Nobel laureate, Prof Wole Soyinka, has reacted to the seven-count charge slammed on Omoyele Sowore by the President Muhammadu Buhari led government.
Igbere TV had reported that the Department of State Service (DSS) are charging the SaharaReporters publisher over alleged treasonable felony.
He is also being charged for ‘insulting the president’, ‘cyberstalking’ Buhari, ‘conspiracy to commit treason’, among other charges.
In the charge sheet obtained exclusively by us, dated Sept 19, the DSS accused Sowore of granting an interview which drew insults on the president.
Sowore was arrested on August 3, 2019 in Lagos for planning a series of protests against “bad leadership” in Nigeria under the #RevolutionNow movement.
The DSS had earlier obtained a 45-day detention order against the former presidential candidate, which expired Saturday, Sept. 21.
Read the full statement issued by Wole Soyinka, which he personally signed and obtained by Igbere TV.
“This is utterly depressing news. So, the Sowore affair has moved beyond harassment and taken on a sinister direction. Outside the country where I happened to be engaged at the moment, I can testify that the immediate reaction around me was to dismiss this as yet another grotesque product of Fake News, of which Nigerians have become the greatest practitioners. I confess that I also joined in this school of thought – at the start.
“Further checks have however confirmed that this government has indeed attained an unprecedented level of paranoia. I do not believe that the Justice department itself believes in these improbable charges, as formally publicised. So, once again, we inscribe in our annals another season of treasonable felony, History still guards some lessons we have yet to digest, much less from which to learn.
“Welcome to the Club, Mr. Omoyele Sowore.”
