Wole Soyinka, Trump Critic, Reports American Visa Cancellation
The US government has revoked the visa for Wole Soyinka, the renowned Nigerian Nobel prize-winning playwright who has been outspoken about Trump since his initial presidency, Soyinka disclosed on Tuesday.
“I want to assure the consulate … that I’m very content with the revocation of my visa,” Soyinka, who received the 1986 Nobel prize for literature, informed a media gathering.
Soyinka formerly possessed permanent residency in the United States, though he tore up his green card after Donald Trump’s first election in 2016.
Soyinka surmised that his recent statements comparing Trump to the Ugandan dictator Idi Amin might have provoked a reaction and led to the US consulate’s decision.
Soyinka noted earlier this year that the US consulate in Lagos had requested his presence for an interview to reassess his visa, which he stated he would not attend.
According to a letter from the consulate sent to Soyinka, officials have terminated his visa, referencing US state department regulations that authorize “a consular officer, the secretary, or a department official to whom the secretary has delegated this authority … to revoke a nonimmigrant visa at any time, in his or her discretion”.
“This is a somewhat unusual love letter from an embassy,”
he jokingly stated while presenting the letter aloud to journalists in Lagos, Nigeria’s financial capital. He also advised any organizations hoping to invite him to the United States “not to waste their time”.
“I have no visa. I am banned,” Soyinka affirmed.
The US embassy in Abuja, the capital, indicated it could not comment on individual cases, citing confidentiality rules.
The current US administration has made visa revocations a defining feature of its wider clampdown on immigration, notably targeting university students who were vocal about Palestinian rights.
Soyinka said he had recently compared Trump to Uganda’s Amin, something he remarked Trump “should be proud of”.
“Idi Amin was a man of international stature, a statesman, so when I called Donald Trump Idi Amin, I thought I was showing him respect,”
Soyinka explained. “He’s been conducting himself as a dictator.”
The 91-year-old playwright behind Death and the King’s Horseman has taught at and been given awards top US universities including Harvard and Cornell.
His newest novel, Chronicles from the Land of the Happiest People on Earth, a commentary about corruption in Nigeria, was published in 2021. Soyinka referred to the book as his “gift to Nigeria”.
In February, the Crucible theatre in Sheffield staged Death and the King’s Horseman.
Soyinka remained open to entertaining an invitation to the United States should circumstances change, but stated: “I wouldn’t take the initiative myself because there’s nothing I’m looking for there. Nothing.”
He went on to criticise the ramped-up arrests of undocumented immigrants in the country.
“This is not about me,” Soyinka emphasized. “When we see people being detained arbitrarily – people being apprehended and they disappear for a month … old women, children being separated. So that’s really what concerns me.”
The ongoing immigration crackdown has seen national guard troops deployed to US cities and citizens briefly held as part of intensive operations, as well as the limiting of legal means of entry.
