Osoogun: Village Ajayi Crowther left at 12 as a slave - To which he never returned
Osoogun, a
popular village in Iseyin Local Government area of Oyo State is
synonymous with Bishop Ajayi Crowther, a renowned slave boy turned
clergyman. But in spite of the international status of the Bishop, the
people still live in the stone age with the community lacking basic
amenities of Life.
Olu Osunde and Taiwo Olanrewaju visited the community recently and report.
Mere
mentioning Osoogun, the birth place of a religious legend and the first
Bishop of Anglican Church in Africa, Bishop Samuel Ajayi Crowther could
spark off an adventurous spirit in anyone, any time. The big name
behind this tiny community of about 15,000 people on the northern side
of Ibadan city in Iseyin Local Government council of Oyo State, on the
way out to Badagry and Sokoto, attracts a lot of visitors from different
parts of the world. Unfortunately, although the religious influence of
the legendary Bishop pervades the community as traditional medicine and
divination have no bearing on the people, the entire community with its
adjoining villages are in a sorry state.
Despite
its long period of existence which is put at about 200 years and the
present level of technological development, the inhabitants of Osoogun
are still strapped to the old way of life bereft of an iota of
civilisation. Apart from the change from thatched roofs by most of the
houses which now carry corrugated iron, the community in terms of
facilities is dead. The people who are farmers live in tattered shelters
with the rust corrugated iron roofs also suspended by decaying woods.
Most of the living houses are mud and until recently, the people
depended on a stream for their daily water needs. When Sunday Tribune
visited recently, the journey to the historical community was smooth and
interesting. Apart from stopping at check-points to ask for directions,
there was nothing too unusual about the road.
As
the Sunday Tribune crew chatted in the car, driving on the well-tarred
Badagry-Sokoto expressway with curiosity looking for a tourism sign post
with information about the place, one of the crew members spotted the
name, Bishop Ajayi Crowther, inscripted in blue ink on a mould and
quickly asked that the car be stopped. In obedience, the driver reversed
the vehicle and veered into the untarred road. Behold! That was the
turning to Osoogun. But for the eagle-eye of the reporter, the crew
would have missed its way. It is unthinkable, that there is no sign-post
to herald visitors and tourists to the birthplace of the first African
Bishop, the Late Bishop Samuel Ajayi Crowther. The inscription that our
reporter saw was even the signposts of the primary and secondary schools
in the village. The inscription read thus: Bishop Ajayi Crowther
Memorial High School, Osoogun. Founded: September 1980. Motto:
Aspiration with humility. Donated by: JSS III Students 2003/2004 set.
While on the right was another inscription, written in green ink—Bishop
Ajayi Crowther Memorial School. St. Mary Anglican School, Osoogun. A
block of 3 classrooms constructed by Oyo State Primary Education Board.
The
first information gathered from our host as we alighted from the
vehicle was that on Friday, 31st August, 2007, four white men from the
United States of America, in company with the Bishop of the Ajayi
Crowther Missionary Diocese, Rt. Revd.
O.O.Oduntan, visited the historical village. The august visitors
couldn't have been less disappointed with the rate of development in the
village than the ST crew was. The untarred road to Osoogun is
sandwiched between farmlands while the major means of transportation in
the village is the Okada (motorcycle). Built at the entrance to the
village is the moderately furnished high school while not too far away
from it, on the same left side, is Bishop Ajayi Crowther Memorial
Hospital. The ST gathered that the first two buildings, painted in light
blue colour, were the nursing hostels of the staff who worked at the
hospital when it was commissioned in 1970.
Further
up was the main hospital building, which has five rooms. The staff room
and examination room were locked up while the ward's key was in the key
hole. The ST crew opened the door to discover five ordinary empty iron
beds without matresses. The crew was trying the handle of the door of
the examination room when two men—one elderly and the other middle
aged—jolted them with greetings. Having explained the crew's mission,
the elderly man, who doubles as the hospital's gardener cum security,
said the hospital, built by Christians, was for some time maintained by
the Oyo State government. According to him, the hospital, now abandoned,
used to have a doctor and eight nurses plus a giant generator, adding
that the hospital's matresses and other equipment were locked up for
safe-keeping. He explained that the hospital, which now has no doctor
and nurses, is currently being managed by the Iseyin Local Government,
while the staff comprises a ward maid, a gardener and a head, who is a
professional in community health.
At
the back of the main hospital building is the children's ward and
dispensary, now dilapidated and overgrown with bush. Lending credence to
ST's view, the middle-aged man, said that the hospital, which used to
be the glory of Osoogun, providing medical services for her people and
those in the neighbouring villages, is now a shadow of itself. He said
that the people of Osoogun now seek medical services at a private
hospital in far away Eruwa, about 25 kilometers to the community, where
they pay through their noses. "Yesterday, I took a woman to Eruwa for
child delivery. She gave birth to female twins and paid N6,500," added
the Okada rider. The elderly man, who said he had been working in the
hospital since 1976, said the other members of staff were not around
because of the on-going strike in the state. On source of water, the
hospital relies solely on rain water which is stored in a reservoir.
