‘Traditional leaders need to be more sensitive to history’

On Saturday, May 8, Chancellor’s Professor and Professor of Africana Studies, Anthropology and History at the University of North Carolina, Charlotte, United State, Akinwumi Ogundiran, read his new book, ‘The Yoruba: A New History’ in Lagos. Veteran culture journalist, ex-Lagos State Commissioner for Tourism, Arts and Culture and publisher of The Culture Newspaper, Steve Ayorinde, engaged him in a stimulating conversation for over three hours at the event. Arts & Culture presents excerpts from the conversation.

The Oduduwa and Obatala we encounter in this book, were they people? Were they real?

I know Obatala was a person. That is not in doubt because we know where he lived in Ile-Ife. His. His original home is Idita. It is an archaeological site; it is a spiritual site that is still there. If you dig through the Ora tradition, Ifa literature, the ritual narratives, Obatala was a person. He was the Chief Priest of Ora; Oramfe. Ora is the avatar of Orisa-Nla in Ile-Ife.

Orisa-Nla means Orisa Oke: the Supreme Deity who occupies the hills of Ekiti, Okun. When the Yoruba arrived in Ile-Ife, they maintained that tradition, but the local manifestation of Orisa-Nla in Ile-Ife is Ora. That is why Oke Ora is still important today in the ritual calendar of Ile-Ife. Obatala was the Chief Priest of Ora; he achieved many things. Obatala was also a patron of artists. So, when he died, he became what you called apotheosis. Eventually, Obatala became the same as Orisa-Nla. That is why till today, Yoruba consider Obatala as Orisa-Nla. After his departure, he became the same with Ora; let me say Orisa-Nla. So, he was a person.

As a scholar, I will be reluctant to say that I know for sure that Oduduwa was a person. I say that because, as an archaeologist, I look for tangible evidence. It is possible that Oduduwa was a person. It is also possible that Oduduwa was a collage of many experiences that coalesced into one person. That is why I argued that the conflicts that ensued in Ile-Ife in the 19th century were not a one-generation conflict. It was a conflict that birthed two visions.

The Obatala group represented one vision, while the Oduduwa group represented the other vision. For a conflict that lasted that long, I know that Obatala would not have lived for 200 years, neither did Oduduwa live for 200 years. Eventually, the vision of Oduduwa won the day, accommodating the Obatala group because they are the ones who know the landscape.

Are we talking about Oba Akinruntan’s Olugbo and the Ugbo of Moremi?

Yes, we are talking about those people. Now, as there was no Olugbo in Ile-Ife at that time, the Ugbo were not organised into centralised political communities. They were scattered. As I said, they were descendants of a Later Stone Age people. They did not have the political sophistication that the Yoruba brought with them. They did not have the idea of a city-state that the Yoruba were trying to build in Ile-Ife. We are talking about how migrants, people with a sophisticated political organisation, overran people with a small scale political system.

Some of the descendants of the Ugbo are still living in Ile-Ife. And today, they are one of the six powerful religious blocs of Ile Ife. They were integrated. Igare is one of their names, but the general name is Ugbo. We also call them Oluyari. But those who were troublemakers were expelled. It appears that because they were fishermen, some of them gravitated towards the riverine areas. That’s why you have the Ugbo, where the river is.

I want to use this forum to ask our traditional leaders to be more sensitive to history. I wrote this book because I was tired of people just simply making up narratives that do not exist to suit their interest. I think our traditional rulers should not be partaking in that kind of discourse because they are leaders. We look up to them to know the history and not to mislead the younger generation. I also want them to provide funding for historical research instead of making up stories because of their superiority. That’s not going to help the Yoruba agenda.

Is there a Yoruba agenda, sir?

It will not benefit the African agenda. Maybe that will be a better way of putting it. Considering the importance of Yoruba history and culture in the global affair, many people who are not Yoruba are interested in Yoruba history. Many people outside Nigeria, outside West Africa, pay attention to what happens in the Yoruba region. They are always asking, what are your kings saying? They do not expect our kings to behave this way.

I know there would be many interrogations as we move along, especially on the Yoruba agenda. But let’s establish historical facts first. Who are we, the Yoruba?

We always use the tribal model to discuss African history. The tribal model is a European imposition that claims that we were trapped before their arrival. We were living on the tree. We had no sense of the past, so we were trapped. One of the things I established in this book is that the Yoruba have been global in their thinking before the Europeans arrived. So, I used the term ‘Community of Practice’ to describe the Yoruba. That we are a people who privilege knowledge as the basis of identity.

In this book, I argue that many people were not Yoruba speaking before but became Yoruba due to their interactions with Yoruba speaking people or as a result of Yoruba Empires. Ife was the first Empire in Yoruba history, not Oyo. Oyo was the Second Empire. As a result of empire formation, the Yoruba could incorporate other non-Yoruba speaking to become Yoruba. So, I call the Yoruba a ‘Community of Practice.’

