A peep into Ilorin emirate

UZOLUA UHAKHEME

Tanure Ojaide in the blurb says “Emirates Blues and Home resistance” boils with passionate anger against the violation of native sovereignty”.

The don at the University of North Carolina, United States, was explicit in appraising the work of his fellow academic, Kehinde Akano who lectures at the Kwara State University, Malete in Kwara State.

In Kwara State, the monarchy is still being practiced in its entirety especially in the capital, Ilorin and its environs. The emirate system makes the successive emir connive with the political elites.

Due to the unequal hierarchy the five local government councils that are referred to as Ilorin Emirate presently in Kwara State, it is only the Emir of Ilorin that is a graded chief.

The people of Shao who the author happens to a kinsman, are the rebellious group out of the decentralized communities namely: Shao, Jebba, Afon, Oke-Oyi, Apado, Okeso, Okutala, Olooru, Malete, Elemere, Apapa, Elesin-meta and others, they have rejected suppression over the years as they’ve always asserted their prominence as a foremost Yoruba community, we may safely say the writer must have inherited a spirit of resilient justice in face of oppression, courage and some writing grit from them.

It is said that the words might be laconic in poetry but the profound meanings they convey speaks volumes about them.

Akano never “wrote” tongue in cheek neither did he mince words in his critic and caricature of the elite-centred emirate system in the state.

This feature of poetry has however been maximized by him to achieve an overall effect of rousing concerned feathers on an issue as complacently innocuous as the Emirates system in the north-central region of Nigeria. Commenting on a rulership that stifles sanity and the people’s right to hold protests, Akano pointed out in the preface  “For daring to resist and speak against the debasing Ilorin Emirate system, the Oba of Jebba was incarcerated for nineteen days on the orders of the present emir of Ilorin using state power”.

Influenced by the development in Kwara state, especially of the feudal Lords and tyranny in the context of land use and ownership, he drew on a heavy use of biblical allusion in one  of the poems,” Counting your blessings” for instance, the writer talks about the privileged few and the marginalised lot.

Within a spate of your ascension

Thy kingdom did come

Thy wishes, like horses were in chariots

And your beggars did ride.

He continued:

“What a pity!

That your barn keep swelling

Yet your household suffers hunger

Here is a sharp commentary on avarice and self-centred nature of the hegemonic monarchy who must have have left the “corridors” of power for its bedchambers.”

Akano reveals in dominant and recurring manner the impudence in the fiefdom, feudal and Emirates systems of the north. In his Tell the feudal parrot, Ajani Ogun, the intrepid fighter, In Odious Words particularly, Akano made some historical allusion: He however brought it home with these relatable lines:

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Umar El Kanemi had exterminated the Mai rulers of Bornu.

Paying no attention to political correctness, Akano said the Emir of Ilorin personally corners the 5% monthly windfalls from the five local government that are so designated and conscripted into Ilorin emirate system.

The poet is furious about gluttonous and self-serving rulers who impoverish their own people. In his The Fattest Superintendent, he says:

“Here is the fattest ambassador of our clan south of the cali-fate

His articles is always glowing with gluttony”

In the above lines, the alliterative “g” adds rhythm to the lines and make the emphasis sink even deeper.

Akano, was nevertheless hopeful and optimistic at a change in the psyche of people, at a glowing illumination at the end of their dark days, in Ludlow’s lamp, which be dedicated to Bishop JK Abimbola,he said in a manner if libation and appeal,

“May your days be longer.

And your camp swell more with the faithful

As you winnow with the words and garner

In odious words, Akano appeals to the feudal matadors to listen to the words of wisdom and a plead for social redemption, He writes:

“Listen to the words of wisdom

Feudal matadors queuing behind their cohorts”

“Note the changing temperament of the   oppressed as they move from anguish to anger.”