Soyinka slams Nigeria 'inaction'

Wole Soyinka (centre) was briefly detained after a rally last week

Nigeria's Nobel prize-winning author Wole Soyinka has blamed President Olusegun Obasanjo for failing to ensure security in a recent spate of violence.

Hundreds have died in spiralling attacks between Nigeria's Christian and Muslim communities this month.

Mr Soyinka criticised President Obasanjo's subsequent decision to impose emergency rule in Plateau State.

He said a national conference on human rights was needed to address relations between Nigeria's different groups.

He said the time was ripe for a conference of this kind, describing it as a "glaring imperative of survival".

He slammed a recent televised appeal for calm by President Obasanjo, describing it as "another one-man show, long on recriminations, short on perceptiveness".

Christian criticism

The Nigerian leader's decision to dismiss the provincial governor and suspend democratic institutions in Plateau State follows the massacre of hundreds of Muslims in the town of Yelwa.

Impunity has been enthroned and nurtured for too long Wole Soyinka

Christian militants were blamed for the killings. In February, 49 Christians were killed in a church as part of a long-standing dispute over land between Christian farmers and Muslim cattle herders.

The tensions spread across Nigeria and scores of Christians were killed in the northern city of Kano.

While Muslim leaders and refugees from the fighting have welcomed the president's decision to take charge in Plateau state, Christian leaders have decried the action.

It is the first time the president has chosen to use his sweeping powers in a state since he took office in 1999.

Unconfirmed reports in the local press say violence has continued in Plateau State despite the emergency.

'Lack of accountability'

Mr Soyinka, who was briefly detained by police during a protest march last weekend, said the government's fear of attacking "sacred cows" had helped make the situation worse.

"The truth is that impunity has been enthroned and nurtured for too long... all over the nation, so that no one has been held up to public accountability and scrutiny for the mayhem that has been unleashed," he said.

President Obasanjo has dismissed calls for a national convention on human rights, saying all such issues must be addressed through the national assembly.

In 1986, Wole Soyinka became the first African to win the Nobel prize for literature.

He is one of the continent's leading authors and thinkers.

He became known politically for his outspoken criticism of the authorities during almost 15 years of military rule, and went into self-imposed exile from 1994-98 when threatened with arrest by dictator General Sani Abacha.