Celebrating culture: The 2013 Asogli Yam Festival
It was virtually a clash of products and service banners in Ho on Saturday, as chiefs and people of Asogli, countless other chiefs and revelers gathered to crown their 2013 Yam Festival, with a mammoth durbar.
The celebration also marked the 10th Anniversary of the installation of Togbe Afede XIV as the Agbogbome Fia of the Asogli State, comprising four traditional setups, Akoefe, Ho, Kpenoe and Takla.
The flapping business insignias, those of mobile telecommunication firms and liquor producers being most prominent, pitched business against what was a cultural fiesta.
However the staffs, umbrellas, regalia and the various designs of kente cloths of chiefs as they entered the durbar grounds, accompanied by tattooed and adorned women amidst drumming and dancing, imprinted the cultural authority on the event.
Yam festivals are common occasions among northern Ewes, including the Asoglis, to celebrate the harvest and pay homage to farmers.
In the past 10 years however, Togbe Afede, a Business Executive, regarded as a chief, cut out from the others, for his strong push for development and good governance, raised the festival platform to different heights.
The Asogli Yam Festival now reflects Togbe Afede’s local and international friendship and cooperation overtures, attracting attention across the sub-region and internationally.
Typical of his overtures, which cut across cultures, is the formal re-establishment of ties between Ewes of Ghana and those in Notsie in Togo, where Ewes in Ghana were said to have migrated from.
The 2013 festival was on the theme “Traditional Leadership and Development Redefined” and had 42 events, spanning a month and half.
Some of the activities are beauty contest, lectures, walkouts, purification rites, agricultural shows and the most popular, hailing of the new yam, which is a street activity of rollicking people.
The combination of colours of canopies, umbrellas and the physical adornments of humans presented an aesthetic atmosphere, at the run-of-the-mill Regional Sports Stadium, venue for the durbar.
In contrast against that splendor, was the rather dull adornment of the podium, draped in peeling national colours.
Togbe Afede paid homage to those, both alive and dead, who took the decision to make him king, pledging never to relent on the path of progress he had been treading.
“I knew that many people desired to be selected by the kingmakers, and were saddened the mantle fell on the unwilling James Akpo (currently Togbe Afede).
“I acknowledge them and thank them because their interest underscored the importance of the great Asogli Paramount Stool.
“I invite them to come along so we can make the Stool even greater.
“All citizens have a role to play in the unfolding history of Ho Asogli,” the venerated chief stated.
Togbe Afede said he had experienced poverty, “when my fees were always in arrears and often sacked from the classroom and from the dining hall”.
He said God had made him to survive, gave him “ambition and passion for development and strong desire to make things happen”.
President John Dramani Mahama, who was Guest of Honour, said chieftaincy was no longer pomp, pageantry and opulence but intrinsically linked with development.
“You are a symbol of that development,” he stated, referring to Togbe Afede.
The President spoke at length about development projects in the pipe line for the Volta Region, stressing that, the region would get its fair share of development.
There were fraternal greetings from President Faure Gnassingbe, President of Togo, Togbe Agorkorli IV, chief of the Ewes in Togo, who led a 100-member delegation from that country and a representative of the Asantehene.
There was noticeable presence of Chinese at the grounds, reflecting the developing business ties between Togbe Afede, as a Business Executive and China.
The Volta Region also has a development pact with China’s Ningxia Autonomous Province.
As the durbar ended, the skies darkened and rain poured down for about 45 minutes pushing the celebration, with loud music and choked drinking bars deeper into the night.
All hotels and accommodation outfits in and around Ho was full in the days to the durbar and passenger traffic to Ho also fluid.
Source: GNA