That’s why when you look at Yoruba oriki, there are people like Nupe that became Yoruba without their oriki as part of Yoruba history. Likewise, there were people like BashorunGaa that we celebrate or hate for his role in Yoruba history. He was a man of Ibariba descent. Even the name Gaa is not a Yoruba name. Because of the role that the Ibariba played in the formation of the Oyo Empire, they were incorporated into Oyo Empire. Therefore, they did not lose their Ibariba ancestry but became Yoruba because they became Oyo.

We have Mossi from present-day Burkina Faso, who became Yoruba as well. When you look at some of the facial marks that we bear, and I discuss it in this book, a facial mark like ‘gombo’. Tell me the etymology of ‘gombo’; it has none. We have facial marks like Toure; what is Toure? These are facial marks that other ethnic groups brought into Oyo Empire. They celebrate their identity because the Yoruba are city people. We are city builders. City builders don’t discriminate. A city is like a corporation. A corporation always celebrates diversity because you want to attract the best talents to come into your city.

You will always look for skills that other people have and integrate them into your city. This is what the Yoruba are, and it’s why the Nigerian question is a setback for the Yoruba.

The Nigerian question is a setback because becoming subjects of the British Empire meant that British colonialism transformed us into tribes. We were cosmopolitan; we were urban people who brought other people in. That’s why I call the Yoruba a ‘Community of Practice’. We had a system of integrating non-Yoruba into the Yoruba agenda. That’s why we have facial marks from Ibariba, from Mossi in our country today. Likewise, our culture influenced those other people. That’s why Benin was a member of the Ife Empire, no matter what people may say today. I know there is some revisionist history being written in some parts of Nigeria. The Royal House of Benin knows that they are part of the Empire.

The current Oba of Benin acknowledged his ‘Yorubaness’ openly, or shall we say Yoruba origin. Yes, when I was teaching at the University of Benin, and you go to the palace, they were speaking two main languages; Edo and Yoruba. So, there’s no doubt about that. Ife Empire spread all the way to where we call Oke-Ogun today. So, in this book, I tried to locate some of the earlier empires and kingdoms like Owu. The Owu that we talk about today, it is somewhere between Saki and Kisi. That’s where the first Owu was.

Owu la koda (Owu was created first)

Yes. It was the first cavalry state in Yorubaland before Oyo became one. Oyo was under Owu in the 13th, 14th centuries.

Where we are today as a people, we know that things have changed. Even in the monarchical system these days, a local government commissioner can remove any monarch. Is there a reason we are still holding on to the custodians of the empires that have fallen?

Let me start with the British. They have a monarchy, one of the oldest monarchies in the world. The Empire has waxed and waned. It’s still there. You can’t have the English identity without the monarchy; it’s still there. I see the relevance of our monarchs; they are relevant, but they also not need to embellish what they are not. There are only two Oba in Yorubaland that can use the title Imperial Majesty. And that would be Alaafin of Oyo and Ooni of Ife. Any other king who is using that is pretending. I’m speaking as a scholar, not as a partisan person, because this is what my research has shown.

I think the question is, how are we binding our new monarchs with the history of the institution? This is a revered institution, by the way. An Oba is a deity. I discuss it in this book that the Yoruba have a fascinating philosophy, and it is that every person is a manifestation of the Orisa. All of us in this room are the manifestation of the Orisa. That’s why the Yoruba preach ‘Iteriba’, ‘Ifarabale’, ‘Tito’, ‘Ooto’ because these are the things that would transform you into a deity. The Yoruba believe that when you die, you become a deity, an ancestor. When you look at many terracotta from Ile-Ife, they are images of ancestors who are being venerated. So, when people die, they are buried inside their living room, in the courtyard. Multi-generation worshipping will take place to celebrate those ancestors because we are manifestations of Orisa-Nla on earth and what will give us that opportunity to become deified is not how much we have but how well we lived. It’s about the descendants that we leave behind.

To become a deity, you have to die in Yoruba philosophy. However, only an Oba can become a deity when he’s still alive. That’s what separates a divine king from you and I.So when our Oba are talking, I’m not sure how many Oba realise that they are venerated individuals. They are even more revered than the Pope, yes. They are living gods, and this was one of the sources of the conflicts between Obatala and Oduduwa. It was a revolutionary idea that a human being could become a deity while he’s still living. It was revolutionary, and the Obatala group opposed that idea. ‘No way, you are supposed to die physically and then come back as an ancestor.

You should not attain the level of immortality while you’re still living.’ So, an Oba attains that level of immortality when he/she because there are female Oba as well, while still alive. Our Oba needs to realise the status that they occupy, and once they realise that, they will realise that their utterances, their performances in public, and the way they carry themselves have gravity unless they want to diminish that post.

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