While another reservoir, built during the late Chief Bola Ige's
administration, is used to store well water brought by tankers from
Eruwa or by cyclists from neighbouring villages.
The
well, also dug behind the main hospital building is not functional
because rather than get to water during the digging process, a substance
like chalk, powdery form surfaced and the substance is said to be in
abundance in Kainkain, a neighbouring village. A pointer to the fact
that a deposit, which could be useful, is in Osoogun. At the first
Anglican Church built in 1912, the vicar-in-charge, Revd. Emmanuel A.
Ajulo, explaining the pain of having a dead medical centre said, there
was a time a man died of a snake bite before he could be rushed to Eruwa
for treatment. According to the Basorun of Osoogun, Chief Bola Bambi,
some foreigners who visited the village while the hospital was still
under construction, doled out £50,000 with which the hospital was
completed. Chief Bambi also attested to the fact that the hospital was
well equipped on completion, saying that it had two ambulances, donated
to it by the missionaries and the Oyo State government. The ambulances,
he said had since been withdrawn by the state government.
He
also added that the giant generator, which is presently non-functional,
only needs servicing and replacement of its heavy battery. Today,
though one could access information on Osoogun on the internet through
the efforts of its Bishop, Rt. Revd. Oduntan, it is however pitiable
that the town is in total darkness as it lacks electricity. Although
there are electricity poles erected in some places in the village, the
termination of the administration of Governor Lam Adesina, who the
villagers said, made effort to ensure the supply of electricity to the
community killed the project. Basorun Bambi recollected that the
committee set up to look into the electrification of the village went to
Ibadan during the regime of Governor Rasheed Ladoja to see the
transformer meant for the village and in the process also met with the
contractor assigned to handle the project, who promised to complete it
by December 2006.
Again,
the committee was said to have met with Governor Alao-Akala and the
contractor assigned to the project, adding that Chief Lamidi Adedibu and
Governor Akala, visited Osoogun during the last election campaign with a
promise to look into the problems of the villagers. Also were it not
for the magnanimity of the late Dr. Simi Johnson, a grandson of Bishop
Crowther, who provided a borehole facility, one of our hosts said, the
community of over 10,000 people would have still been depending on well
or stream water or both for their day to day activities. Chief Bambi who
took the Sunday Tribune crew round Osoogun community said the second
borehole, sunk for them by the DFFRI, was faulty, while he explained
that the functional borehole was initially powered by solar energy
before the local government got it repaired and changed it to manual. He
also informed the crew on what prompted the DFFRI boss to donate a
borehole to the community. The Senior Chief said when the market, which
now holds at Maya village, used to hold at Osoogun, the DFFRI boss had a
stopover on a market day and he, Chief Bambi entertained him. The DFFRI
boss then, perhaps as a result of the hospitality, asked if there was a
borehole facility in the village, to which the Basorun replied in the
negative. The DFFRI boss then promised that the following Monday, a
borehole would be sunk in the village. That was how the community got
the borehole which is now faulty.
Chief
Bambi said but for the community's bad and untarred road, the market,
which holds every five days and boasts of traders from all over the
nation, would still be holding in Osoogun. Going down memory lane, Chief
Bola Bambi said it was Papa Alabi Olakoilo, who reestablished Osoogun
village on 16th January, 1912 with the permission of the Alaafin of Oyo.
That was after the war in which Bishop Ajayi Crowther was captured as a
slave. Osoogun, the historical community, which is four miles in
circumference is 45 kilometres to Iseyin, the seat of the Anglican
Diocese and the local government headquarters. It is bordered by about
70 other villages like Igbo-Ilasa, Araromi, Akinlabi, Onikainkain,
Akipopo, Adegbola and Moyaoke among others. The major occupation of
Osoogun male indigenes is farming. They deal in produce like cocoa,
cassava, oranges, pepper, yam and tomatoes. The women, however, delight
in making garri and also breed sheep and goats.
There
is no gainsaying that Bishop Crowther's values are firmly entrenched in
Osoogun as the village boasts of only two religions—Christianity and
Islam, with the former in the larger percentage. The Christian
denomination in the village include the Anglican Church, Christ
Apostolic Church, Cherubim and Seraphim Church and the Gospel Church.
Although it has no central palace, the community has a king, who rules
from his personal building. The king, Chief M. Oyebamiji Olalere, the
Olosoogun of Osoogun, was installed on 13th September, 2003. Chief
Olalere, who said he was working in Lagos before he was brought home to
be made king, appealed to the government to provide all necessary
facilities in Osoogun, in order to enable investors site their companies
in the village. "Immediately after their secondary education, our
children leave the village for Ibadan and Lagos but if there is a higher
institution here and a company where they can work, they will stay
around and contribute to the development of their birthplace," the
monarch stated.
