As the custodian of his people’s mores, the Alaafin of Oyo, Oba Lamidi Adeyemi, is always interested in championing the cause of the Yoruba culture and tradition. For all time, he stresses the imperatives of language, culture and traditions as prerequisite for peace and development. This he canvassed at a lecture he delivered during the cultural day at the Law Faculty of the University of Ibadan (UI). BODE DUROJAIYE reports.
The Alaafin of Oyo, Oba Lamidi Adeyemi may not be a show man, but the paramount ruler exhibits the stuff of a genius whenever he is invited to occasions.
Not only does he impress the audience with his mastery of colonial history, his captivating speeches usually attract rounds of applause that leave the audience wondering if he is indeed a monarch or a visiting Prof. of African History.
A story teller and incorrigible performer, Alaafin remained the first African monarch to arrive at the John F. Kennedy Airport in the United States of America (USA) with a large traditional drummers who thrilled every passenger with delightful tunes.
It was when the paramount ruler was invited by captains of industry of the American Chambers of Commerce and Industry held at Dallas early last year.
During his recent invitation by the Faculty of Law, University of Ibadan to give a lecture on “Secret of Language and Culture”, Alaafin left no one in doubt that he could have been famous had he opted for a career in the academia or public speaking.
On arrival at the institution, the Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Administration), Prof. Aiyelari Ambrose, who represented the Vice-Chancellor, now Minister of Health, noted that “one enviable and remarkable highpoint in the life of this great monarch is his deep knowledge and high sense of recounting historic events with facts and figures; and with an accuracy that will beat the imagination of youthful intellectuals.’’
In his welcome address during the cultural day of the Faculty of Law, the Dean of the Faculty, Prof. Adeniyi Olatunbosun described the Alaafin as “embodiment of Yoruba culture, as well as the synthesis of the aspirations and goals of the nation’’.
He stated that ”this is not only in social values of veracity, egalitarianism, justice and democracy; but in dress, utterances and comportment. He is a monarch with a class. The foremost traditional ruler is of the conviction that a people without a cultural identity of their own would be lost in world history and their contributions to human civilisation forgotten very easily.’’
He added that all these attributes informed the Faculty’s decision to invite the Imperial Majesty to attend the event.
In his lecture at the colourful event, Oba Adeyemi decried what he called “gradual extinction of Yoruba customs and traditions.
The paramount ruler, who was disturbed at how modernisation has been allowed to bombard Yoruba traditions, warned that “as things move at the present time, it will be disastrous if we fold our arms and allow our traditions to dwindle into oblivion in the face of permissiveness.
“How many Yoruba sons and daughters can brilliantly articulate their local language? It is frightening that our languages are dangling on the pit of extinction while preference is accorded to foreign languages, especially the English language. Languages often hold the only record of a people’s history, including their songs, stories, praise poetry and ancient traditions.’’
Continuing, Alaafin said: “In particular, many indigenous cultures contain a wealth of information about the local environment and its resources in vegetation, based upon thousands of years of close interaction, experience and problem-solving.
“With the extinction of a language, therefore, mankind also loses access to local understanding of plants, animals and ecosystems, some of which have important medicinal value and many of which remain undocumented by science.
“Thus, the survival of threatened languages and the indigenous knowledge contained within is an important aspect of maintaining biological diversity.”
Oba Adeyemi asserted that “languages are now becoming extinct faster than birds, mammals, fish or plants. Of the estimated 7,000 unique languages spoken in the world today, nearly half are likely to disappear in this 21 Century, with an average of one language lost in every two weeks.”
It is most likely that in less than 50 years from now, even some major Nigerian languages, if not encouraged, can become extinct and lecturers in our universities would have cause to excite their students with great lectures in a course on, say, “Ancient Igbo” or “Ancient Yoruba languages”, and of which they would speak thus, with nostalgia: ‘They once flourished in the distant past but have now become extinct’. This is a disheartening possibility for anyone who cares about our indigenous languages, the history and unrecorded knowledge they carry within them.’’
He also spoke on African traditional religion which he said clearly plays a distinctive role as the ultimate source of supernatural power and authority that sanction and reinforce public morality.
“It is pressed into full service to maintain social order, peace and harmony. Traditional Africans believe that success in life; including the gift of offspring, wealth and prosperity, are all blessings from the gods and ancestors. They accrue to people who work hard and who strictly adhere to the customs and traditional norms of morality of the community, people who strictly uphold the community ideal of harmonious living. Only such people could entertain a real hope of achieving the highly esteemed status of ancestorhood in the hereafter.
“The vast majority of norms, taboos and prohibitions are directed towards protecting the community and promoting peace and harmony.
“Communal farmland, economic interests such as the market places, streams or shrines, are generally surrounded with taboos, including who may or may not enter and when and under what circumstances people are permitted or not to enter such places. Stealing is abhorred. It is, in fact, an abomination to steal things relating to people’s vital life-interests and occupation,” he said.
Religion, according to him, may be distinct and separate from morality, as many scholars have rightly argued.
“For traditional Africans, however, the line dividing the two is very thin indeed. African traditional religion plays a crucial role in the ethical dynamics of the different groups. In the traditional African background, ‘gods serve as police men’. African traditional worldviews invariably outline a vision of reality that is at once ethical in content and orientation. Humankind and their world are the focal centres of a highly integrated universe. Human conduct is
seen as key in upholding the delicate balance believed to exist between the visible world and the invisible one,’’ the monarch said.
Alaafin’s speech, which was interjected with unique dance steps to delightful traditional beats were awesome sight to behold, as the crowd hailed the monarch amid resounding ovation.
Alaafin pledged the donation of a bus to the Faculty, following students’ request. He was later presented with an award by the Faculty’s Dean, Prof. Olatunbosun.
