The 2025 World Sango Festival is scheduled for August 7 to 16 in Oyo, Culture Ambassador of the festival, Dr Paula Gomes, in an interview with TheTabloid.net, offers an insight into what to expect. Excerpts
How prepared are you for the festival?
We are set
How set is the Alaafin too?
The Alaafin is set as well.
How are you readjusting to the new Alaafin?
We are understanding ourselves without any problem; all is going smoothly. The new Alaafin loves culture and wishes to continue to preserve and promote the heritage; so, we are together on the same page.
What is the connection between the festival and the Alaafin?
The World Sango Festival is deeply linked with the throne of the Alaafin and to the survival of the people’s identity. It remains a socio-cultural mechanism of utmost importance for the unity, mass participation, sense of belonging and the common identity of the Yoruba land as a whole. The unity and participation of the community in the festival through exhibition and production of indigenous products, special attires, chanting, drumming and Sango dance repertoire of all keeps the spirit of the festival alive.
What is the significance of it?
The festival encourages and restores pride in the community through identifying, protecting, promoting and revitalizing the heritage, as well transmitting on the knowledge from generation to generation, through demonstrating their outstanding value as human creative genius, giving evidence of their roots in the cultural tradition or cultural history of the community and being a means of affirming the cultural identity.
What’s the duration?
Every August, it’s a 10-day event of intensive traditional practices accommodating many cultural features and it is during the period that the bond between the Alaafin and Sango is renewed. The collective memory of the Yoruba people remains alive and have the strong connection to their ancestors. Oyo community considers worthy to reconnect to their ancestor Sango, being a way of remembrance, celebrating and mediating between humankind and their ancestry.
What are the main features of the festival?
The festival is always a variety of culture; every year we introduce elements part of the Yoruba heritage. This year, we have the new Alaafin. So, it is going to be great.
Published on August 2, 2025
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