Lagos, March 24, 2025 | The air feels heavier in Nigeria today as Wole Soyinka, the 90-year-old Nobel Laureate and literary giant, lets loose a truth that’s hard to swallow. In a Sunday interview with The Guardian Nigeria, aired on Channels Television at 7 PM WAT on March 23, he declared that slavery isn’t a relic of the past in Africa. It’s alive, he said, thriving in shadows we’d rather ignore. At 1:25 PM WAT, his words are still rippling, stirring a mix of unease, anger, and a call to look deeper across a continent that’s wrestled with chains for centuries.
Soyinka didn’t point fingers at one spot. He painted a broader, bleaker picture: human trafficking, forced labor, and exploitation aren’t just headlines, they’re a pulse beneath Africa’s skin. Speaking from Lagos, where he’s long been a voice of conscience, he tied this to a global shame modern slavery’s 50 million victims, per UN counts, with Africa’s share stubbornly high. “The structures remain,” he argued, suggesting colonial scars and new greed keep the beast fed. For him, it’s not history, it’s now, and Nigeria’s no exception.
The timing stings. Just yesterday, Soyinka blasted President Bola Tinubu’s emergency rule in Rivers State, calling it a federalism-killer. Today, he’s widened the lens, and folks are connecting dots. On X, posts like one at 9:30 WAT echo his slavery warning, some tying it to Rivers’ oil-rich chaos, where power plays might echo old bondage. “Slavery not yet dead,” another mused at 11:15 WAT, wondering if he’s hinting at elites exploiting the vulnerable. Soyinka didn’t name names, but his track record decades of calling out rot suggests he’s not bluffing.
For Nigerians like Chika, a Lagos trader, it’s personal. “You hear of girls tricked to Dubai, boys stuck in Libya,” she said, voice low near her stall. She’s right. The Global Slavery Index pegs Nigeria among the top 10 for modern slavery, with 1.4 million trapped domestic servitude, sex trafficking, kids forced to hawk or beg. Soyinka’s not breaking news; he’s amplifying it. Web whispers, like Al Jazeera’s December 2024 piece on Nigerian women abused in Iraq, back him up. “Modern slavery,” one activist called it, and Soyinka’s nodding along.
He’s got history on his mind too. Africa’s transatlantic slave trade 12.5 million shipped off, per Caribbean leaders’ February reparations push left wounds that never healed. Soyinka, steeped in Yoruba roots and global fights, sees echoes: colonial plunder morphed into today’s trafficking webs. “The past isn’t past,” he seemed to say, and X users agree some at 10:00 WAT link it to Europe’s stalled reparations talk, others see Africa’s leaders as complicit. It’s a messy knot, and he’s tugging at every thread.
The man’s no stranger to stirring pots. At 90, after surviving Biafra’s fallout and Abacha’s jails, Soyinka’s still swinging yesterday against Tinubu, today against a continent’s denial. Critics might call it grandstanding; fans say it’s courage. Either way, it’s landed. Posts on X split the mood some hail a “prophet,” others roll eyes at an elder who won’t quit. But Chika’s take cuts deeper: “He’s saying what we know but don’t face.” Nigeria’s 221,000 in slavery-like conditions, per the IOM, aren’t stats to her they’re neighbors.
Tonight, as Lagos hums and Rivers simmers, Soyinka’s warning hangs thick. No solutions offered, just a mirror held up. Will it spark action tighter laws, real rescues or fade into the noise? The African Union’s reparations push this year suggests momentum, but Soyinka’s skepticism bites: if slavery’s not dead, who’s really fighting it? For now, his voice is the loudest in the room, daring Africa to look at its ghosts and decide what’s next.