𝙾𝚕𝚘𝚔𝚞𝚗 𝙵𝚎𝚜𝚝𝚒𝚟𝚊𝚕 2024 𝙿𝚛𝚎𝚜𝚜 𝙲𝚘𝚗𝚏𝚎𝚛𝚎𝚗𝚌𝚎

Text of press conference delivered by the chairman of the 2024 edition of Olokun Festival, Barrister Peter Olayinka Oguntimehin, held on Tuesday, October 8, 2024, at the Oodua House, Ezekiel Street Ikeja, Lagos state.

I welcome you all to this press conference which marks the beginning of the 2024 edition of the annual Olokun Festival, organised by the Olokun Festival Foundation (OFF).

This year marks the 22nd edition of Olokun festival. It may interest you to note that we have successfully organised the festival without any break since 2002 after the first edition which held at the Alpha Beach.

We embarked on the journey at a time when we observed that the Yoruba race was losing touch with their culture and traditions.

The first two editions, 2002 and and 2003 were held at the Alpha Beach. But we moved to the Suntan Beach, Badagry in Lagos State in 2004 after we observed that the troubling traffic congestion around the Alpha Beach area in the first two editions.

What that means is that we have successfully organised the Olokun Festival in Badagry nonstop every year since 2004. And in that period, we have organised the festival in the historic town of Badagry without break.

To the glory of God, we took the giant step to register the festival with the corporate affairs commission in 2005, the year that marked the birth of Olokun Festival Foundation, the umbrella body of all our festivals with more than 20 traditional festivals in its fold.

The Olokun Festival has recorded unprecdented successes in the last 22 years. It is therefore a thing of joy that we are seeing many other pseudo groups following in our footsteps. But we have set a standard that is difficult to meet, if not impossible in cultural festival celebration that spreads across the length and breadth of Yorubaland.

We can confidently beat our chest today that apart from the late Oba Oniru of Iruland in Lagos who performed the annual traditional rites by celebrating the Olokun in his community, we remain the only entity that has organised uninterrupted annual celebration and rites of Olokun festival since 2002.

The Olokun Festival Foundation is indisputably the only non-governmental organisation in the country that has consistently organised more than 20 cultural and traditional festivals every year. It is important to note that we have achieved this feat without the support of any outside or corporate organisation.

Let me, however, use this opportunity to extend an open invitation to members of the general public or corporate organisation that may be disposed to joining hands with us in this beautiful journey of cultural promotion. Our doors are open to you all.

Twenty-two years after we began the journey, Olokun festival has grown in leaps and bounds to attain an international status. The festival has truly attained a global status, attracting tourists from across the globe every year. Today, cultural enthusiasts from Africa, Asia, Europe and the Americas look forward to attending the Olokun festival.

The reason for this is not too far-fetched. Olokun festival is beyond the funfair that you see and enjoy at the grand finale. Olokun is a spiritual festival with basketful of blessings for its deities and all attendees of the festival.

It is for this reason that we are emphasising on the spiritual aspect of Olokun deity at this year’s festival. Towards this end, there will be a vigil between 1am and 3am on the eve of the festival day in Badagry. We have been assured that all those at the vigil will go home with special blessing from the benevolence of Olokun. I want to implore all of you to endeavour to be there.

You will agree with me that it is universally agreed that God is responsible for nature. He created nature for the benefit of humanity. We must make serious effort as humans not to destroy nature on the platter of religion or greed.

Lagos state is perhaps one of the biggest beneficiaries of this gift of nature in Nigeria. Most of us may be ignorant of the fact that the major advantage enjoyed by Lagos state today is the fact that it is surrounded by water. The state is so blessed that it has access to both the lagoon and the ocean. Only a few cities in the world are as blessed as Lagos. The state is enjoying double blessings from both Olokun and Olosa, the deities that control the seas.

