Presidential Election 2015: Beware Of Political 419s, Soyinka Cautions Media
Nobel laureate, Prof. Wole Soyinka has raised the alarm over what he described as political 419s whose activities had been a form of violence of some members of the electorate.Their criminal activities, according to him,
ranges from reproducing
similar media headlines to interviews that were not conducted to issuing
fake statements and then attribute them to persons who might not be
aware of their antics.Soyinka regretted that the organisers of the All Political Stakeholders National Workshop on Violence-Free Elections in 2015 got President Goodluck Jonathan and General Muhammadu Buhari (rtd) as well as 12 other presidential candidates to sign an accord without addressing the other kind of violence.
He denied making any statement endorsing any presidential or governorship contestant, saying such attributions to him were “fabrications by faceless, often self-appointed agents of deception”, which should be publicly criticized.
“Whenever I choose to declare support for a candidate – as is my electoral right – I shall ensure that I deploy a medium that places my authorship beyond dispute”, he added.
The Nobel laureate further noted that he was less bothered about the view of some opportunists who sometimes use out of context genuine quotes from statements he had made in the past, even as he warned that such users should expect to hear from his Literary Agents.
He said, “From personal interest however, I was disappointed that the communiqué makes no reference to the violence done to members of the electorate whose identities are stolen, abused and debased during this exercise.
“It is rapidly becoming commonplace to encounter totally fictitious statements, even entire interviews published and attributed to unsuspecting authorship.
“This criminal proceeding has even involved the cloning of media mastheads to which non-existent interviews are then attached. To render it in local parlance, this is political 419, and of the most despicable brand”.
Soyinka added that although it would be not be fair to hold the candidates for the elections responsible for this ugly trend in the media, it must be stressed that “they also have a moral responsibility to denounce these dirty tricksters in the strongest terms, even in their own interest.
“The resentment inspired in victims of such cowardly conduct cannot but impact on their own political image. The media must also protect itself by taking necessary measures against such unprincipled confusionists. It is the democratic right of every citizen to know exactly who is saying what on issues that affect their political choices”, he noted further.
Comments