Oba Adeyeye Ogunwusi, the Ooni of Ife, said that the people of South-West Nigeria, are ‘Ara Ife’ and not Yoruba, as they are called.
On Saturday, in his Ile Oodua Palace, Oba Ogunwusi spoke to welcome the natives of Otun-Ekiti and the descendants of Olofin Ogunfunminire, who had come to Ile-Ife to reunite with their roots.
The royal father, who noted that Ife had its origins in all towns and settlements across Yorubaland, further clarified that a study had revealed that the Yoruba people of South-West Nigeria were around 120,000 years old with the oldest DNA.
Joseph Adewole, Akeran Onimoba of Moba in Lagos State, Oba Razak Adisa, Alagbado of Agbado, Ogun State, Oba Adeayo Syllon and Aare OnaKakanfo of Yorubaland, Iba Gani Adams, Oba Ogunwusi, announced at the event attended by Ajero of Ijero-Ekiti, Oba, that the name Yoruba could not be contained in Ifa corpus.
On Sunday, Moses Olafare, Director, Media and Publicity Directorate, Ooni’s Palace, quoted Ooni as saying:
“There is nothing like Yoruba in Ifa corpus, it is like an alias given to us. We are all from Ile-Ife, we are Ara Ife.
“Scientifically, it has been proven that only the Yoruba that have the ghost DNA which gave the emergence to the likes of the sickle cell. Over 90 per cent of sickle cell history and genealogy is within us and our forbearance call them Abiku; the spirit and reincarnation of ghost spirit. You can hardly find that in the world.
“At some point, we once lived together as one big happy family and the likes of Oore of Otun played a pivotal role as the spokesperson of Oduduwa, our progenitor, the thinking and think-tank. We started the Parliamentary system.