Between Alaafin and Ooni: The sacred legacy of history and the fierce urgency of now

I said, in my piece few days ago, that one of the key issues I wanted to comment on is the latest instalment of contrived Alaafin-Ooni controversy. I was hoping to have a few more days to put my thoughts together, but events appear to be moving ahead of this plan. Among others, an excerpt from a comment I made to a group of friends on WhatsApp is now circulating more widely. I am grateful for those who have shared it. It is very much a true reflection of my views, but not my fully developed thought on the subject in the light of the current round of controversy. It is, at best, a rough prelude to the core message I wanted to convey. What I offer now is a shorter version of the message that I needed to put out.

Those who have followed my earlier intervention, published on 10th May in the Nigerian Tribune, will recall that I had warned that the Alaafin throne will not be in short supply of controversies contrived to distract the institution from important priorities. The courtiers and aides needed to be fully alert and well equipped to discern and respond- only where necessary- with the right tone and timing. There is a whole depth of meaning to the notion of “Oyo Mesi”, after all. It is in that light that I found the issuance of a “48hours ultimatum”, by one of the palace aides, unconsidered and ill-judged. I know Alaafin would not of course publicly denounce the aide in question, but I know enough to confidently say that Alaafin would not have sanctioned that press statement- certainly not in the form it was put out. I  hope that appropriate lessons have been drawn to bring about what I consider to be urgent systemic changes, especially regarding the palace media strategy. I’ll leave that for now.

I had also, in the 10th May Tribune piece, urged supporters of the Alaafin institution to more circumspect about how they brag about empire. Instead, as I argued at the time: “Alaafin Owoade must meet his calling for such a time as this. That requires discernment of the times, the willingness to think outside the box, the wisdom to pull it together, and the sheer will to pursue a visionary agenda. With regard to the first, it goes without saying that the time is different. We are not in the 18th century, and any nostalgia about a geopolitical empire is, in my view, an indulgent misreading of the times. Indulgent because the geographical empire is long gone; misreading because invocation of the old empire elicits negative emotions among certain sections of Yorubaland today”. This is my starting point in this intervention.

The first point to make is that empire brag is not the same as a commitment to defense and protection of shared history. The former is a nauseating indulgence; the latter a patriotic duty. A people without history is no people in a real sense. History is a linchpin of identity. That is why we must not engage history with levity or casual revisionism- nor should we cower in the face of epistemic violence being unleashed by cultural philistines and cyber hooligans. History is important. There are parts of the landscape of history that lend themselves to subjective perception, but there are also parts that are clear and unambiguous- that only self-serving mischief makers would seek to blur.

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The legacy of Oyo empire is clear and unambiguous. Like all empires, it has its dark sides, but that empire is more than just a story of conquests and expansion. The Oyo empire gave Africa an innovative and highly sophisticated system of governance at the time European nations languished under absolute monarchies. Consider that for a moment—the radicality of the innovation in context, and the scale of ambition. The empire also nurtured and developed the Yoruba language, otherwise known as Oyo Yoruba, which remains one of its greatest civilisational achievements. Therefore to merely assign political supremacy to the Alaafin is , in my view, a fraught and reductionist exercise. Politics is always temporal, and it is incongruous to tether the Alaafin solely to the political sphere in a post-empire, liberal democratic age. The Alaafin was never merely a secular authority; the office embodied a transcendent role that underlines its historic, and enduring, cultural leadership.

Of course, the Oyo empire- at once geo-political and now cultural- is a shared heritage of all Yoruba peoples who all contributed in no small ways to its historic greatness and timeless glory. This enduring legacy is cultural and civilisational, a heritage that continues to live, breathe, and shape identities long after the empire itself has passed. It is why it should engender pride, not instigate hostility; it is why it should inspire solidarity, not elicit controversies.

This now brings me to the final, and core, message of this piece. The real challenge of the historic empire- for Alaafin, Ooni and other Obas- is the compelling summon to meet the priorities of today with innovation, courage and ambition reminiscent of their forebears. Our villages are surrounded by terrorists and foreign mercenaries; many of our youths are wasting away in unemployment and under-employment, and a growing number are trapped in drug-infested lifestyles. Industry is a slow moving train, where existent; our education system, once a pride of the African continent, is a shadow of its former glory; our culture is in regress. It is not all a tale of gloom and doom, of course. In the midst of the unfolding societal atrophy, we see pockets of excellence and resilience, led by our youth and digital natives awake to the promises of the 21st-century knowledge economy. They provide, in the encroaching darkness, a glimpse of the possible- a future that can match, and even surpass, the comparative glory of the empire at its peak. This vision of the possible is the fierce urgency of now. It is the vision to which Alaafin- and other Obas with him- should commit himself with undiluted focus, relentless zeal, and an iron will. In the face of this all else is distraction.

The vision before our traditional and community leaders does not lend itself to superficial “empowerment” schemes and palliative interventions. It has to be bold, new, and ambitious- an audacious launch and unapologetic leapfrog into the 21st century. This is the real challenge of history.

Seun Kolade is a Professor of Entrepreneurship and Digital Transformation at Sheffield Business School, Sheffield Hallam University, UK.