Globacom Chairman, Dr. Mike Adenuga Jr. has harped on the need for
parents to bestow traditional cultural values of the Nigerian ethnic
nations on their offsprings in order to preserve the unity and social
cohesion taught by cultural events like the Ojude Oba festival.
Dr.
Adenuga, whose company, Globacom, has sponsored Ojude Oba Festival in
the past ten years as part of its Glo Heritage Series, said this in a
goodwill message at the Ojude Oba festival celebrated on Wednesday in
Ijebu Ode, Ogun State.
He noted that unless parents took it upon
themselves to propagate the values behind cultural events, the next
generation may consider the festivals fetish or insignificant and
thereby jettison them.
Dr. Adenuga said the theme of this year’s
celebration, “Ojude Oba: Our Culture, Our Pride”, briefly captures the
societal relevance of the festival within the current milieu and
represents a common resolve to ensure that its essence is cascaded to
the next generation as a source of pride and honour for the Ijebu race.
Represented
at the event by the Commercial Coordinator, Business Enterprise, Mr.
Folu Aderibigbe, the business mogul and culture enthusiast recalled
that, “over the years, Ojude Oba has remained not only a point of
crystallisation and social re-engineering; it is as, well an avenue for
the constellation of ideas and initiatives that are geared towards
prompting the growth of the society and the wellness of its people”.
He
declared that unless the next generation understood the significance of
the festival, it stood the risk of being relegated into oblivion,
especially in the light of the growing penchant for Western cultures by
the Nigerian youth.
According to him, Ojude Oba is also an
exhibition platform to display the cultural wealth of the people and the
values that unite them and has assumed the role of a social melting
pot, where all divergent issues affecting the lives of the people are
processed, congealed and digested.
He said it also provided a
platform where the sons and daughters of Ijebuland both at home and
abroad are reminded of their collective responsibility as, active
players in the socio-economic growth of the geographical space known as
Ijebuland.
The Awujale of Ijebuland, Oba Sikiru Kayode Adetona
gave kudos to Globacom for its commitment to the promotion of cultures
and traditions in Nigeria through its Heritage Series.