Aregbesola in Austria, wants all Yoruba race integrated worldwide

A call has been made for a concerted effort to bring about the integration of the Yoruba race across the world.
The Governor of Osun State, Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola, made this call at the after event party of the Nigeria Cultural Festival, Adire Carnival organised by the Egbe Omo Oduduwa Austria at the Centimetre Event Hall, Vienna, Austria on Saturday.
Aregbesola warned that in globalising world that is rapidly being overtaken and overwhelmed by Western value system, it becomes imperative to reinvent the Yoruba rich and noble culture.
In a speech entitled: “Yoruba Renaissance in Our Time”, he said this kind of integration would help preserve Yoruba culture and make it a more formidable force in the global scheme of things.
He said before colonialism and its adversity, the Yoruba nation were known to have established thriving urban towns and cities, which are part of the fabrics of eventual social and industrial development.
According to him, colonialism did a lot of damage to Yoruba indigenous effort at development.
He said: “It might interest you to know that the textile industry where Adire came from had been established and thriving and had been exported to Europe as far back as the 18th Century.
“As a catalytic prelude to Yoruba global integration, we have already drawn up a Development Agenda for Western Nigeria, in order to show the depth of our seriousness and commitment to this cause.
“Today, in South-West Nigeria, we have the right conditions in place to replicate and surpass the development feats achieved under Chief Obafemi Awolowo, saying the first and most critical condition, which is a strong political platform, the progressive political party of the Action Congress of Nigeria in transition to All Peoples Congress is already in place in nearly all the South West.”
Aregbesola disclosed that in an attempt to retrace this path of development set by Awolowo, infrastructural facilities such as road, education, agriculture, tourism and the environment are among some of the vital areas that are being given quality attention.
He noted that in his own domain, the Osun State Government has introduced education, free school uniforms and free meals in public schools, adding that his government is building new model school, which compare with any of their kind anywhere in the world.
Aregbesola stated that the e-learning tablet, Opon-Imo, that his government introduced to senior secondary schools, is the first-of-its-kind in the world.
Describing the Opon-Imo as a standalone learning tablet for self-paced study, he said the device provides three major contents of e-library, virtual classroom, and an integrated test zone.
He continued: “The virtual classroom category contains 63 e-books covering 17 academic subjects for examinations conducted by WAEC and JAMB, as well as non-academic life-enriching subjects such as History of The Yoruba, Sexuality Education, Civic Education, Ifa on ethics and morals, enterprise education, hints and tips on passing SSCE and ‘How to Live a Healthy and Happy Life.’
“In Opon-Imo, there are some 40,000 JAMB and WAEC practice questions and answers dating back to about 20 years. It also contains mock tests in more than 51 subject areas, which approximates to 1,220 chapters, with roughly 29,000 questions referencing about 825 images.
“In Osun, where I preside, the story is that of accomplishments that are unequalled since the creation of the state. In less than 100 days in office, we employed 20,000 youths under the Osun
“Youth Empowerment Scheme, for public works. Two years later, we gave them soft landing they were eased into other permanent jobs and employed another 20,000.
“Osun now has the least unemployment figure in the country. In two and a half years of purposeful governance, we are applying a touch of revolution to the vital sectors of the state’s social and economic development.”