[STRIKER] Rebranding: A Serious Business

Engr. Rauf Aregbesola was sworn in as Governor of Osun on November 27, 2010 (after about three and half years of titanic legal battles to reclaim his stolen victory at the 2007 Osun Governorship election). From the swearing-in podium, he commenced on three redefinitions in a jiffy, which are significant steps that only the deep can comprehend – on day one, he rebranded himself as Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola, then proceeded to rebrand Osun as State of the Virtuous (Ipinle Omoluabi – complete with all symbolism), and embarked on the redefinition of its children’s education with the Education Summit. These are fundamental steps that needed to be studied by Nigeria if Nigeria is not a painfully lost “mere geographical expression.” After study should come the embrace and replication of redeeming, transformational examples!

Let us set aside Nigeria that is going nowhere very fast, unfortunately under the headmanship of a Yoruba in charge. Let us face the Yoruba reality: the question of being, identity and destiny; the import and urgency of rebranding, to save our children, children’s children and generations unborn. They all could be found encapsulated in the footprints, words and actions of the Avatar, Obafemi Awolowo, and the team of titans he led in Egbe Omo Oduduwa, Action Group (AG) and Unity Party of Nigeria (UPN) but just one signature is sufficient, the Unity Party Anthem: resurrected, translated and popularised by “The Great Ogbeni” – due credits to Governor Sanwoolu; an anthem that was component part of Osun rebranding then and now adopted by the Southwest Governors.

Nowhere is the importance of identity for survival and prosperity in a world of cutthroat competition highlighted better than in the opening of Chancellor Williams’ epochal book “The Destruction of Black Civilisation” where he recited the Suma Legend thus: “What became of the black people of Suma,” the traveller asked the old man, “for ancient records show that the people of Suma were black, what happened to them?” “Haa,” the old man sighed, “they lost their history, so they died.” Perhaps the easiest way to imagine the statement is to think of a 50 years old Nobel Prize-winning genius in Medicine and Surgery that has now lost his memory!

STRIKER: STRIKER: Nobody Will Take Us Seriously

Once you no longer know who you are, your purpose and destiny, you are on your way to becoming what the Yoruba are becoming, and so sadly: a terrible degeneration in just 40 years. Space will not permit a detail catalogue of the inglorious decline here but suffice it to say if we are becoming what will make Awolowo restive in his grave and make Oyenusi regret that he didn’t come to the world at the right time, then we need urgent return to base through a rebranding taken as seriously as efforts to earn a ticket to heaven.

Life is not merely to be lived as counted years of misery and emptiness, ending up as just a number in a billion populations. We can’t all be Michael Jackson in that lifetime but all lives can be lived abundantly. The mentioned anthem: an uplifting and purposeful affirmation, should be studied to understand the clear and present danger the Yoruba face today and the urgent call to duty to its would be heroes and heroines. The first stanza talks to that duty – the needful to uplift the race from the murk and as exemplar to the rest of the world. The second speaks to Work as the only true and acceptable path to wealth (individual work and cooperative work for collective prosperity). The third highlights freedom and unity of purpose as worthwhile pursuit. The last is a clarion call to citizens to take their rightful place as the leading light of the black race – which can only be through powerful examples of uprightness, creativity and being always counted at the frontier of human progress.

Whereas there are brilliant sparks everywhere, now and then, inside and outside the country, the plain truth is that the Yoruba is a pale shadow of itself. No need to belabour the issue, a self examination in all major criteria of life from birth to death and remembrance; from education, skill, commerce, character, attitude to healthcare, art, language and culture, shows a terrible deficit of not being in any good standing. Rather, we see a lost, wayward, straggler in the middle of the wilderness, petrified at any slight challenge from “others” and barely holding on to mere existence, hardly able to compete in the social environment.

We are now only sustained by heritage; which is being bastardised and washed away. The time is now “to reflect, to rethink, and to act,” individually and collectively.

The opinions expressed in this publication are those of the author. They do not represent the opinions or views of OSUN DEFENDER.