Africa News
Nigerian Nobel laureate Wole Soyinka launches political party
Sep 26, 2010, 10:08 GMT
Nairobi/Lagos - Nobel literature laureate Wole Soyinka was elected chairman of a new political party in his native Nigeria at the weekend.
The Democratic Front for a Peoples Federation (DFPF) is to participate in parliamentary and presidential elections in the West African state next year. However, whether the 76-year-old Soyinka, who became the first African to be awarded the Nobel for literature in 1986 would run for office, remains unclear.
In his speech after being elected party chairman, Soyinka said the DFPF wanted to transform Nigeria into a democracy and the fight corruption.
Soyinka stated that Nigeria was being 'sucked dry while a minority is so lubricated that they slip out of grasp when their hands are caught in the till,' according to the news website Next.
According to Next, the DFPF was denied registration when it was first founded in 2002. Soyinka has said the party would cooperate with other political groupings in achieving its political goals.
Soyinka's work includes the novels The Interpreters and Season of Anomy. His books, poems and plays have focused on abuses in Nigeria, is regarded as a moral authority in Africa's most populous country. He was imprisoned under a military dictatorship and spend long periods in exile.
Nigeria's presidential elections were originally scheduled for January, but electoral authorities have postponed the poll because of problems with voter registration.
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