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The US authorities has terminated the visa for Wole Soyinka, the renowned Nigerian Nobel prize-winning playwright who has been critical about Trump since his first presidency, Soyinka stated on Tuesday.

“I want to tell the consulate … that I’m very content with the revocation of my visa,” Soyinka, who won the 1986 Nobel prize for literature, addressed a media gathering.

Soyinka formerly possessed permanent residency in the United States, though he discarded his green card after Donald Trump’s first election in 2016.

Soyinka surmised that his recent remarks comparing Trump to the Ugandan dictator Idi Amin might have caused offense and led to the US consulate’s decision.

Soyinka mentioned earlier this year that the US consulate in Lagos had requested his presence for an interview to reevaluate his visa, which he stated he would not attend.

According to a letter from the consulate sent to Soyinka, officials have revoked his visa, referencing United States 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 rather curious love letter from an embassy,”

he humorously stated while reciting 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 said.

The US embassy in Abuja, the capital, said it could not comment on individual cases, pointing to confidentiality rules.

The present US administration has made visa revocations a signature of its wider clampdown on immigration, notably focusing on university students who were vocal about Palestinian rights.

Soyinka mentioned he had recently compared Trump to Uganda’s Amin, something he said 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 giving him praise,”

Soyinka said. “He’s been conducting himself as a dictator.”

The 91-year-old playwright behind Death and the King’s Horseman has lectured at and been recognized by top US universities including Harvard and Cornell.

His newest novel, Chronicles from the Land of the Happiest People on Earth, a critique 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 accepting an invitation to the United States should circumstances change, but added: “I wouldn’t take the initiative myself because there’s nothing I’m looking for there. Nothing.”

He went on to denounce the escalated arrests of undocumented immigrants in the country.

“This is not about me,” Soyinka said. “When we see people being detained arbitrarily – people being hauled up and they vanish for a month … old women, children being separated. So that’s really what worries me.”

The recent immigration crackdown has seen military personnel deployed to US cities and citizens short-term arrested as part of intensive operations, as well as the curtailing of legal means of entry.