The media team of Labour Party’s presidential and vice presidential candidates in the 2023 election, Peter Obi and Datti Yusuf Baba-Ahmed, has said that there is not going to be any debate between Datti and the Nobel Laureate, Prof. Wole Soyinka.
It will be recalled that Soyinka recently dared Datti-Ahmed to a public debate following the latter’s comment in an interview with Channels TV, where he stressed that “whoever swears in Tinubu ” has “ended democracy” in Nigeria”.
Following the Labour Party’s VP candidate’s statement, the National Broadcasting Commission (NBC) slammed a fine of N5 million on Channels TV for breaking the broadcasting law in a programme with Datti.
Datti had also during the TV interface spoken about the Supreme Court in a manner described by Soyinka as “fascistic language”.
Soyinka during an interview on the same TV, said, “I denounced the menacing utterances of a vice-presidential candidate as unbecoming. It was a gladiatorial challenge directed at the judiciary and, by implication, the rest of the democratic polity,”
With Soyinka’s open challenge, the Obi-Datti media team in a statement on Saturday said that culturally it is not decent to pitch a far-younger Datti to point out an 88 year old Soyinka’s folly to his face, even if the old man called for it.
It noted that their age and accomplishment gaps are parallel one to another, and that the respect for the Septuagenarian academia is not out of cowardice at all.
The statement further reads, “Like many Nigerians, we are bewildered by the late hour intervention of our respected Nobel laureate Prof Wole Soyinka in issues around the flawed 2023 elections. Where was he all this while?
“One of those who should ordinarily and rightfully be honoured as the conscience of the nation, Prof. Soyinka is now criminalizing dissent and in fact weighing in on the side of fraud and injustice!
“We state therefore that the vice-presidential candidate of Labour Party, Dr. Yusuf Datti Baba-Ahmed cannot take up Prof. Soyinka’s offer of a public debate, not out of cowardice, but for cultural and political reasons.
“Culturally it’s just not decent, their age and accomplishment gaps taken into account, for Datti to sit opposite the 88 year-old global icon and point out his folly to his face, even if the old man called for it.
“And politically there is no basis for such a challenge in that Prof. is not on any of the opposite ballots.
“If however, he can use his influence to drag his preferred candidates, who resisted debates throughout the campaign, to the studio this second, Datti says he is more than willing to take them on,” the statement reads.
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