‘Nigeria could split,’ says Nobel-winner Soyinka

The outspoken Nobel-winning author Wole Soyinka has launched an excoriating attack on the Nigerian president's wife in response to the political crisis gripping the country. The 76-year-old playwright says his homeland is a "failed state" and says the country could break up while its first lady uses stolen power for corrupt ends.

A political activist since the 1960s, and the first African to win the Nobel prize for literature, Soyinka is now heading the Save Nigeria Group, calling for the impeachment of president Umaru Yar'Adua, who has not been seen in public for months, and accusing his wife, Turai, of "spousal abuse". Critically ill, the president underwent medical treatment in Saudi Arabia in November and since his return last month has been kept in an ambulance with his own mother forbidden to visit him.

Speaking to the Independent, Soyinka accused Turai Yar'Adua of using her husband's incapacity to take power covertly for her own corrupt ends, sharing it with a group of "absolute brigands". He said: "This woman is there standing guard against the truth of his health. When will the rest of the nation wake up?

"[The President] returns under the cover of darkness and they say he is up and drinking tea, with a straight face. Everyone knows it is a lie – even those who say it – and it insults people's intelligence. His mother was told to go away and could not see her son. It is spousal abuse."

Thousands of protestors have taken to the streets to support Soyinka under the banner of the Save Nigeria Group. The veteran campaigner has been arrested by Nigerian authorities for his political work twice before, though not since the 1960s.

Nigeria is beset by larger crises: sectarian killings in the central region, as reported previously on The First Post; and attacks by armed separatists in the Niger Delta. As Soyinka was speaking to the Independent yesterday, the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (Mend), set off two car bombs.

Soyinka's intervention was couched in vigorous language. The writer, who in February grabbed UK headlines when he damned England as a "cesspit" breeding ground for fundamentalist Muslims, yesterday turned his invective on his own country.

"I wish in God's name someone would govern this place in a way that doesn't make me feel personally belittled," he said. "I cannot stand the notion of these people feeling they have the right to wipe their dirty feet and piss upon us."

So serious is the situation that Soyinka believes the country could fragment within 12 months. He said: "Nigeria is looking at its last chance in the next year. The level of anger has peaked. I don't rule out Nigeria breaking up. That's what can happen to a failed state." ·