Awujale race: KWAM1 not from our lineage – Ruling house

The Fusengbuwa ruling house of Ijebu Ode has disowned popular Fuji musician, Wasiu Ayinde Marshall, saying he is not a member of the family and therefore not qualified to contest for the vacant Awujale stool.

The family also fixed December 15 for the nomination of contestants seeking to succeed the late Awujale, Oba Sikiru Adetona, whose 65-year reign ended with his death in July.

The nominees are to be forwarded to the kingmakers, who have seven days to select the next monarch.

Spokesperson for the Fusengbuwa Nomination Committee, Abiodun Ogidan, told journalists during a briefing at Ile Nla on Thursday that the musician’s claim of belonging to the ruling house was false.

Ogidan said, “We just rose from the family meeting where all the Olori Ebi, the family heads of the Jadiara and Fusengbuwa families.

“And it has been confirmed by our family that from all that he (Wasiu Ayinde) has written in the family lineage data form given to him, that he is definitely not one of us in the Fusengbuwa ruling house.

“And let it be noted that Awujale nomination forms were not given to him; the Awujale form had closed by the time he began to claim that he’s from the Fusengbuwa family.

“How can someone who has never been part of our family meetings or supported the family in any way now suddenly wake up at the height of the glory of our family and begin to say what never happened?

“Wasiu Ayinde is only trying to rewrite history, but this is 2025; he can’t pull the wool over our eyes. He is not part of us, and people with fake lineage won’t be part of what we are doing here.”

Earlier, the family meeting, was chaired by Otunba Abdulateef Owoyemi and attended by his deputy, Otunba Adedokun Ajidagba; Prof. Fassy Yusuf; and Prof. Lasun Gbadamosi, among others.

A second family—the Oduneye family of Ijebu Ode—also rejected the musician’s claim, insisting he could not have come from the Jadiara royal house, which forms part of the Fusengbuwa ruling structure.

Speaking on behalf of the Oduneye family at Ile Nla, the family house of the Fusengbuwa ruling house in Ijebu Ode, Alhaja Adesumbo Oduneye said the family was shocked to see that the lineage form submitted by Ayinde was signed by her half-brother, Adetayo Oduneye, whom she described as “neither family head nor authorised representative.”

She said, “We are all shocked when the Fusengbuwa ruling house lineage data form signed by Adetayo Oduneye Eruobodo was sent to us, yes, he is one of us, one of the children of our late father, Adebanjo Tijani Oduneye but he is never the head of the Oduneye family.

“We don’t even know anything about Setejoye that he is talking about; he is spreading falsehood because Alhaji Wasiu Ayinde is never a member of the Oduneye or Jadiara royal family.

“Wasiu Ayinde doesn’t, by any means or chance, have anything doing or connected to Jadiara ruling. Irrespective of whatever Adetayo Oduneye is saying, he is on his own; the family members of Oduneye’s home and abroad sent me here to tell the whole world that Alhaji Wasiu Ayinde Marshall is not one of us and not from Jadiara.

“No one knows anything about what Adetayo Oduneye is doing; he is only hellbent on distorting facts, and the family has said that such shenanigans will not be allowed to stand.”

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The lineage form submitted by the musician last week was reportedly signed by Adetayo Oduneye, who claimed to be the leader of the Setejoye unit of the Jadiara ruling house.

Ayinde last week publicly declared his intention to succeed the late Awujale, insisting that he hails from the Jadiara ruling house, a sub-unit of the Fusengbuwa family whose turn it is to produce the next king.