IJESHA KINGDOM: PLACE OF PRIDE or PRIDE OF PLACE!!!

IJESHA KINGDOM: PLACE OF PRIDE or PRIDE OF PLACE!!!

I write this little piece of my mind to elucidate and justify the feelings of jubilation that currently sweeps across the whole of Ijesha Kingdom following the emancipation of the soul that transpired due to the pronouncements by the courts with regards to the Osun Guber tribunal!!! Ijesha land alone contributes eighty percent of the Internally Generated Revenue from Osun State!! Osun state supercedes Delta state in Internally Generated revenue streams!! Ijesha land boasts of the best Agricultural produce out of West Africa!! Osun State leads the rest in returning Nigeria to its former status as an Agricultural haven!!! International Coacoa prices dictated by a joint cooperative of coacoa farmers in the Heart of Ijeshaland!!!! These are the predominant thoughts in my head as i head to Ilesha immediately after the news broke that the Osun Guber tribunal had accorded and pronounced Engineer Raouf Aregbesola as the rightful Governor of Osun State!!! Ijeshaland must still be jubilating even as i sit in the quiet of my study contemplating the way forward for my people!!  These thoughts will only be jsutified if we as a people are able to achieve these milestones in the next 4 years of an Ijesha rule! It brings me to my knees in pure humility to God when i pray for wisdom and understanding of the times ahead for our people!

I travelled alone through the night and arrived Ilesha around 10pm only to find the streets littered with debris of an ongoing carnival. I am certain that there is no diabolical festival in these parts that stresses the prevalence of voodoo or its accompaniments so i pressed on through the Irojo entrance and am confronted by a horde of broom carrying and cutlass wielding mob that had set up a barricade at the junction of the garage! This i found alarming as these boys did not look familiar in the least. I approach them with apprehension thinking to myself what this could mean, they queried me and screamed ACN!! I was thrown aback as i did not know the response to the partisan chants of the Action Congress of Nigeria however i was comfortable as i knew that we were all in the same celebration!! I hailed them and bade them farewell with a little token of my appreciation for the security being provided at the junction. Driving into Ilesha I realized that the people were all awake in this normally dead town!! On a normal day the town would be asleep by 8pm which was a major worry for me as most commercial towns never go to sleep. Trade should go on round the clock. This was not the case in Ijeshaland till this blessed day when all our peoples were kept awake by the sheer excitement and feeling of joy that pervaded all our sleeping glands!! An Ijeshaman had emerged as Governor of Osun State!! Ijeshas will finally be vindicated and exonerated for the role we played in the emancipation of Osun State from the hands of strangers and pretenders to the throne!!

In view of the above, i recalled the events that led up to the 16 years war that took place in Yorubaland between the Ijeshas in partnership with the Ekitis against the supposed tyranny of the Oyo Empire in the mid to late 19th Century!! The Oyo Empire in its bid to ensure predominance in Yoruba land via the exacting of taxes would send its warlords to battle with the Ijesha Kingdom under the Owa. Once they won the battle due to the superior firepower accorded by the use of firearms they would install an Ajele (Mayor) to oversee and undermine the Owa and Ijesha people in general. The people would be docile in a guise to show that they had been subjugated until the day of reckoning when the battle cry of the oppressed people would be heard and all the citizens of this illustrious ancestral capital of Ijesha land would rise together to apprehend and behead the tyranny represented by the Ajele (Mayor)!! This was rather barbaric as i came to the realization that even after 100 years of existence the spirit of the Ijesha was still the same!! The battle-cry was heard as far as Abuja and the whole world as Ijeshas (myself included) rose to the voice of justice and reasoning to take our rightful place in Osun State!!

Today I am aware that all the people that were once the stooges of oppression are on the run from their homes for fear of reprisal attacks that would probably follow. The few ones that were used by the system as agents of discord in the community are being paraded around town with whips in their trail to show that they were once masters and now they are the slaves. The leaders try to calm the mob but even they cannot help but join the frenzy as freedom after oppression in itself is a strong intoxicant. The elderly man collects the whip from the youthful mob and instead of letting the culprit go and advocating for leniency he himself begins to whip the culprit who runs for his dear life! It is now clear that there will be no safe haven for the oppressors in the land!! I observe all this through the window of my minds eyes even as the jubilant mob walk past me and hail me for a deserved victory!!

In my ethereal journey to the Ijesha land  of my dreams i was waiting to stir from my slumber thinking in my subconscious that this was too good to be true as just two days earlier i had written a piece about the sufferings of our peoples!! God is truly in control of these parts and once again the joy of the prospects of true freedom from the shackles of mental, economic, social and political slavery was too much to conceal as i declared free drinks for all at the bar!! I see my comrades all come to congratulate me even as i let my mind wander why the entreaties of joy. I am not the Governor and neither am I a member of the Governors party; i was quickly notified that only a bastard Ijesha would not celebrate this important, historical and monumental victory. This was akin to the historical victory of the Ijeshas at the Belumi battle of the late 19th century; where the Ijeshas got hold of the Gatlin rifle and were able to repel the warring hordes of the Oyos!! This time around the victory was predicated in the law courts and once again our partners in victory were the Ekitis!! Is this history repeating itself or is it just me trying to connect events that span across two centuries?? Whatever the case may be, i am proud to say that by virtue of this victory in Osun State, the Ijeshas can breathe a sigh of relief as we now have the pride of place even as our land enters a new era of regeneration that will make Ijeshaland a place of pride!!

Obokun a gbe a o!!!

Chief Daniel Bankole Afilaka

(Bobagunwa of Atorin Ijesha)

 OPA KAN.. IJESHA KAN!!!

(c) November 2010