Without mincing words, we are proud to say that we have benefited immensely from our relationship with Olokun. Like I said earlier, we have grown and we continue to grow. The records speak for themselves.

Let me seize this opportunity to share a few of the innovation and growth that we have experienced with you. Fashion show and beauty pageants are parts of the annual programmes in the line-up of events for Olokun Festival. I can proudly tell you that today we have some of our former fashion enthusiasts and beauty queens who are masters of the game and are doing great things in their own fields of endeavours.

Also, we have consistently organised quiz competition for secondary school students in Lagos state as part of the activities for Olokun festival. As I speak with you, apart from the fact that the competition has hugely contributed to the growth of Yoruba language among the young ones, we have records that former winners of the competition have gone ahead to record all-round success in their pursuits.

It may also interest you to note that every year, we invite erudite and renowed professors from different West African countries as guest lecturers. They have lectured us and our guests on several topics relating to the importance of Yoruba culture and Olokun traditions. Expectedly, this has attracted culture enthusiasts who are earger to drink from the pot of knowledge of the university professors every year.

Most importantly, we have used Olokun festival as a platform to attract and solidify a robust relationship with Yoruba monarchs from across the border in Benin Republic. I am happy to inform you that most of these monarchs who have Yoruba ancestry are today very happy to identify with us, and every year the number continues to grow.

Beyond this, we have successfuly taken the message beyond the Atlantic. Our people in Brazil, USA and other Caribbean countries have begun to celebrate Olokun festival in their various countries. Before now, they celebrate Yemoja festival, The reason for this was that they did not really know the difference between Olokun and Yemoja. But we are happy that today, through contact with us, they have made the correction by celebrating both Olokun and Yemoja as two separate deities. These are part of the positive impacts that our efforts have had in these faraway nations and globally.

We are particularly happy today that Olokun has given us an image that is globally recognised. The Olokun Festival Foundation has become synonymous with highly reputed traditional Yoruba festivals spread across Yorubaland. It is indeed a good thing to be so recognised by the global community.

And for this year, in what has become the tradition to kick off all our activities with prayers to the almighty, we shall begin the 2024 edition of Olokun Festival with Prayers to the Almighty on Tuesday, October 15, 2024 at the Oodua House here. The prayers will conducted in the three main religions, namely Traditional, Islam and Christianity.

For this year, like I stated above, the deity has mandated its devotees to gather for a vigil between 1am and 3am on the eve of the grand finale. There will also be special prayers for Yorubaland by Olokun at 10 am.

This year, the OFF has decided to get more of the indigenous communities in and around Badagry more involved as participants. In doing this, plans are in place to organise the logistics of bringing them to the grande finale. We envisage that the annual Olokun Festival organised by the Olokun Festival Foundation (OFF) shall become a major tourist attraction for international tourists in the nearest future. It will be a major boost to the sustainable development of tourism in Nigeria.*

We have below the full time-table of the programme of events lined up for the 2024 edition of Olokun Festival

PROGRAMME OF EVENT OLOKUN FESTIVAL 2024.

PROGRAMME OF THE DAY

DAY 1. TUESDAY OCT. 8th 2024 AT OODUA HOUSE
PRESS CONFERENCE AT OODUA HOUSE

DAY 2. TUESDAY OCT. 15, 2024
PRAYER TO ALMIGHTY GOD AT OODUA HOUSE

DAY 3. THURSDAY OCT. 17, 2024.
FASHION SHOW AT OODUA HOUSE

DAY 4. SATURDAY. 19 2024.
BEAUTY PAGEANT AT OODUA HOUSE

DAY 5. MONDAY OCT. 21, 2024. OLOSA DAY PROGRAMME

A.FESTIVAL FLOAT 10AM TO 2PM

B..VISIT TO OBA AKRAN OF BADAGRY 12 NOON TO 1.30PM

C..BOAT REGATTA 2PM TO 5PM

D..OLOSA GALA NIGHT 7PM TO 11PM