Wole Soyinka @92: Championing Trans-Atlantic ‘Heritage Voyage of Return’ amongst diaspora Africans
By Anote Ajeluorou
WHAT more could Africa’s legendary man of letters, Prof. Wole Soyinka, possibly want to accomplish again at 92 years of age? As his birthday comes round on Monday, 13 July 2026, with activities spread across the globe, this is one question culture historians will probably ask, as the man’s restlessness rivals that of a youth stung with ambition and just starting out on life’s journey. What with his frequent trips around the world when he could just sit back at his Ijegba Forest home in Abeokuta and sip from his vast collection of favourite wines and occasionally undertake his lifelong pastime of hunting. But Soyinka is possessed of his abiku avatar spirit and is always ‘coming and going this several seasons’ in restless pursuit of one cultural project or the other.
The project that defines his waking moments these days is his zeal to unite and bring to their ancestral homeland in Africa many Africans dispersed into the diaspora through the infamous Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade to the global North. It’s as if Soyinka wants to make reparations of sorts on behalf of Africa’s ancestors, who fell for the wiles of the white man and sold off their brothers and sisters to Europeans for trifles. While the wealth of the infamous Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade is still visible today in Europe, America and the Americas, Africa’s share of whatever the fortune amounted to long faded with those who engaged in the trade. This explains the one-sided nature of the trade that benefited Europe and left a broken continent that is still struggling with its lasting impact in the form of colonialism and post-colonial conflicts that succeeded it.
Next year Soyinka will embark on an ambitious and audacious reverse Trans-Atlantic ‘Heritage Voyage of Return’ and bring back descendants of Africans back to the continent. The plan is to bring home over 2,000 descendants of diaspora Africans from the Americas, America and Europe in a ship bask to Africa in a reverse manner in which their ancestors were taken centuries ago. It’s a symbolic reversal intended to return the stolen back to base and exorcise the trauma of the forceful dispersal of Africans against their will. But now they will return on their own free will. With reparations and restitution arguments assuming an ever keener dimensions with Ghanaian President John Mahama raising the stakes in his UN demands months ago, Soyinka’s proposed Voyage of Return will not have come at a more auspicious time in history.
Indeed, while President Mahama would seem to have stolen the spotlight with his deft diplomatic and political UN move to have the world recognise enslavement of Africans as the ‘gravest crime against humanity’, Soyinka’s mission to physically bring home diaspora descendants is a symbolic victory only a cultural figure of Soyinka’s stature can dream to pull off. However, the two leaders, one political the other cultural, are working closely on behalf of Africa and African diaspora. Last month, Soyinka was specifically asked by President Mahama to headline the NEXT STEPS, which is the follow-up campaign to the Reparations declaration at the UN. Next month also, he is campaigning vigorously in parts of Europe for the same project.
Soyinka’s desire is for the descendants of the dispersed to return home to their roots and take their rightful place amongst kith and kin. This immense quest has been at the centre of his global diplomacy shuttles for quite a while now with frequent visits to the Americas, particularly Brazil and Cuba and America. These visits have yield some level of success. Last year in August, Arise News reported Soyinka’s meeting with the President of Brazil, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, and its implications. Joined by Nigeria’s President Bola Tinubu on a state visit to Brazil, Soyinka’s presence became more than symbolic. It spoke to the momentum of his quest.
Wole Soyinka gifting the President of Brazil Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva his book, Myth, Literature and the African World last year
According to the report, “Nigerian Nobel laureate Wole Soyinka met with Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva on Monday in Brazil, coinciding with President Bola Tinubu’s state visit to the South American nation. During the meeting, Soyinka presented his book, Mito, Literatura e o Mundo Africano (Myth, Literature and the African World), to President Lula, highlighting the rich cultural and literary heritage of Africa.
“The encounter underscores the strengthening of cultural and diplomatic ties between Nigeria and Brazil, following decades of historical, social, and economic links between the two countries. Soyinka’s work explores Africa’s myths, literature, and their global significance, providing Brazilian leaders an insight into the continent’s intellectual and creative traditions.
“President Tinubu’s state visit focused on enhancing bilateral relations, including trade, investment, and cultural exchange while Soyinka’s meeting with President Lula adds a cultural dimension to the diplomatic engagements, signalling the importance of arts and literature in international relations. The visit was marked by discussions on collaboration in areas such as education, cultural exchange, and mutual support in multilateral forums, further solidifying the Nigeria-Brazil partnership.”
And a little later, Soyinka visited the Ooni of Ife in October 2025 and enlisted the respected monarch’s help in the quest to reunite Africa diaspora with those in the homeland. He expressed that the interest to reunite was mutual, as the African descendants also want to return and build a life on the continent.
TheArtHubNg had reported on October 26, 2025 that ‘Wole Soyinka highlighted the growing desire among Africans in the diaspora, particularly Afro-Brazilians of Yoruba origin, to reconnect with their history, ancestors, and cultural identity. He emphasized the importance of educating them on the historical realities of slavery and fostering unity that encourages their return to their ancestral home, Ile-Ife. According to him, “If we do not take decisive steps now, it may take much longer to rebuild this bridge. When they come home, they can contribute to the economic, cultural, and intellectual development. But above all, their deepest desire is to rediscover their origin.”’
Also in October 2025, Soyinka had headlined the Door of Return Festival in Badagry where over 50 diaspora descendants of African origin were treated to what was the returnee dress rehearsal for the big one next year. With the Door of Return monument being built on the marina in Badagry, the diaspora descendants present were made to walk through the ‘Door-of-No-Return’ that marked their ill-fated seaward journeys to foreign lands into slavery. The guests were ferried to Gberefu island where the anchored slave ships awaited the captured Africans for onward transportation across the seas. They were also ferried back in canoes colourfully decorated and made to walk through the Door-of-Return back to the ancestral homeland, a symbolic return from the foreign lands their ancestors had been forcibly taken in ancient times. It represented a joyous moment for the African descendants to have experienced what their ancestors underwent centuries ago by walking the same ill-fated path to foreign lands.
For this huge project, Soyinka has the support of Nigerians in Diaspora Commission (NiCOM), led by its Chairman/CEO, Hon. Abike Dabiri-Erewa, who was the main driver of the Door of Return Festival in Badagry. Dabiri-Erewa said Nigerians would be on hand next year to receive over 2,000 of such diaspora Africans who would arrive in Badagry after retracing the reversed seaward journeys that took their ancestors away from the African shores centuries ago. She noted that Soyinka was the arrowhead, who would lead the charge for this historic ‘Heritage Voyage of Return’ of African diaspora back to the homeland.
Champions of reparations for Africa’s enslaved people during the vexatious Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade are excited at Soyinka’s bold ‘Heritage Voyage of Return’ for diaspora Africans. In spite of the push back by America and Europe, it is yet another stab on the conscience of the global North to recognise the injustice it perpetrated against Africa and Africans centuries ago. It will also mark a moment of healing for the descendants of those who were taken, as it is a recognition of the wrongs their ancestors suffered. It also signals that the African motherland has not forgotten those who were forcefully taken away and is keen on reuniting with them.
Rebuilding and closing the schism between Africa’s dispersed and the motherland makes Soyinka’s quest as perhaps the greatest and long-awaited embrace the motherland needs to have with Africa diaspora – a proud mother joyously welcoming home children she lost to European bandits centuries ago.
Global reparatory justice campaigner and President of Ghana, John Mahama () in warm handshake with Prof. Wole Soyinka while the former Commonwealth Secretary-General, Chief Emeka Anyokwu, looks on
