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This year’s Olojo Festival, celebrated annually in Ile Ife, Osun State, took place on Saturday, September 30, 2023.
It is one of the most popular and respected festivals in Yorubaland, and is celebrated in honour of ‘Ogun’, the god of iron.
The festival connotes the day in the year specially blessed by ‘Olodumare’ (the creator of the universe). It is a special moment when prayers are offered for peace and tranquillity in Yorubaland and Nigeria.
This year festival started with the seclusion done by the revered monarch, the Arole Oodua, Ooni Adeyeye Ogunwusi, on Sunday 24, 2023, before he proceeded to the palace on Friday, after some women from the town had earlier swept the palace, which symbolises sanitisation from evil. During the seclusion, the Ooni was expected to commune with the ancestors and pray for his people.
At the significant event which took place inside the palace, tourists from Nigeria and abroad traveled down the ancient town for the 2023 celebration and immediately the Ooni wore the sacred crown “Ade Are” traditional adherents started offering prayers to “Olodumare”.
Earlier, a foreign tourist, His Majesty, Raba Gaye Konjwa of the Ndebele Nation, South Africa, while fielding questions from journalists on the celebration, called on Africans to unite so as to solve the problems confronting the continent.
Konjwa charged Africans across the world to come back to their source with a view to solving the problems together and protect their indigenous cultures.
According to the monarch, “Wherever you are as Africans, let’s come back to our homes. You don’t need to run away from your home. Our problem is our problem that we need to solve. Nobody else will solve our problems unless African brothers and sisters do so.
“We shall solve our problems on our own by uniting. Let’s stop from being selfish.
“We’ve been so concerned about the issue in the whole African continent. We are so divided and I think it is about time we unite for the progress of our continent. We have the organization called Sovereign Congress of Africa. It was established so that we can unite in the whole entire Africa and remember; together we stand, divided we fall.
“As Africans, we need to unite and protect our territory, protect our culture because we are rich in culture, let’s stop this idea of fighting one another. Be you a Nigerian, a South African, a Ugandan, a Congolese among others, we are one.
“Fighting one another was a man-made and we need to unite to form a stronger bond. The enemies are very scared of us and are busy exploiting us just because the believed we cannot stand on our own. We need to go back to our traditional leaders. When we align with our traditional leaders, then we will be able to conquer the world and our Africa and with all our riches and in our culture, let’s unite as Africans for the betterment and development of our region.
“I’m here with His Majesty, my Colleague in the Sovereign Congress of African leaders as a whole preaching unity. Let’s unite, let’s go back and respect African elders. We need to stand and love one another, protect one another, let’s stop this issue of xenophobic, South Africa is also your home just like Nigeria is also my home, Uganda and Congo are my homes. Let’s unite and stand as African brothers and sisters.
However, a Mexican and traditional worshipper, Ifamosun Saorigameh expressed his excitement seeing Yoruba tradition alive.
The Yoruba-speaking Mexican, who traveled from Mexico to witness the 2023 Olojo festival said; “this is my first time attending the Olojo festival, but four years ago, the first time I heard about it, I wanted to participate, so this year I traveled to Nigeria to attend the festival.
“I’m feeling so happy because our Yoruba culture is alive I’m very happy to see that.
“People outside really love local fabrics and any kind of Yoruba clothes and if we can take this to all places, it will be good for fashion around the world,” he said.
