In his Death and The king's Horseman,renowned playwright Wole Soyinka keenly observes the profound disdain shown by the colonial authority for an ancient custom of the Yorubas . This is clearly captured when it becomes news in the play that the Elesin Oba( the king's horseman)will be buried alive,as traditional antecedents demand,following the king's demise. Does that sound strange and nonsensical to us? If it doesn't,certainly it does to the English officer Mr. Pilkings,who makes a resolve to prevent the proposed requiem from taking place. The playwright carefully constructs our understanding of the African colonial experience on the fact that various practices were and are still regarded as repugnant and uncivilized by the colonial masters whose judgments should not only be treated as Eurocentric but be critically and reasonably examined. We may begin by increasing our awareness that there has always been a tendency to measure the validity of the foreign culture by the outright rejection of the African cultural practices.

However,with the ever increasing cultural decline that we now experience,we may be compelled to say that this century may no longer accommodate many of its cultural practices. Is that really a disturbing prediction?Besides,as long as there are those who believe that the utter disregard for and abandonment of the African culture is a sign of grim portent,there are also those who can go as far as to say that barbarity is the major characteristic of most African practices. And the implication of this is that there has always been a confrontational argument,on both sides, as to how reasonable it is to discard cultural practices on the basis of repugnant. Drawing from the above, can we therefore begin our intellectual discussion: Discarding cultural practices on the basis of repugnace : how reasonable?

Being the Chairman's opening remarks at the Creative Writers' Club Weekly Workshop(Ahmadu Bello University,Kongo Campus)