- AFTER SYMBOLIC VISIT TO THE ANCESTRAL FOREST
By Alvin Nii Okine Kasabrofo.
The people of Prampram are gearing up for the celebration of this year’s Lalue Kpledomi festival, with the first taking place on the 23 of April. According to an elaborate program released by the Prampram Traditional Council, a curfew will immediately follow right after the first celebration has ended. The second and third will also follow the next Tuesday after each other. The festival is a veneration of the ancestral deity, Lalue, and the first is held to honor her memory.
The final celebration is often taken into the lower side of Prampram, where the “Kplemi” or drum is lowered into the sea. Prior to that, an appropriate customary rite will be performed by the Chief Priest of the Traditional Area, Nii Ayertey Charway Labia. As part of an elaborate spiritual rites towards the festival, a symbolic visit to the ancestral forest was performed near the forecourt of the Prampram District Assembly.
The all white spiritual cermoney which was attended by members of the Prampram Traditional Council lead by its President and the Paramount Chief Nene Tetteh Wakah III, was used to ask for blessings for the people of Prampram and environs. For the first time the event was carried live on PramcitiTV, a social media news outlet based in the town, and streamed around the world.
Explaning the rationale behind the event, Nii Ayiku Obleh IV or Numlor Kpanyor, a Counsellor and prominent member from Kley, one of four quarters making up Prampram, said the “Huemiyami” in Dangbe or the visit to the ancestral forest, offers the spiritual heads in the town an opporutnity to come together and seek God’s blessings.
He said spiritual fortification is an integral part of every human being and before the beginning of an important exercise as the Kpledomi, it is important the town goes before the Lalue diety, to seek the blessings of God for the town and its people.
“ We pray for the good of the land; for our fishermen, farmers, teachers, drivers, and any other professional to be flourish in whatever they do,” he said.
“ We also pray for those who are desperately seeking to have children to not only be blessed with them, but have the patience and wisdom to raise the children in the appropriate way,” he asserted.
According to him, what is done during the event is no different from what other religious bodies especially the Christians do in their various places of worship.
Nii Ayiku Obleh IV also pleaded with natives of the town to actively participate in their festival, since it is a true representation of their own identity.
The colourful ceremony was also witnessed by the traditional queenmother Naa Osabu Abbey I, Asafoatsemeyi and Asafoanyemi, divisional chiefs from the traditional areas and members of the public.
