DELSU dons to Christians: Stop demonizing Urhobo culture

WARRI— TWO lecturers at Delta State
University, DELSU, Abraka, Professor
Christopher Orubu and Dr. Emmanuel Biri,
have condemned the demonization of
Urhobo culture under the facade of
Christianity.
Both lecturers, speaking at the first
Ughievwen Cultural Carnival,  staged at
Otughievwen, headquarters of Ughelli South
Local Government Area, said the trend was
robbing Urhobo nation and Ughievwen
Urhobo in particular, economic oppor-
tunities to sell its culture and heritage to the
outside world.
Professor Orubu stated that as a people,
Ughievwen of Urhobo evolved with peculiar
cultural practices and heritage giving its
sons and daughters a self- identity that
cannot be sustained by any borrowed
culture.
He said: ”Our four pivots of chieftaincy,
Adeh, Eboh, Igbun-Otor and Igbun-
Eshovwin, which have been handed down
from generations have exclusive
entertainment carriages in various
festivals, which were the envy of non-
natives, who throng the community from far
and near to share in the fun.
Demonization of culture
“Today, in the name of Christianity, these
attractions are fast fading away. We
demonize our culture on the notion that
they are fetish, but even the Pope has
entered shrines, not of Christians, and
acknowledged the sense of faith in God by
adherents of the deities worshipped in such
shrines.”
In a separate lecture on The Past, Present
and Future of the Ughievwen People , Dr. Biri
of the Department of Mass Communication,
DELSU, said that some of the core cultural
values of Ughievwen Urhobo, being so
demeaned in the land, were being celebrated
with growing global recognition in other
climes.
Biri asserted: “The Epha (celebration of bare
breast maidens), which is Urhobo’s
appreciation of the purity in women, is
gradually going into extinction on the
notion that it is fetish and obscene.
“But in Swaziland, the same heritage has
become an annual tourist attraction visited
by several people from around the world.
“In Ughievwen, ancestral worship has also
been condemned as demonic and fetish
whereas in Japan, the second largest
economy in the world, ancestral veneration
remains a valued culture.
“Japanese, including the most highly
placed, go to venerate the graves of their
dead parents, decorating them with flowers.”
Why we organized carnival
Chief Enyote Gbogbo, who headed the team
of organizers of the event, told Niger Delta
Voice: “The pains expressed by the DELSU
scholars underpin the motivation for
originating the Ughievwen Cultural Carnival.
Gbogbo said: “We noticed Ughievwen will
have no sense of identity as a people if our
cultural values are being rubbished and
discarded, no matter the excuses.
“To revive the dying culture, we have
decided to bring the various cultural
celebrations into one big annual carnival.”