•Evangelist FEMI AJEWOLE Tells City People
Alfa Sule is an evangelical dance drama ministry based in Ibadan. It was founded in 2002 by Evangelist Olufemi Ajewole. The Ministry specializes in stage drama presentation. They’ve been to many churches, crusades for presentation and the Lord has used the ministry to win more souls to His Kingdom.
The big news is, they are celebrating their 20th anniversary.
City People’s Head of Tv, SUNDAY ADIGUN had a chat with Evangelist Femi Ajewole and he revealed how they got the stage name, Alfa Sule 20 years ago. Below are exerpts of the conversation.
What is Alfa Sule drama group all about?
Alfa Sule is just an alias of Christ Chosen Drama Ministry. It is a ministry that propagates the gospel through dance drama. We started in 2002 with about 10 members but now, we have increased to 40 members. We had our first ministration on January 18, 2002, and it was successful. We brought creativity into drama, which made everything so fantastic.
How did you come up with the concept of the drama group?
I was teaching in a school before I took the drama up as a ministry. The school was preparing for their end-of-the-year party, so I was asked to teach some students drama, because God has bestowed the gift of drama on me. In trying to teach the kids drama, I discovered that they were not really getting it. For example, you ask a kid to play the role of a father, but he cannot really talk like a father. For weeks, I tried to get the best out of them but to no avail. So, I said to myself, ‘why not voice it out and make the students do a demonstration of it?’ I gave it a trial and it was good. To make the rehearsal more interesting and easier, we provided music with the school drum. After the performance, the response we got from the audience was fantastic. I wasn’t expecting it to turn out that way.
Later, I abandoned the idea and went back to school. One day, somebody said ‘is it every one of us that will end up as electrical engineers?’ I was like ‘that is true; I have a gift in me, I can use it to do better things for myself than being an electrical engineer’. So, I shared the vision with my brother, Woli Agba and some of my neighbours, and that was how the whole thing started.
What actually inspired the idea?
The inspiration came from the Holy Spirit. I studied Electrical Engineering at The Polytechnic, Ibadan. For you to come up with that kind of drama concept is not something ordinary. I didn’t learn it from anybody but the Holy Spirit inspired me. If you check out most of our movies, you will see it there. We don’t buy scripts, the Holy Spirit writes scripts for us. So, the Holy Spirit is the source of our inspiration.
Were you the first group that started the dance drama?
Dance drama has been in existence, before we came on the scene but one thing we noticed was that they got their messages across through actions and not voice. But our own style is modern dance drama based on choreography and voice. It is like miming; there is a background voice. It’s not like narration but practically voice and action, like doing exactly what you are saying.
What challenges did you face before getting to this stage?
It’s over 20 years now since we started the ministry. Then, we had JS1, JS2 students in the group, so for people to see that children of that age could do something that will touch lives, was really incredible. Despite the fact that we used young ones as cast members, people still got the message and were blessed. We just had to convince them that the little ones can also do something that the elderly will appreciate. Another challenge we faced was people harassing us for money. We also faced challenges of some ladies trying to be closer than normal. Do you understand what I am trying to say? But we thank God for allowing us to stand on our feet.
How did you get the stage name, Alfa Sule?
Alfa Sule was a character in my first movie, “Oti Gan Pa” I remember we went for a ministration somewhere and people loved how we performed. One of the guests wanted to invite us for his show but couldn’t get our name. He spoke with the first man who invited us to help him reach out to us but there was no time and they needed to put the name in their flier, later, they decided to use one of the characters in the movie and that was Alfa Sule. A week before the event, they reached out to us and we went for the show. When it was our turn to perform, they kept shouting Alfa Sule but we didn’t know they were referring to us until the convener came and said that was what he registered our name with. Since then, we’ve been using the name as our stage name.
What do you do aside from running the drama ministry?
Initially, when I started, I was working as a teacher. But when God expanded the ministry, I had to quit the job and face the ministry squarely. That’s what I have been doing, and it is the only thing that puts food on my table.
Are you married?
By His grace, I am married and blessed with kids. I got married in 2010.
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