A new chapter in the advancement of Yoruba culture, history, tradition and values will open on Tuesday, November 23, 2021, as the Vice President, Professor Yemi Osinbajo, turns the first sod of the Yoruba World Centre situated inside the University of Ibadan.
A statement issued by Chief Shola Oshunkeye, the Director of Media and Publicity of the International Centre for Yoruba Arts And Culture (INCEYAC), said Osinbajo will be joined at the occasion by the Governors of Southwest, the Ooni of Ife, His Imperial Majesty, Oba Adéyeyè Enitan Ògúnwùsì (Òjájá II), the Alaafin of Oyo, Iku Baba Yeye, Oba Lamidi Adeyemi III, and many eminent Yoruba leaders.
A brainchild of the International Centre for Yoruba Arts and Culture, INCEYAC, the three-in-one occasion, will feature the opening of the Centre’s temporary abode, the presentation of a full documentary on the Yoruba World Centre, and the laying of the first foundation at the permanent site by the Vice President.
When completed, according to Oshunkeye, the Yoruba World Centre will have a standard library; an archive; a museum; a recreation, reconstruction and digital centre; broadcasting and film village; and an artificial forest (Zoo)
Explaining the purpose and significance of the gigantic project, Chief Alao Adedayo, a member of the Board of Trustees of INCEYAC, and Publisher of Alaroye newspaper, said the centre will serve as a one-stop shop that offers old, new, recreated and reconstructed materials for researchers, lecturers, students, authors, journalists, historians and members of the public interested in Yoruba history, arts and culture, as tool for nation building, national cohesion, and mutual understanding.
Explaining further, Alao Adedayo said though the project is an idea whose time has come, he lamented that vibrant and vast as the Yoruba race is, it has “no single institution anywhere in the world where researchers, or anyone at all, can stay to conduct and complete works on the history, arts and culture of the Yoruba people.
“Being the largest user of Yoruba language (in print) in the world today, and because of our daily interactions with the language, arts, culture and history of the people, through our newspaper-ALAROYE, we can confirm that there is no such institution in the entire world.In addition to providing a good ambience for researchers, the Yoruba World Centre, as a knowledge centre, will help Nigeria and Nigerians in the onerous task of nation building.”
Adedayo, therefore, urged all Yorubas, at home and in the diaspora, to support the centre.
