Olojo set to boost festival outing, as Ooni promises celebration with a difference

One of the pristine rallying points for all Yoruba in Nigeria and the Diaspora, Olojo cultural festival will, this year come with unique features and upscale celebration said the Ooni of Ife, Oba Adeyeye Enitan Ogunwusi, Ojaja II in Ife.

The Ooni who was speaking during the 219 Olojo Festival Cultural theme summit tagged developing our cultural heritage for sustainable domestic and international tourism patronage, said the festival is taking a new leap through innovative means to making its celebration a globally driven event that will attract both domestic and diaspora patronage.

According to the Ooni of Ife, we are exploring all trendy avenues to make the Olojo festival a strong international brand identity that will not only project the cultural ingenuity of the Yoruba people but also institutionalised the celebration as a point of convergence the Yorubas as one people with our festival and one source.

Oba Ogunwusi, however, acknowledges the presence of some of the corporate sponsors who he described as faithful brand supporters who have been identifying with the Yoruba cultural pride.

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According to Ooni “I thank all of our sponsors who have been supporting and still making sure that the Olojo festival is still classic and people-driven.

“I assure you that this year edition will be coming with more innovations as we are working round the clock with our consultants and festival committees to pep up the outing of the event.

“We have announced some of our brand sponsors (Nigerian Breweries and Cways) today but there are other brand sponsors which will be unveiled soon as some of them are still fine-tuning their corporate social responsibility support with us.

Speaking at the seminar, the guest speaker, Mr Dare Babarinsa, whose paper focused on developing our cultural heritage for sustainable domestic and international tourism patronage, said considering the avalanche of benefits that could be derived from Nigerian cultural heritage, there is need for a clarion call to consciously develop, sustain for domestic and foreign tourism patronage.

Babarinsa who did not spear the rod in his choice of words and usage, said Nigeria and Nigerians should stop apportioning blames on unfounded obstacles and be ready to build a selfless threshold for the promotion of the commonwealth for the benefit of all, adding that he sees the Olojo Festival as an auspicious time to take the bull by the horn in making things better for all.

“We should take charge of our land instead of giving excuses that Abuja is disturbing us or putting obstacles on our ways. Mahatma Gandhi, the great Indian liberator was asked whether Indians were capable of gaining independence from Great Britain. He said “The problem of India is not Great Britain. The problem of India is the Indians. When Indians are ready to be free, nobody can stop them.” Nobody is stopping us from creating our own Regional Authority. Nobody is stopping us from re-creating our educational system to serve the peculiar needs of our people.”

He added “Nobody is stopping us from constructing regional super-highways to link all our state capitals. Nobody is stopping us from building our own rail lines or coordinating our farming to become the backbone of our economy as it was in the First Republic. We have to build new cities and provide electricity to power our industries and light our communities. All these we have to do ourselves because nobody would do them for us.

“Notwithstanding, Nigerians have been able to preserve their cultural heritages till date and hopes they would be sustained for patronage, locally and internationally. We have practically westernised our sensibilities at the expense of our cultural heritage.

“Millions of Yoruba are living in other parts of Nigeria outside Yorubaland and they still speak their language, wear clothes that are peculiar to them, eat foods that Yoruba’s are known for. I would like us to focus more on Yoruba’s who live outside Nigeria.

“The truth is that the wealth of Yorubaland is in the Yoruba people all over the world. Until we are able to think in a universal term that would encompass the whole of Yorubaland, both within and outside Nigeria, we would not be able to harness our full strength.

“The Yoruba are the hope of the Black race. If we get it right, then the Black race would be redeemed. If not, Africans would remain the poorest part of humanity living in the richest portion of the earth,” Babarinsa explained.

Reassessing the situation, Babarinsa said what is to be done is for the people to harness the full power of the Yoruba people all over the world for the development of Yorubaland.

According to him “We need to let the Blacks all over the world know that Yorubaland is home to them and that Ile-Ife is the centre of that home. Africans in the Diaspora should be encouraged to come and we should be willing and ready to receive them. In the late 19th and early 20th Century, many Africans in the Diaspora were willing to return home in Africa.

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“Indeed, the Jamaican Pan-Africanist, Marcus Garvey, started the Back to Africa Movement which yielded a lot of results. His campaign that Africans should return to Africa was received with alarm and hostilities by the Whites. For us in Yorubaland, many of the freed slaves and descendants returned home. One of them was the great Bishop Ajayi Crowther, the first African Bishop.

“Our people during the First Republic were not blaming Prime-Minister Abubakar Tafawa Balewa for their woes. They knew they were the masters of their collective destiny. When we make Yorubaland attractive, tourists would come.

“Africans all over the world, especially in the Americas, would know that this land of Oduduwa and Orunmila is their home. They would come here, not just as tourists, but as natives returning to the land of their ancestors. No date could be better suited to start this new Back to Africa Movement than the period of Olojo Festival, a festival established by our forefathers to commemorate the First Dawn when Olodumare created the heavens and the earth. That we have a festival to celebrate and a date to commemorate shows that the ancestors did their duty. Now let us do our duty for we are the ancestors of the future.”

The moderator of the seminar, Professor Wale Omole in his candid submissions said there is a lot of neglect going on which has dramatically made Nigeria a backbencher in most of the things that would have made the country a superpower among comity of nations, adding that to make a headway, Yoruba and Nigeria must take the lead in harnessing rich potential still untapped in Nigeria.

“There is a need to develop and preserve our tourism potential, (heritage) to boost our economy. The western world is reinventing our herbs and other natural resources and at the end sell they back to us.

“There is no illness in the entire world that we don’t have the herbs cure for it in Ife. The Obafemi Awolowo University in Ife is vast in human health but how passionately have we gone to make them compete with other people like the Chinese and the Indians who held theirs with pride and today, they are forced to reckon with when you talk of alternative medicine.

“The natural heritage in Ife is are God’s gifts for us to preserve and promote for the betterment of the people through practical development and management of the resources, and this we must start with the clarion call of the Olojo festival, given relevance by the Ooni of Ife, Oba Ogunwusi,”Professor Omole added.

Also, one of the discussants, Mrs Ayo Jaiyesinmi, who bare her mind at the event said culture is the people and the people is culture, adding that anyone who is lost connection with his or her culture has no identity.

Jaiyesinmi commended that spiritually and passion the Ooni attached to the cultural heritage of the people, saying that the Ooni has invested his time to make it to this stage and it is important for us to join force with him to carry on the advocacy.

“Culture is the Identity of whom you are and where you come. It is a value of life that must be promoted with pride. Jaiyesinmi added.