OLOKUN FESTIVAL FOUNDATION HOLDS MAIDEN LECTURE
Tuesday, 20th of January was a memorable day in the annals of the Olokun Festival Foundation as it held the maiden edition of the Oodua Festival Public Lecture Series. The maiden lecture titled “Embracing Cultural Values for National Re-orientation and Political Emancipation”, facilitated by Snowfield Consult, was held at Awovarsity Cooperative Hall in the prestigious Obafemi Awolowo University Ile-Ife, and was graced by enthusiasts of culture, lecturers from different departments in the Obafemi Awolowo University, various traditional rulers from all over the SouthWest and secondary schools from around Ile-Ife. This year, the lecture is part of the events for the 2015 Oodua Festival.
The Olokun Festival Foundation founded in 1993 is an organization whose sole aim is the promotion and protection of Yoruba culture and values especially through an appreciation of ancestors and progenitors of the Yoruba race and has been involved in the promoting of culture. The Head of the Olokun Festival Foundation, Otunba (Dr.) Chief Gani Adams leader of the OPC (Oodua Peoples Congress) was present at the event with an entourage of chiefs and members of the OPC and Olokun Foundation both in Nigeria and in the diaspora.
Delivering the welcome address, Chief Gani Adams extolled the values of the Yoruba culture and talked about how he has been promoting Yoruba culture for the past thirteen years. He talked about how the Oodua Festival is designed to be the rallying point for the cultural activities organized and participated in by the Yoruba (descendants of Oduduwa), and how in the distant time formed the basis for cultural assessment in Yoruba land. He also talked about how the maiden lecture is very appropriate especially at a time when Nigeria is the focus of international world.
Chief Gani Adams also talked about how the Federal Government is making efforts to rebrand the image of the country through the sensitization programme of the National Orientation Agency, but it is not getting it right, for the government has failed to identify the values of culture for the economic, political and social growth of the country. According to him, in rebranding Nigeria, cultural development should be supported by the Federal Government; similarly cultural tourism should be promoted as it can serve as a veritable economic base, especially with the recent dwindling oil prices in the international market. Similarly, he opined that what Nigeria really needs at this time is cultural reawakening, more emphasis should be placed on cultural awareness, and apart from the government supporting cultural orientation, children should be enlightened using our core cultural values as case study. Government should also encourage parents to attach more importance and dedication to culture. In achieving all these, he concluded that traditional institutions have a role to play though they have not been empowered to champion the course, but government can spur them into action with its commitment.
The keynote address was delivered by Dr. S.O. Subair of the Department of Educational Management, Obafemi Awolowo University, a Consultant and Managing Director of Snowfield Consult. A firm of training consultants and managing practitioners, who are also involved in promoting cultural and educational activities around the world. In his address, Dr. Subair talked about how cultural values are very essential in nation building and in promoting social and political unity and harmony in the country. According to him, most of Nigeria's travails today can be traced to an erosion of cultural values, thus there is the need for cultural values re-orientation and political emancipation at the national level, and government should embark on several activities that are capable of jettisoning and resisting all forms of counter – productive values that have held the country to jugular.
The high point of the event was when the Guest Lecturer Dr. Sola Ajibade of the Department of Linguistics and Africa Languages, Obafemi Awolowo University was called upon to present the lecture of the event titled “Embracing Cultural Values for National Re-orientation and Political Emancipation”. Dr. Ajibade in his lecture talked about how embracing African culture can lead to unprecedented development in Nigeria and Africa in general. According to him, the essence of culture as the sum total development of individuals in the society and the transformation of society for the good of all for cultural systems equip members of the society with the powers of transcendence, which include prudence, will power, fore thought, intuitive insight, beatific vision and powerful imagination for creativity and invention, required for socio-political wizardry and economic magistracy. Thus we waste our time if we think that development will come our way when we foolishly strive to abandon and abolish our culture.
At the lecture, Dr. Ajibade also asserted that there is an urgent need for cultural refinement, purification and revival in order to enhance national unity, cohesion and political development, and that part of the roadmap to the development of Africa can begin with the mastering of African cultural values, hence as Nigerians and Africans we must study the trade of our ancient fathers, master the ways of our forbears go all out to make our discoveries relevant to contemporary Africa, for development is impossible without a common indigenous outlook married with native myths, religion and tradition.
Ending the lecture, Dr. Ajibade extolled the values of oral tradition, poetry and folksong to the Yoruba culture and asserted that there are various Yoruba oral genres such as Esa, Ijala, etc. that can be used to teach various values that in turn foster unity, cooperation and oneness among the people. He further asserted that Yoruba oral tradition like that of the rest African societies is a vital tool that is used to construct history, legitimize cultural values and pass judgments on contemporary political realities, and the Yoruba oral tradition is used to commend the good, critique the offenders, cure diseases, curb the deviants, conserve knowledge and cultural values, consecrate and shape the society, fashion and refashion social identities.
Some of the side attractions at the event were performances from various cultural groups and advocates of culture all around the Southwest.
