Developing the Tourist Potential of Benin-City, Part 4: David Ebengho's Shrine

[Oluwatoyin Adepoju]

Developing the Tourist Potential of Benin-City, Part 4: David Ebengho's Shrine 

Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju 

A world class artistic installation at 2nd Cemetery Road, Benin Ciy.

Integrating at least 50 years of ritual artistic practice, David Ebengho's shrine, in his 80s, testifies to his journey across the priesthoods  of various deities, from Orunmila to Sango, Ogun to Ayelala,  Eshu to Olokun, Mammy Water priesthood to Ifa babalawo, adept in the esoteric knowledge of Ifa, a scope dramatized in terms of the visual splendour of his shrine, it's variegated celebrations of diverse  deities through distinctive instruments achieving a unity that is both harmonious in it's multiplicity as  awesome in the atmosphere generated by this magnificent assemblage.

The glorious churches of Cambridge, a centre of the Church of England,  which I have seen, built by the topmost masters of Western medieval architecture, are not superior to Ebengho's majestic assemblage on an untarred street, marked by water filled potholes, in Benin City, as it looked when I was there.

The government should tar the road, in promoting the shrine as a destination for spiritual and artistic tourism and pilgrimage. 

Image shows David Ebengho and pictures of various sections of his shrine.