IN both history and essence, Ile-Ife in Osun State holds great importance to the Yoruba as the source of the race.
From Ibadan through Egbaland to Lagos, Oyo, Ekiti, Ondo and even the Benin Republic, there is a general avowal about the preeminence of Ife as the cradle of not just the Yoruba but human civilisation. The town holds the same historical significance for these people who see it as their home.
Significantly, too, Ile-Ife is the home of the popular Obafemi Awolowo University (OAU). However, as prominent as Ife is, it shares the same fate with some other towns in the country in terms of infrastructure, especially, such facilities that could facilitate quality academic and learning. Except for the magnificent and richly stocked libraries located right inside the OAU, Ile-Ife cannot boast of any other educational recreational resource centre where its teeming sons and daughters could broaden their educational horizon. This singular reason of providing a conducive atmosphere for learning, according to Senator Iyiola Omisore, informed the decision to construct a communal library in Ife.
According to him, education remains the bedrock of human development and any investment that would promote and enhance learning should be supported by all right-thinking persons. “I hate to see people suffer as a result of poverty,” he explained.
“I believe that the worst kind of poverty is that of the mind or what you can call poverty of ideas. That is what informed my intervention in the health and education sectors and in the area of youth empowerment. It is for all these reasons I donated the ultramodern library to the National Ife Descendants Students Association (NIDSA)”, he noted, promising to replicate the library project in all part of Osun State and indeed in the remotest corners of Yoruba land.
The library, which was inaugurated on September 7, a day to his 56th birthday as part of the intervention of the Millennium Development Goals intervention, stands on a spacious land on the Ife-Ibadan road, same side with OAU and at an accessible location to the university. But if the outside held any allure, such would be dwarfed by the internal beauty, as well as the lofty goals of the project initiator, one of which is “to build and equip more future Omisores and people who would compete with me in no distant future and even be greater than me.”
The library, equipped with both hard copies of books for students from secondary to tertiary levels as well as an electronic section where about 20 desktop computers were on display and with a promise of internet facility and more books to come, the library offers readers a wide range of experience. “It is ultramodern in every sense of the word and it is a source of great joy to Ife students,” stressed Waheed Omisakin, president of NIDSA.
Omisakin, who noted that there was hardly a working library in Ile-Ife except those inside OAU, described the library as up-to-date with a book section and electronic section, saying students would have access to both textbooks and online materials. Apart from the library, Omisakin also listed many areas Omisore had assisted students and indigenes of Ife.
The presentation of the library, he noted, was a welcome development. He said: “We appreciate Senator Omisore for this great effort. In times past, NIDSA members said they found it difficult to see him but when I came on board, I was determined to meet with him and I found out that he is accessible and approachable as an Ife man. NIDSA is non-partisan, we approach anyone so far he is an Ife person but when we approached Senator Omisore, he received us warmly and even sponsored the moribund quiz competition programme of the association among all secondary schools. He also sponsored our community effort, the Free Summer School in which our members teach all secondary school students during holiday, to the tune of N1 million and donated 10,000 textbooks. So, donating this library was in continuation of the good works he has been doing.”
Dispelling the notion that the library could have been conceptualised as a political bait to lure students and younger generation of Ife indigenes as well as other residents, the NIDSA president, said “Senator Omisore, as we know, is a scholar and he even has a Ph.D; so if he has donated a library, it is for the purpose of building more scholars and developing education. As he said, he did this to build more Omisores in Ife and to raise those who will be greater than him and you cannot do that without sound education. Thank God we have OAU; Oduduwa University and a polytechnic here, by the time this library is opened and fully operational, students from all these schools will come here and it will generate funds for NIDSA.
To Omisakin, things have continued to work well during Omisore’s time and his own era as president while most of the indigenes who said they heard about the library commended Omisore and called on politicians and well-meaning individuals to follow his footsteps in making life easy for the people, pointing to his efforts in the health, road and education sector while in the Senate as a worthy lesson for others.
Also, a 200-level student of Economics at the Oduduwa University, who simply introduced himself as Folake, also said she heard that the library had been inaugurated. She could not conceal her excitement at the prospect of gaining unfettered access to millions of resource books globally as she promised to visit the library with her friends when it becomes fully operational.
For the teeming youths of Ife, the gift of a library could not have come at the right time, especially with the ongoing industrial action of the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU). Now they can boast of a place they can hurry to for mental rejuvenation and wisdom acquisition typical of Ile-Ife,the cradle of the Yoruba and a land built with wisdom and run on wisdom . In essence, all Omisore has done is to ensure that wisdom continues to flow ceaselessly from the fountain of human civilisation.
tribune.com.ng
No comments:
Post a Comment