The Ile Isokan Or­isha Shrine of Febeau Vil­lage, San Juan, brought its 20th An­nu­al Ogun Fes­ti­val to a vi­brant close on Oc­to­ber 12 at City Hall, Port-of-Spain, cul­mi­nat­ing in a grand pro­ces­sion through Wood­ford Square.

Ile Isokan—the re-es­tab­lished fam­i­ly shrine of the Os­ouna fam­i­ly (The Dol­lies)—was orig­i­nal­ly found­ed around 1945 by Hi­lary Kat­grant George. In 2004, Lester Os­ouna, great-nephew of Hi­lary, re­vived the space known his­tor­i­cal­ly as Shango Yard af­ter sev­er­al years of dor­man­cy.

The name Ile Isokan means “House of Uni­ty.” Now cel­e­brat­ing over two decades of con­tin­u­ous spir­i­tu­al ser­vice, the shrine con­tin­ues to up­hold and share the prac­tice of African spir­i­tu­al­i­ty un­der the lead­er­ship of Oloye (Chief) Ogun­ri­no­la of Ife, Lester Ogun­bowale Os­ouna.

Ogun, the Imale/Orisa ho­n­oured dur­ing the fes­ti­val, is revered as the de­ity gov­ern­ing met­als and met­al­work, agri­cul­ture, tech­nol­o­gy, and self-de­fence, in­clud­ing mar­tial arts and war­craft.

In 2024, Ile Isokan ex­pand­ed the Ogun Fes­ti­val in­to a na­tion­al cel­e­bra­tion, host­ing part of the event in To­ba­go in part­ner­ship with the Ogun­da Atorise Ifa Tem­ple. The 2025 edi­tion once again demon­strat­ed uni­ty and col­lab­o­ra­tion with­in the Orisa com­mu­ni­ty, fea­tur­ing par­tic­i­pa­tion from a wide range of or­ga­ni­za­tions, in­clud­ing:

• ↓The Ifa/Orisa Coun­cil of Trinidad and To­ba­go (IOCTT)

• ↓Egbe On­isin Ele­du­mare

• ↓The Idake­da Group

• ↓Ile Ijosin Otu­ra Meji Awon Os­un

• ↓Agun­da Atorise Ifa Tem­ple

• ↓The Eman­ci­pa­tion Sup­port Com­mit­tee

• ↓Ise ti Yeye Olo­gun Waa Se

• ↓Ile Iju­ba Gbog­bo Orisa Mi­mo Ofun Osa

• ↓SADU Mu­si­cal Acad­e­my

• ↓Afri­ka House

• ↓Ma­mi Ase Ile Ife Oro­mule

• ↓Ita Oosa Ig­bo Ita­pa

The fi­nal day of the Trinidad leg fea­tured ac­tiv­i­ties at both City Hall and Wood­ford Square.

Wood­ford Square was trans­formed in­to a live­ly African mar­ket­place, of­fer­ing tra­di­tion­al cui­sine, cloth­ing, art, and craft. Vis­i­tors al­so viewed two cul­tur­al ex­hi­bi­tions—the Dr. An­tho­ny Williams Mem­o­ra­bil­ia Ex­hi­bi­tion, ho­n­our­ing the for­mer cap­tain of Pan Am North Stars, and the Rudolph Charles In­no­va­tion Lega­cy Ex­hi­bi­tion, cel­e­brat­ing the leg­endary Des­per­a­does cap­tain.

At City Hall, the spir­i­tu­al ser­vice (Iwure) was led by Oloye Ogun­ri­no­la of Ife, Lester Ogun­bowale Os­ouna, with the li­ba­tion cer­e­mo­ny fol­lowed by a litany per­formed by Alatunse Ogun Olakela Mas­se­tun­gi. The fea­ture pre­sen­ta­tion, ti­tled “Pan is Ogun,” was de­liv­ered by Awo Okiki­o­la Michael Coop­er.

The pro­gramme al­so in­clud­ed per­for­mances and pre­sen­ta­tions by Atil­lah Springer, Christo­pher Best, Sheena Aji­bo­la Richard­son, Isa­iah Vil­lafana, and Wayne “Li­on” Os­ouna, and cul­mi­nat­ed in a pow­er­ful fi­nale by the Wasafoli Per­form­ing Com­pa­ny.

The evening con­clud­ed with a spir­it­ed pro­ces­sion from City Hall around Wood­ford Square, led by the Egun­gun (An­ces­tral Mas­quer­ade) of the Oje So­ci­ety for An­ces­tral Ven­er­a­tion, drum­mers from Egbe Omo Is­ese, El­ders of the Orisa com­mu­ni­ty, Pai Atekosang Cristo Ado­nis and his grand­daugh­ter Aliyah Ado­nis of the San­ta Rosa First Peo­ples Com­mu­ni­ty, and a spe­cial pre­sen­ta­tion by The Idake­da Group.