The Alaafin of Oyo, Oba Abimbola Akeem Owoade, has urged Yorubas across the world to unite in restoring the values, traditions, and cultural heritage that define the race, stressing that cultural tourism remains a key pathway to Nigeria’s economic diversification.
Speaking at the 2025 Iyake International Festival in Ado-Awaye, Oyo State, the monarch said Nigeria must shift its focus from oil dependency to tourism, noting that cultural revival can play a significant role in strengthening the national economy.
He emphasised that nations that have achieved rapid development did so by leveraging cultural identity.
Citing China as an example, Oba Owoade recalled how the Cultural Revolution of 1965–1968 helped reshape political behaviour, restore cultural principles, and ultimately propel China into one of the world’s strongest economies.
He said Nigeria must learn from such examples by rejuvenating, protecting, and proudly promoting its cultural heritage. According to him, cultural preservation will not only unite the Yoruba race but also serve as the foundation for projecting its traditions to the rest of the world.
“If we do not appreciate our own cultural values, there is no way we can harness them for our development. We must strive to maximise the economic opportunities of our cultural artifacts and festivals for our development. All these can be developed to meet international tourist standards and thus yield enormous foreign earnings to our governments at various levels. In the first instance, there would be a stimulation of rural development since most of the tourist attraction areas are located in rural areas.
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“In the second, it would also lead to a drastic reduction in rural-urban migration and human congestion in the urban centres, which is one of the major economic problems of the contemporary Nigerian state, because of employment opportunities and income generation that will be opened up for rural dwellers.”
The Alaafin, who was accompanied by his Queen Consort, Ayaba Abiwunmi, cited the instance of the Yoruba, which possessed famous traditions of art, precisely because they had productive economies and vibrant commercial systems, which allowed artists and craft workers freedom from scarcity and provided access to metals, woods, and clay sculpture.