The distinguished Ooni of Ife, Ooni Adeyeye Enitan Ogunwusi, despite the high rate of civilization still gets a human alarm clock to wake him up daily.
Omisore Lateef Oyewale Oderinde , a palace staff has the privilege of always being the first and the last person that sees the Ooni of Ife after his wife.
Omisore is always adorned in ‘gberi ode’ (Yoruba traditional hunter’s dress) with a tiger skin as apron which traditional serves as bullet proof,
Omisore goes to wake the Ooni up between 7.30 am and 8.30 am daily. He also announces the monarch’s arrival at any event he attends chanting his oriki (eulogy) using ijala ode (Yoruba hunter’s chant) style. In his eulogy of Ooni, he praises the king as the husband of Otiti, the Olori.
According to reports, traditionally, this is how a typical Yoruba king should be woken up and praised at intervals but with civilization many kings have done away with this aspect of the culture.
Ooni Adeyeye Enitan Ogunwusi going by the fact that he is a first class Yoruba king, a custodian of the Yoruba culture and tradition has continue to show through his lifestyle despite being young, well educated and well traveled that he is out to bring back the lost glory of the Yoruba culture and keep the culture alive.
See his photos below…