- He’s an impersonator, Ooni’s palace responds
middle-aged man claiming to be a son of the Ooni of Ife, Oba Enitan Ogunwusi Enitan has gone online to demand that the foremost monarch admit him as his son or risk spilling some secrets.
The man equally threatened the Ooni with a two-month ultimatum within which he should be invited to the palace or he reveals more secrets about the Yoruba king.
“Oba Enitan Ogunwunsi is my father. He hid me with my mother with a clear instruction that I must not reveal myself,” the man said in Yoruba.
Dressed in a white Agbada, a Yoruba flowing robe, the man who did not identify himself via a name narrated that he would have kept quiet but for the silence of the Ooni to identify with him as his prince.
“Anytime I desire to come to the palace, he would stop me that it was not yet time. Now is the time. My mum might not talk, but I will say the truth. The king is my biological father,” the man said in the video.
Talking about his motive for the outing, he said he was not suffering but wanted to be known as the son of the Ooni Ogunwusi.
“Though I’m not suffering; there is a house, cars are there, there is money, but I’m no longer interested in them. I want to be known as the son of the king, Oba Adeyeye Enitan Ogunwusi, Ojaja II,” he added.
However, the Palace of Oduduwa, the seat of the Ooni has faulted the man’s claims and described him as an impersonator.
The spokesman of the Ooni, Moses Olafare, responding to the viral video on Thursday through a statement disclosed that the matter had been reported to security agencies for further action.
Olafare averred that the Oba as a responsible father and custodian of tradition, knows and acknowledges all his children and would stop at nothing to take full responsibility for them.
“He is not a child of Ooni Ogunwusi as fraudulently claimed, but also never related in any way to any lineage of the Ogunwusi royal family and the Giesi Royal Compound of Ile-Ife at large,” Olafare declared in the statement.
He called on the said impersonator to refrain from engaging in or promoting such deceptive practices, while assuring that the House of Oduduwa remains committed to preserving the rich cultural heritage of the Yoruba people and would not tolerate any attempt to undermine or tarnish its legacy through fraudulent means.
