looking corpse. But whoever is monitoring when the crab goes to bed should prepare for a long vigil because the crab does not go to bed early (and the crab is Soyinka’s zodiac sign)!
Ninety years is special, culturally, spiritually and commemoratively. It is called the nonagintennial or granite anniversary. There are only about 22 million nonagenarians in existence, constituting 0.28 percent of the global population of 8.1 billion people. It is the privileged club of the anointed, those fated to be among the last set to tell the story of their generation — and Soyinka’s generation of intellectual elites was our golden generation.
It is not given to many people to be of abiding relevance to their country as Soyinka has been for six decades. By the time my path crossed that of Soyinka at the University of Ife in the 70s, he had already achieved fame (his foes will say, notoriety) and was a highly sought academic. I wasn’t a spring chicken myself having cut my teeth in journalism at DRUM Publications before returning to school.
As president of the students’ union, I knew that I needed the collaboration of those who had seen it all before and who would be there as trusted allies if things turned awry. In that sense, Soyinka was an uncommon counsellor and backbone. It was from him that I learnt that what matters in life is not the ‘ariwo ojà’, but the nobility of your convictions and the courage with which you pursue your ideals using all your talents, no matter the odds. He shares that honour in my life with his cousin, Fela Anikulapo-Kuti, Dr. Tai Solarin and Chief Gani Fawehinmi.
I pity those who, because of a disagreement over political perspectives, think that they can diminish Soyinka’s stature as a global intellectual. Great as the invention of social media is, it has, sadly been turned into a lynching machine by those that Nelson Ottah, (one of those who taught me how to chew the journalistic cud) would have described as “intellectual piccaninnies”.
Former presidential aspirant, Kingsley Moghalu has this to say on the matter: “Nobel Laureate Wole Soyinka is a principled fighter for justice in our country and around the world. He is a phenomenon that unlettered and uncultured people may not fully understand in an age of lazy social media in which many don’t read or think deep.”
In 2014 when he turned 80, I invoked Providence to spare our elderly friend and pathfinder for many more years, especially as he still looked so comely and strong. In many ways, he is “a tree that makes a forest”, as I titled my column in Daily Trust at the time (https://dailytrust.com/kongi-a-tree-that-makes-a-forest/) In just one more decade, if the Heavens permit, we’ll be gathered to usher him into the club of centenarians. Happy birthday, Prof!