He
also used the opportunity to appeal to the Anglican Communion, which he
commended so much for its interest in the development of Osoogun, to
site satellite campus of the Bishop Ajayi Crowther University in
Osoogun. "We have accommodation for the students and we also have
spacious land," the king added. To the Oyo State government, the monarch
appealed that a new local government be carved out of the present
Iseyin local government, to comprise Ado-Awaye and her 40 neighbouring
villages and Osoogun and her 70 neighbouring villages, with Osoogun as
the headquarters of the local government.
While
proposing Bishop Ajayi Crowther Local Government as the name of the
council, the monarch posited that that gesture would help to hasten the
development of the village. Corroborating the king, Basorun Bambi said,
it was a pity that the Western people of the country do not honour
Crowther as the Easterners. "Well, a king is without honour in his
hometown," he added. "If you go to Onitsha and Lokoja, you will see the
big Cathedral named after him with his photographs placed there, while
another Anglican Theological College is named after him at Lokoja," he
said. While moving round the village, Chief Bambi pointed out to the
crew the first house built with corrugated iron sheet in 1959; the spot
on which the first house in the village, which has since been
demolished, was also built.
Another
important place was the Pastor Samuel Ajayi Crowther Memorial Tourist
Centre, Osoogun. There one unexpetedly need to squint his or her eyes to
be able to read the sign post which inscriptions have faded out. The
spot contained the house Crowther lived with his siblings and parents
before he was captured and sold to slavery. Sunday Tribune crew was also
shown the giant Ose tree, to which Crowther was tied after he was
captured. If Osoogun is developed to a standard tourist centre with all
enabling facilities, Sunday Tribune crew noted that the lives of the
people and the purse of the government would be the better for it. And
if not that the crew went on the journey in a car, it would have had to
sleep at Osoogun till
8.a.m the following morning when the vehicle which plies Ibadan to the
village gets there.
Sunday Tribune gathered that on a daily basis, the vehicle leaves Oritamerin in Ibadan at 6
a.m and gets to Osoogun at 8 a.m
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Bishop ajayi Crowther
12-year-old
Ajayi was captured in the same war in which his father, was captured
and nothing has been heard about his father since then. At Badagry,
where the slaves were taken enroute their destination, the elderly man
looking after them was said to have been favourably disposed to Ajayi.
He sent him on errands and had wanted to keep him in Badagry but for the
sudden arrival of the Portuguese slave traders.
BISHOP
Samuel Adjai (Ajayi) Crowther (C. 1809 - December 31, 1891) was a
linguist and the first African Anglican Bishop in Nigeria. Born in
Osoogun, Yorubaland, in today's Iseyin Local Government, Oyo State,
Nigeria, Rev, Dr. Samuel Ajayi Crowther was a member of the Yoruba
ethnic group but was also a Sierra Leone Liberated African.
Ajayi
was captured by Fulani slave raiders in 1821 and sold to Portuguese
slave traders. Before leaving port, his ship was borded by the British
Navy, and Crowther was taken to Freetown, Sierra Leone and released.
While there, Crowther was cared for by the Anglican Church Missionary
Society, who taught him English.
He
converted to Christianity, was baptized by Rev. John Raban, and took
the name Samuel Crowther in 1825 after his master. While in Freetown,
Crowther became interested in languages. In 1826 he was taken to England
to attend Islington Parish School. He returned to Freetown in 1827 and
attended the newly opened Fourah Bay College, an Anglican missionary
school, where his interest in language found him studying Latin and
Greek but also Temne.
After
completing his studies he began teaching at the school. He also married
Asano Susan, a school mistress, who was also on the Portuguese slave
ship that originally brought Crowther to Sierra Leone and the union was
blessed with three children, two females and male.
In
1841, Crowther was selected to accompany the missionary J.J. Schon, on
an expedition along the Niger River. Together with Schon, he was
expected to learn Hausa for use on the expedition. The goal of the
expedition was to spread commerce, teach agricultural techniques, spread
Christianity, and help end the slave trade. Following the expedition,
Crowther was recalled to England, where he was trained as a minister and
ordained by the Bishop of London.
Rev.
Dr. Crowther began translating the Bible into the Yoruba language and
compiling a Yoruba dictionary. In 1843, a grammar book which he started
working on during the Niger expedition was published, and a Yoruba
version of the Anglican Book of Common Prayer followed later. H also
began codifying other language. Following the British Niger Expeditions
of 1854 and 1857, Crowther produced a primer for the Igbo language in
1857, another for the Nupe language in 1860, and a full grammar and
vocabulary of Nupe in 1864. In 1864, Crowther was ordained as the first
African Bishop of the Anglican Church.
That
same year he also received a Doctor of Divinity from Oxford University,
Bishop Dr. Crowther's attention was directed more and more to languages
other than Yoruba, but he continued to supervise the translation of the
Yoruba Bible (Bibeli Mimo), which was completed in the mid 1880's, a
few year before he death in 1891, Crowther suffered a stroke and died
the last day of that year.
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