Speaking with AIT, Dr. Don Pedro Obaseki, the Director of Researcher and Strategy for the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) in the 2023 presidential polls, made claims about Nobel Prize winner Prof. Wole Soyinka’s academic history.
Obaseki alleged that Prof. Soyinka was rusticated from the University of Ibadan (UI) and thus could not present a diploma from the institution. This revelation has stirred up a new angle in the ongoing controversy surrounding President Bola Tinubu’s academic records.
Obaseki’s statements came in the midst of a heated political debate regarding President Tinubu’s educational credentials, a matter that has been brought before the Supreme Court by the PDP’s presidential candidate, Atiku Abubakar.
While addressing the issue, Obaseki stated that the central question should not revolve around whether Tinubu attended Chicago State University, but rather whether he genuinely graduated or falsified his diploma.
Using Wole Soyinka’s case to analyse Tinubu’s case
The PDP Director drew a comparison by bringing up Prof. Wole Soyinka’s educational background. According to Obaseki, Prof. Soyinka, a renowned Nigerian playwright and Nobel laureate, attended the University of Ibadan in the 1950s. However, he asserted that Prof. Soyinka could not produce a diploma from the university due to being rusticated before completing his program.
He argued, “It is not whether he attended or whether the person is a female or a male that attended; the issue is the certificate.”
Further highlighting the controversy, Obaseki referred to specific documents during the interview. He cited file 26, file 7, of a deposition, where it was mentioned that the University of Ibadan did not recognise the certificate and that this was the first time during the proceedings that they had seen a certificate like it.
