Women are custodians of culture and heritage — Olori Aderonke Ogunwusi
By Jeleel Olawale
The wife of Ooni of Ife, Olori Aderonke Adewuyi-Ogunwusi on Thursday described African women as custodians of culture and heritage in society, saying women are the engine room of African culture and growth.
Olori Ogunwusi made this disclosure at the Women’s History Month conference of Oloris and whose first edition had the theme, ‘The impact of Oloris in National development,’ held at the Ooni’s Palace, Ile-Ife.
“It is no news that women are the pillars of the society. We are the engines of growth and economic development with enormous responsibilities to God, Man and society at large.
“Women provide the labour force for production of goods and services. Women have the natural gift from God to do so many things at the same time. Women play the roles of wives, mothers, caretakers, educators, to mention a few, there’s no role that a woman cannot play.
“According to the UN, watch organization, Women play a key role in supporting their households, and communities in achieving so many things like food security, generating income, improving livelihood and overall well-being.
“It is worthy of note that women in the past have established kingdoms and ruled as Kings. Women like Ooni Luwoo, Alaafin Orompoto and Osemawe pupupu the founder of Ondo Kingdom.
“I know we all have various projects that we are doing in our various Kingdoms and today for the first time in history, we are all coming together to see how we can all work together and collaborate on the different things that we do,” she said.
She noted that there is a need for Oloris to come together for the emancipation of women from poverty and how to develop their community.
“Women are the engine room of the home and national development. Women are the custodians of national development and the power of women is significant to nation building.”
She said women have made impact in humanity and are custodians of culture and heritage, describing the role of women in society as monumental and unprecedented.
Olori Ogunwusi stressed that she had empowered thousands of women through her cultural and fashion organisations, urging Oloris to come together to uplift women out of poverty.
“We are going to be assistant keepers, putting things together to uplift the poor and sharing ideas together to assist women. I am going to set up Moremi Microfinance Bank to give money to women as soft loans to start their business.”
The wife of the Osun State Governor, Erelu Ngozi Adeleke enjoined women to be courageous and take their place in national development, adding that her office is open to all women with a view to give to the needy in society.
“We need to go back to our communities to organise children, youths, women and carry them along on whatever we can do to help them out of poverty. I have encouraged the Oloris to go ahead to help their people because things are hard presently.
“They need to give to people no matter how little it is. We are going to collaborate to touch lives of the poor in our society,” she said.
“By the time that our government is fully grounded and I start my NGO, I’ll ensure that I collaborate with all Oloris to empower their people in their different domains.
“If we give them bags of rice, it will finished, but we will try all our best to ensure that they will be putting food on their table themselves, this would eradicate poverty among all and sundry.”
Similarly, Wife of Alapomu of Apomu, Queen Janet Afolabi, said the role of women in society is unquantifiable, likening it to Moremi, a courageous Queen who protected Ile-Ife against external aggressors.
She noted that Oloris are supporters and better hands of Kings in community development, stressing the need to identify community problems especially girl child education in their domains.
Queen Janet urged Oloris to do problem analysis of a community and devise strategies to solve women’s challenges in their domains, focusing on the need to emancipate women from mental and health decadence facing women in society.
