By Adesina Soyooye
A son of Nobel Laureate, Wole Soyinka, has passionately pleaded that the story about Fulani Herdsmen attacking his father’s house, be discontinued.
Dr Olaokun Soyinka said that the story was not only false, but meant to inflame an already bad situation.
In a statement he personally signed, Olalokun pleaded: “This is not true. Please, do not circulate further, and help to debunk it.”
He described the news as an attempt to forment trouble. He said: “It is an attempt to encourage discord. Although some cows were spotted, neither Prof, nor his house was attacked by anyone.”
He said his father confirmed to him on Wednesday that nothing of the nature of the news making the rounds ever happened.
“Kindly do not fall for this attempt, no matter the motive, to inflame this problematic situation.”
The Ogun State Police Command, in a statement signed by Spokesperson, Abimbola Oyeyemi said the Command was shocked to see a video of the attack trending, dismissing it as completely false.
It admitted that there was a case of a stray cow around Prof’s area, and disclosed that the cows are owned by a Yoruba man, not Fulani.
“Yesterday, Tuesday 9th of February, 2921, one Kazeem Sorinola, an indigene of Ijeun, Abeokuta, who is into Cattle business, was said to have been informed by a young Fulani man, Awalu Muhammad who is taking care of the cattle that one of the cows had got missing.
“While the Fulani man was searching for the stray cow around Kemta Estate where Prof. Wole Soyinka’s house is located, the Prof himself who was going out then saw the Fulani man with some of the cows, and he came down to ask where the man was heading to with the cows. He there and then asked the Fulani man to move the cow out of the vicinity.”
The statement said that the DPO Kemta Police Division, moved to the vicinity on hearing the news, searched the whole place, there were no cows as it was just a case of a stray cow.
The owner of the cows and the Fulani man were invited, questioned and profiled. Nothing more.”
An associate of Prof. Soyinka, Dr Olu Agunloye, a former Minister of State, Defence, had also issued a statement that Soyinka’s house was not under attack, and that Soyinka had dealt with the situation by warning the “herdsmen” to get off.
The news of the attack had gone viral, with all kinds of angles added to it which corrupted the true story.
An activist, Dr Joe Okei-Odumakin, had, immediately, issued a statement asking President Muhammadu Buhari to rein-in the Fulani herdsmen as the attack on the Nobel Laureate’s house marked a new low for Nigeria.
All the stories have turned out to be false.
