Campus Cult: Not Soyinka’s Fault but Blame Soyinka

By

Hakeem Babalola

mysmallvoice@yahoo.com

 

Something is amiss. This missing thing is a mirror. It is a profound situation of a society. This society is in self-deceit of what seems to be the reality of a people who has lost something they thought is still with them. It is a society stark naked yet mocking the nakedness of its neighbour. The whole thing is like a deep wakeless sleep. It is fundamental yet superficial.

 

This thing should have been destroyed at the incipient stage but somehow squirmed to the heart of a people. It frightens friends, relations, institutions, the community and the larger society which had bread and butter it. It is it because it has lost human values. It is dangerous, for it is parading itself in human form. it is cruel; even brutal instrument of torture. It is here to further make a destructive raid on our society unless the society itself ponders on the genesis, the effects and the method of reversal.

 

It is cultism in the Nigerian Tertiary Institutions. The menace of secret cults in the Nigerian universities has become another politics of violent wind; a tempest that has swept over the land. It is a major social problem both within and outside the Nigerian universities. One thing is as ironical as unfortunate though: the involvement of a giant. The engagement with cultism of a man who could simply be described as a humanist is in itself humorous; even satirical mimicry.

 

The origin of cultism in the Nigerian colleges can be traced to the Pyrates Confraternity that was founded by this literature giant, Wole Soyinka and others at the then University College, Ibadan in 1953. The Nobel Laurete's aims may have been lofty and noble in the quest to end tribalism and elitism, to abolish convention and to revive the age chivalry, I doubt if he has enough vocabulary to clean the dark stain left by Oyinbo’s wine. He is involved, and his ardent critics have always attributed the present modus operandi of secret cults in our higher institutions to him. Wole Soyinka upon his attempt to rectify or put things in perspective may have to carry this stigma to his grave. It's a pitiful fate.

 

Perhaps this is the reason behind the recent documentary on Cultism in the Higher Institutions by Soyinka himself.  He seems deeply touched as he leads us to the exact spot where it all began at the then University College, Ibadan. The documentary shows Soyinka as the reporter, the analyst and the narrator. It is a melancholy approach at looking in retrospect. But I am not sure whether he regrets or not being the founder of something that has dampened the spirit of education in our society.

 

According to Soyinka, over 80 students have died within the last two years in campuses yet there has not been a single conviction. There are about 10, 000 members across the country. They are named Black Arks, Eye, Black Movement of Africa, Daughters of Jezebel and so on. They are being described as gangs of thugs, drug addicts, killers disguising under campus fraternity. They always send a message of terror and control to fellow students, faculty and even citizens out of campus.

 

"Back in the 1950’s, It was fun," says Soyinka. "We were young idealistic Nigerians with independent minds. It was a rebellious gesture against the colonialists. It was a debating society with imagery of non-conformist world; a crown jewel of Nigerian nation".

 

The modus operandi may be quite different, however, I suspect the basic aim is the same. Wole Soyinka’s Pyrates Confraternity or National Association of Seadogs was seeking attention and control in those days; so is the present cultists in our colleges. The Nigerian youths have been neglected for so long. Successive governments probably have even taken a surreptitious pleasure in seeing our future intellectuals mutilating one another. Otherwise how is it possible that members of these notorious cults have not been seriously prosecuted.

 

Some have even alleged that most cult members in our higher institutions are sons and daughters of oligarchy and military officers. They want to rule our minds like their parents have attempted. They have gradually turned citadels of learning; a radically distinctive and unequal topographic shrine of learning, a berth for self discovery, a craft to free one’s mind to a gory and maddening ceaseless tumult. They cut human flesh in pieces. They cut head open. They behead. They bathe victims in acid. Do they also rape?

 

But it is a mirror, a mirror of a larger society. It is a phenomenon inevitable in a society where one man is allowed to steal a horse while another must not even look at a halter. Campus’ trait of extreme cruelty is an ineluctable destiny in a society where thugs have become the "godfathers" of political appointees. The brutal mind of cultists is a reflection of that of Nigerians’ leaders. They also kill as well as sending us a message of terror and control. They rule instead of lead. They steal instead of being prudent.  

 

Therefore it is sheer hypocrisy for these leaders who also belong to different cults, to decry cultism in the Nigerian colleges. These good for nothing politicians should be told in clear language that it was they who set a precedent in which our students are now emulating. It was they who seemingly destroyed education by giving little or no attention to what is going on in the Nigerian colleges. It was they who have manipulated our youths’ intellectual endearment and turned it to brutal thuggery. It was they who encourage and protect cultism in our tertiary institutions.

 

What I am saying is simple. Since it is obvious that cultism in our colleges is a mirror of us, it would amount to wasting of time if we only focus our attention in eradicating cultism in our campuses, while political killing is rampant in our society. Let us focus on what Adewale Rotimi posited in his Violence in the Citadel: The Menace of Secret Cults in the Nigerian Universities.

 

 

"To effectively combat secret cultism," he writes. "The universities must enjoy improved funding, recreational academic facilities must be improved and virile students union activities must be encouraged. For the general Nigerian society, the present culture of violence in the society must be curtailed."

 

Finally, I think it’s unfair to apportion blame for this campus killings and very serious wastage of our students on Wole Soyinka. "I get the blame for starting it all," he says in the documentary. When this giant found his Pyrates Confraternity in those beautiful days, he and others did not engage in savagery as we are now witnessing. Or did he? Even God seems to have lost control after He created the universe.