The News (Lagos)
Michael Mukwuzi
10 May 2004
The first salvo could well have been intended as the innocuous words of a royal father who was writing history from his own understanding .
Although the Oba of Benin, Omo N'Oba Uku Okpolokpo, Erediuwa may not deliberately have gone for a kill, his account, in his autobiography, of how the Yoruba and Benin people originated could not but stir the hornet's nest. The book, entitled: "I Remain Sir, Your Obedient Servant", was launched in Lagos penultimate weekend.
The royal father asserts on page 205 of the book that the ancestor of the Yoruba race "was one Ekalederhan, a Benin prince who had once escaped the community's axe-man but later reappeared in Ife after wandering in the bush from Benin for a very long time." Omo N'Oba avers that Ekalederhan, having become the ruler in Ife, refused to go back to Benin but, instead, sent Oranmiyan, his son, basically on a home-coming mission to start the present dynasty in Benin after the demise of the Ogiso dynasty.
The claim is a rewrite of the history of the Yoruba who have long believed they descended from Oduduwa. The Ooni of Ife, Oba Okunade Sijuwade, was quick to return the Benin monarch's fire. At the launch, on Monday 3 April 2004, of "A Jewel of Inestimable Value, the biography of Mrs. Hannah Dideolu Awolowo, the Ooni described the claim of the Benin monarch as a distortion of history.
While describing Omo N'Oba's narration as a poor attempt at rewriting history, Sijuwade reeled out some historical data to back his argument. He stated that the Oba of Benin, whose dynasty commenced in 1191 AD, was an Ife prince lent to the people of Benin on their request after the end of Ogiso's rule. On the request, the Ooni narrated, Oduduwa decided to send Prince Oranmiyan who established the dynasty and whose first son in Benin from a Benin woman was Owonuka (Eweka), the progenitor of all Benin Obas, including the Omo N'oba, since 1191 AD.
The Ooni stated that since the Oranmiyan dynasty began till 1900, the heads of dead Benin Obas were buried in a sacred place called Olorun-Oba-Ado in Ife. Records in the archives, he said, made it clear that since 1191 AD and up till 1916, the Ooni of Ife had to be informed and his approval sought for the installation of a Benin Oba.
According to Sijuwade, Oduduwa descended directly from heaven in the company of 400 deities, through a chain, to the spot now known as Ife.
But Omo N'Oba has received support from unlikely quarters-within Yorubaland. In less than 24 hours, Sijuwade's claim came under attack from the Oba of Lagos, Rilwan Aremu Akiolu 1. Akiolu declared that the Erediuwa could not be lying. "When one is talking of traditional rulers with integrity, proven records of preserving culture and upright character in this country, Oba of Benin is one of them. I believe in what he wrote on Oduduwa. He cannot lie," Rilwan said. The Awujale of Ijebuland, Oba Sikiru Adetona, in a chat with TheNEWS, would also not wish the Ijebu people to be linked with the popular version of the evolution of the Yoruba race.
According to Adetona, Sijuwade has no claim to Yoruba royalty and as such cannot speak for the entire race. He explained that the Ijebus hailed from the Middle-East and have no ancestral links with Ife.
The stance of the two royal fathers is, however, believed to have political undertones. In Lagos, in the race for succession after Oba Adeyinka Oyekan died last year, the Ooni was said to have backed Otunba Adekunle Ojora against Akiolu. The Ooni has also not been known to have congratulated Akiolu after the latter emerged Oba.
Generally, among Yoruba rulers and the people, the popularity of the Ooni has waned considerably following the infamous role he played in the aftermath of the annulment of the June 12 presidential election which Chief Moshood Kashimawo Abiola, a Yorubaman, won. The Oba Of Benin has stirred a debate and as it unfolds, it is expected to open a new vista into the origin of the Yoruba and Benin ethnic groups. Dr. Hakeem Haruna of the Department of History, University of Lagos, counselled that "rather than dissipate energy on the pages of newspapers, the rulers should leave the new claim for historians and researchers to investigate, validate and confirm the seemingly new input in Yoruba/Benin history."
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