His Royal Majesty, Oba Joseph Adebayo Adewole, Arojojoye II is the Owa Ajero of Ijero Kingdom, an ancient town in Ekiti State, South West Nigeria. Oba Joseph is the custodian of the deeply rooted culture and tradition of the land. Despite being a devoted Christian, he has been able to live up to expectation and the many cultural demands of the stool of Owa Ajero which comes with many responsibilities. The Owa Ajero presently has 8 beautiful Oloris as his wives and they live in peace and harmony. In an interview with City People Reporter JAMIU ABUBAKAR and Photojournalist, ABDULRASHEED SANNI, Oba Adewole revealed to us the main reason why he married 8 wives which he said is connected to the demands of the stool of Owa Ajero. Below are the excerpts:
I observed that your Oloris are quite large in number. Is there any historical significance to that?
Well, you may think that they are large, but not yet large enough. Because when I came to the throne, I inherited 17 of them from my predecessor. They handed over 17 of them to me. And that is the tradition here. “Ato ere sis ani won fi bi esin. Ijo ti won ba ti gbin agbado ni won ti gbin ogere mo!” Hope you understand what I’m saying? So, it’s part of the thing here. Actually, we have some ceremonies for the oloris to perform. This is a great palace. This palace is not a modern palace, it’s an ancient palace. And we have our tradition and culture. So it’s part of our tradition and culture that the oloris here have to be many. It can’t be just one. There can always be many. So that is it.
Being a devoted Christian, how easy was it for you taking up the role of the custodian of the tradition?
Yes, actually there is no problem about that. The reason being that the Oba has the authority and the obligation to make sure that every person practices his own religion the way he wants it. So if somebody says there is a stone, that stone is his own god or goddess, he has to have free access to that. If it is a river, if it is a tree, we go. For Christians here, I have a very cordial relationship with the Christians. I have a cordial relationship with the Muslims. I go to the mosque, I go to the Eid with them during Ileya, during the Itunu Awe and things like that. And they are free with me. So also, with the traditional religionist, everybody is allowed to practice their religion the way they want to do it. And nobody is allowed to disturb any other person. So we are living together peacefully here. But as it is, nobody distorts me from my own religion. In fact, when I came to this throne, I built the first chapel in the palace. So I worship there. I worship with my chiefs who find it convenient for them to join my family, we worship together. And Like I said, I worship with the mosque, I worship with all the churches, I worship with them.
And basically, for the traditional religion, before they do anything, they take permission from me. Sometimes they collect certain things for their rituals from me. And I give them. So that’s how we have been able to do it and live peacefully here.
MEET THE BEAUTIFUL OLORIS OF OBA JOSEPH ADEWOLE, THE OWA AJERO OF IJERO KINGDOM
(1) OLORI ABIKE ADEWOLE, (2) OLORI MARY ADEWOLE (3) KIKELOMO M. ADEWOLE (4) OLORI C. KIKE ADEWOLE (5) OLORI ABIMBOLA ADEWOLE (6) OLORI MAUREEN ADEWOLE
(7) OLORI ADEDOYIN ADEWOLE (8) OLORI REMI ADEWOLE
