[continued from previous message]

Some of them would even have told you that this building is juju or that we kill people. I want to tell you that there is nowhere in the whole of this building where rams are slaughtered. If we kill and carry babies like they have often alleged, the police would have been here, this being a metropolitan
town. What I mean is that you can't see members of the R.O.F getting involved
in any crime or conniving with anybody to perpetuate crimes. We do our things
in very religious ways. We don't just admit people. We only take people who have discovered that our members are exceptional in their neighbourhood.

What is exit like for the initiated who want to opt out?

Easy, anybody can get out of it at whatever stage of initiation or membership
since they were not forced to join in the first place.

Burial of late members has always brought you at loggerheads with the church.
What could be responsible?

It is time that in most cases burial in the problem, but again our christian brothers have been unfair and in most cases insincere to our departed brethren.

Remember I cited the fact that Ven. Archdeacon Ogunbiyi was castigated at the
introduction of ROF despite other innovations of his in the church. Look at the case of our late Olori Oluwo, Oludare Holloway. He was very useful to the
Methodist Church ñ they knew he was in R.O.F but couldn't do away with him while he was living.

The question is why does the church use our members to make name and money while they were alive and only shout to complain about their membership of R.OF after death.

We only go to burials when invited by family of the dead. We don't want to quarrel with the church, so if anybody dies today and the family says they don't want R.O.F there we keep off; if the church doesn't want us there we will step aside.

If we are invited to participate we do whatever in the presence of the deceased family, how then can we be removing parts of their departed, beloved
in their presence? If we are invited we don't cost the deceased family half penny. We provide for ourselves and friends who will like to join us. We only
follow them to the burial ground and come back.

Members of R.O.F are members of one church or the other. We don't all belong to one church. So we see these people who preach against us and say what does
not apply as nonetities; people who do not know what they are doing. They are
all telling lies and flouting the commandment of God that forbids lying.

We Are Misunderstood, Says Oyenuga

Chief Adeleke Oyenuga is, apart from being an Oluwo in the Ogboni Aborigine fraternity of Nigeria and oversees, the Oluwo Alakoso of Ikorodu Division of the fraternity.

In this interview with Staff Reporter, LEKAN FADEYI, Oyenuga who is also the Olori Oluwo of Ogboni Iwase Otufe of Nigeria said traditional worshippers are
misrepresented. Excerpts:

CAN you give us a brief history of Ogboni society. I mean how it started, when
and who started it.

I cannot say specifically when Ogboni started. I am not sure anybody can be so
specific about it but one thing I am sure of is that so many people are incorrect when they say Labosinde owns Aborigine. Aborigine was started by a Dojo of Adore who is now late and whose name I do not know.

Labosinde was a teacher and thus had the luck of being literate to side track
the Deji. He Labosinde, was also the secretary of the society then. As to when, let me state here again that I have not heard anybody specifying that Ogboni started in year 'A' or 'B'.

Can we have you list some of the renowned Ogboni extractions and their similarities?

First we have the Osugbo gbede which is normally referred to as being owned by
the Oba. This is for the Oba's chiefs. There is Ogboni Aborigine fraternity of
Nigeria, there is Iwule Ogboni and it is believed to be for the elderly four.
Firstly we have Ogboni Otu Ife, there is Ogboni Arapa Nika, this came from Akoko in Ondo State, there is Ogboni Ara Ife, there is Ogboni Akala, and there
is Ogboni Agamasa, Ogboni Ogenete and also the Reformed Ogboni Fraternity (ROF) which came out of Ogboni Aborigine. I belong to all but the ROF.

What differences exist in their mode of operations and can they be united?

There are so many differences in that their mode of worship differ even though
they all worship Edan which is Gold like.

If you look at the fact that even if you are a member of the Aborigine and not
initiated to Ogboni Osugbo, you can't just say because you are initiated into
Aborigine. You can go and join Osugbo when they are performing. If you do, you
will suffer the consequence. That is the way it is with all of them.

The Osugbo's being titled chief of the Oba can however attend functions of the
Aborigine because they are respected members of the society.

It is therefore not expressly possible for a member of one society to gatecrash into another's. The Aborigine in most cases can worship with the ROF
because ROF migrated from the Aborigine and their language can be spoken by the Aborigine. It is language (mode of communications that betrays whoever wants to impersonates.

There is this belief especially in ROF that the fraternity does not owe its existence to the Aborigine. How come you are saying ROF was extracted from Aborigine?

Whoever is knowledgeable should know that ROF was extracted from the Aborigine
by the late Baba Ogunbiyi.

Pa Ogunbiyi was an Apena in Aborigine before he travelled abroad to discover that Ogboni as it was then practised was wrongly practised and can be better structured and practised. When you look at what Ogunbiyi's Reformed Ogboni Fraternity is doing you will realise that it is only the imbeciles that will call Ogboni a secret society.

Those who say Ogboni is a secret society are in darkness. Ogboni is white and
clean in nature and the fact that they have some secrets that are strategic to
their operations and which the uninitiated do not know does not mean it should
be called a secret society. Some will say they severe their heads, they cut their neck, they are never buried whole but I tell you whoever is in it will be surprised that so this is Ogboni.

What then will make you join these societies that are not comfortable practising in the open?

I am a traditionalist to the core and have discovered that membership of these
societies among other things is usually helpful; it provides assistance in troubled times; if one as a member lacks anything, the brethren will rally round him. Again if one is wrongly punished or afflicted, it is normally the duty of the society to collectively ensure that the person is arraigned and thirdly they are always fourably disposed to helping each other first before helping a non member. So whoever says traditional grouping such as Ogboni is a
secret society is an illiterate and an imbecile.

Lets go back to the issue of similarity in the operation of these societies. What unite them?

All Ogbonis believe in Edan and whichever Iledi that is sure footed and properly established must have four female Edan and one male which is known as
the Ajagunmale which is the heavenly Oluwo.

If you now look closely again, you will discover that we have three societies
out of the about ten that I mentioned initially who have another thing in addition to the Edan. They have what is called Onile, which is different from
Edan but often called Edan by those who are not knowledgeable.

Onile is like a status, it is the first to be seen at any Iledi that has it, it normally stands like meandering and that is why those who are verse in the
history of Ogboni will say it is the Onile that you first greet before Edan.

Ogboni Osugbo gbede or Ogboni Abalaye which is Awo Oba has Onile and Edan, Ogboni Imule has Onile, it also has Edan and Arapa nika Onikere mefa also has.
These three have Onile, others don't have and whoever is a member of these societies know that it is the onile that you first greet before you proceed to
Edan. They perform different functions and these functions are not for me to tell you because you are not initiated into the societies.

There is the belief that the manner in which Awos practice today has taken the
shine out of traditional societies. What are your views?

It is true that we the youths have messed up a lot of things today. In the olden days you don't know an Awo from an Ogbo but today we raise shoulders about. You see small children going about today to tell their friends that they are Awo and revealing the things they see the elderly ones do in Iledis.

Before now you are not qualified to become an Awo until you are 35 years of age. At that age you are old enough to be punished for offences you commit as
an Awo. You are expected to have attained maturity that compels you to be able
to keep secret.

But today if anybody brings in money to join, that person is instantly given the highest title in the Iledi. This is wrong and that is why we are having problems.

So what is causing our problems is that the right steps taken by our forefathers who started the institution of Awo are not strictly adhered to now. Let me tell you whatever is different from the original is fake and there
is no way you can find a way round it.

There appears t...

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