ABEOKUTA – A 35-year-old man, Quadri Soyoye, has disappeared into thin air following plans by his grandmother, Abeke Adunola Soyoye, to induct his wife, Mazeedat as Ogboni worshipper priestess.
Newsjaunts gathered that the father of three who is an ardent Islamic practitioner was born into a family where Ogboni traditional religious belief is firmly established.
Checks by our reporter revealed that Mr. Quadri Soyoye’s grandmother, Madam Abeke Adunola Soyoye who was an ardent Ogboni worshipper must ensure she provided a successor that must succeed her as the priestess of the Ogboni confraternity after her demise.
Crisis started for Mr. Soyoye and his wife, Mazeedat in February, 2022 when his grandmother approached his wife to be her successor as a priestess of Ogboni deity.
The annual Ogboni confraternity celebration is a yearly festival where all sons and daughters and their spouses must return home to pay homage and offer sacrifice to the Ogboni deity as a pledge.
Further checks revealed that the decision of Mrs. Mazeedat to convert Quadri to Islam did not augur well with the grandmother.
A family source disclosed that Mazeedat’s action was viewed as a taboo for the reigning Chief Priestess not to have a successor from her family lineage.
Narrating her daughter’s ordeal in a petition dated to the Ogun State Commissioner of Police, the mother-in-law to Mr. Quadri, Mrs. Adeyemi Olasumbo Adeuke accused three traditional chiefs of the community, the Oluwo Ifa, the Inlado, and the Apena of threatening to hypnotize and attack her daughter and her three kids spiritually if she failed to accept to be initiated into the Ogboni confraternity.
She explained that, on 18th May, 2022, the three chiefs visited her daughter’s husband’s residence at No 35, Moshood Abiola Housing Estate, Obada Oko, Abeokuta with a threat that if his wife did not agree to the priesthood, severe repercussions would strike the family.
She added that, on November 19, 2022, another four unknown hefty men with charms around their necks and wrists attacked her son-in-law’s car wash business centre with a demand to compel his wife’s allegiance to the Ogboni confraternity.
She said, “On this encounter, they approached my son-in-law that they have a message for him from his grandmother, who is the Chief Ogboni Priestess. He asked what was the message, and they told him that his grandmother asked him to compel his wife to come back into the family religion which is the worship of Ogboni deity, or else, they would face serious repercussions. There and then, he told them that he had made up his mind and that he is now a Muslim and his religious conviction is towards the Islamic religion.
“On 19th November, 2022, he was accosted by four hefty men with charms around their necks and wrists. They made incantations and asked him to follow them to the Ogboni worship shrine. He refused and told them that he was now a Muslim and he would not allow his wife to step into a shrine of any deity. There and then, they took some objects in form of whips and used it to strike him several times and asked him to do the needful.
“After beating him and terrorizing him with their charms and harmless, they left.”
Mrs. Adeyemi further stressed that her son-in-law’s situation was compounded when, on March 11, 2023, his car wash centre was burgled and burnt by unknown men suspected to be working for his grandmother.
Similarly, on 8th May, 2023 in a petition addressed to the Commissioner of Police in Ogun State, she said the Ogboni priests brought masquerade into Mr. Quadri Asalatu service and chased the congregation with charms.
She said the case was reported to the community head, Chief Ayotunde Irebami, but nothing positive came out of it.
She explained further that, when she thought everything was over, another attack was launched at his residence where his belongings were destroyed while some were carted away.
Newsjaunts reports that, Mr. Soyoye’s grandmother, who was an Ogboni priest, is dead. She died on June 24, 2023 and his grandson, Quadri, has fled with his wife with three kids to an unknown location for the fear of forcefully initiating his wife into his mother’s position as Ogboni Chief Priestess.
