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Soyinka: Vocal government critic
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Nigerian police briefly detained Nobel laureate author
Wole Soyinka during an anti-government rally in the commercial capital Lagos on Saturday.
He was among a number of protesters detained after police used tear gas to break up the protest.
Mr Soyinka, 69, a vocal critic of the administration, was released without charge after an hour.
The authorities said the organisers did not have official permission to hold a demonstration.
Under Nigerian law, police permission has to be sought for public demonstrations, but the protesters
decided to go ahead anyway because they believed it was their constitutional right to do so.
'Unprecedented force
Several hundred people gathered in central Lagos for what they said was a protest against civilian
dictatorship and wasteful governance.
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 We were brutally and heavily tear-gassed, the force used was unprecedented 
Femi Falana
Human rights lawyer
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They were led, among others, by Mr Soyinka, who is the head of the Citizens Forum - a coalition
of pro-democracy forces.
But police were waiting for the protesters, and broke them up using tear gas and firing into
the air.
"We were brutally and heavily tear-gassed, the force used was unprecedented," said
Femi Falana, a leading human rights lawyer who took part in the march.
In 1986, Wole Soyinka became the first African to win the Nobel prize for literature.
He is one of the continent's leading authors and thinkers.
He became known politically for his outspoken criticism of the authorities during almost 15 years
of military rule, and went into self-imposed exile from 1994-98 when threatened with arrest by dictator General
Sani Abacha.
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