Emir of Ilorin dragged to court over Isese Festival

 The Emir of Ilorin, Dr Ibrahim Sulu-Gambari, has been sued by a human rights lawyer, Malcolm Omirhobo for stopping traditional religious worshippers from holding their Isese festival in Ilorin, Kwara State.

Omirhobo in the suit filed before the Kwara State High Court, said as an Olokun worshipper, he wants to court to declare that the action of the Emir was an affront to the constitutional rights to “freedom of dignity of the human person, freedom of thought, conscience and religion, freedom of expression, freedom of peaceful assembly.”

It would be recalled that a Muslim group, Majlisu Shabab li Ulamahu Society, in Ilorin, Kwara State, had in July this year gone to the house of a traditional religion priestess to warn her against going ahead with her planned Isese festival in Ilorin.

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Priestess Yeye Ajesikemi Olokun Omolara Olatunji, an Osun devotee, had released fliers announcing a three-day traditional event aimed at celebrating certain Yoruba deities to the chagrin of the Muslim group, which described Isese festival as idolatry.

They also premised their stance on the fact that the Emir of Ilorin had made a public declaration against such events.

Omirhobo, in the suit, is asking the court to declare that Ilorin, just like every other part of Nigeria, is a multi-religious and multicultural society/city, and hence, “the respondent has no constitutional powers or authority to ban and/or prohibit Isese festival in Ilorin, Kwara State, which made it impossible for the applicant to commune, felicitate, celebrate, merry, bond and worship with the community of African traditionalist/Olokun worshippers.”

The Lagos based lawyer also wants the court to make an order of “perpetual injunction” restraining the Emir and his agents “from embarrassing, coercing, bullying, harassing, intimidating, tormenting, torturing, dehumanising, debasing, and frustrating the applicant from enjoying his fundamental rights to dignity of his human person, freedom of thought, conscience, and religion, freedom of expression, freedom of peaceful assembly and association and freedom of movement with other Olokun worshippers in Ilorin, Kwara State in private and in public.”