Popular actor Wale Ojo will start as Nobel Laureate Wole Soyinka in a new film, ‘The Man Died’, produced by Awam Amkpa for Zuri24 Media. The film will premiere in July, coinciding with Wole Soyinka’s 90th Birthday.
From the title, one can conclude that the film may not be unconnected to the book written by Soyinka, titled, ‘The Man Died: The Prison Notes of Wole Soyinka’. The book is a record of the 27 months of imprisonment suffered by Soyinka who was held as a political prisoner in 1967-1969 at a time of civil war and secession of the now defunct Republic of Biafra.
In the trailer, Wale Ojo wore the signature afro hairstyle and khaki French suit Soyinka is known for. The dress code of some of the characters in the trailer was also reminiscent of the ’60s. What about the legendary Voxwagen beetle car and also architectural designs in the film that can still be found at the University of Ibadan, Nigeria’s first university? This is another plus for Nollywood, where producers now boldly dig into Africa’s history to root out stories that will interest the rest of the world.
The other acts in ‘The Man Died’ include Sam Dede, Francis Onwoche, Nobert Young, Edmond Enaibe, Segilola Ogidan, Simileoluwa Hassan, Christiana Oshunniyi, and many more.
During the civil war, Soyinka broke into the Nigerian Broadcasting Corporation studio in Ibadan during the Western Region’s political crisis in 1965 to air his grievances.
Decades later, the Nobel Laureate revealed some of his decisions leading to his becoming a political prisoner.
In an article, he said, “On July 6, 1967, civil war broke out in Nigeria between the country’s military and the forces of Biafra, an independent republic proclaimed by ex-Nigerian military officer Odumegwu Ojukwu on May 30 of that year. The war killed more than 1 million people, many of whom died from starvation. It ended in January 1970 with the reintegration of Biafra into Nigeria.
“Malnutrition, Red Cross, kwashiorkor, relief flights, genocide, the Uli airstrip used by Biafran planes to elude the Nigerian blockade, mercenaries, the Aburi accord that broke down and led to war—these are some of the memory triggers of the Nigerian civil war of secession that we would like to re-assign.
“Over a million lives perished—a shameful proportion of them children—mostly through starvation and aerial bombardment. The Nigerian federal government, committed to the doctrine of oneness, had boasted that the conflict would last no longer than three weeks of “police action.”
“We had learnt much from the politics of other nations, but apparently not from history; the war lasted more than two years.
“Tormented by the image of a herd of human lemmings rushing to their doom, as a young writer, I made the “treasonable” statement warning that the secessionist state, Biafra, could never be defeated.
“The simplistic rendition of that conviction in most minds—certainly in the minds of the then-ruling military and its elite support was that this applied merely to the physical field of combat. Thus it was regarded as a psychological offensive against the federal side, an attempt to demoralize its soldiers while boosting the war spirit of the enemy.
“That “enemy” had also boasted that no force in black Africa could defeat them. My visit to the Biafran enclave in October 1966 resulted in arrest and detention. During interrogation, I insisted that my statement was meant as a counter to the surge of emotive nationalism and slavish sanctification of colonial boundaries.”
