University of Ibadan (UI) Vice-Chancellor, Prof. Isaac Folorunso Adewole has described Yoruba language as one of the best in the world, urging its users to maintain its sustainability and be proud of it as one’s language is one’s identity.


Speaking while receiving officers of American Councils for International Education , led by Dr. Victor Frank and Ashforld Njogu who were in UI for the assessment of Yoruba Language Flagship Programme, Prof. Adewole noted
that the American government had challenged the users of Yoruba language
by sending four of its citizens to Nigeria to learn the language.

Four
American students have, under the Yoruba Language Flagship programme,
been residing in UI for a couple of months with a view to acculturating
into Yoruba language through which they now communicate fairly well
in the second language.

Prof.
Adewole disclosed that he was shocked by the level of fluency with which
the foreign students interact, saying “even some of us who were born
into the language could hardly make a sentence without interspersing
it with English language”

He
therefore urged parents to encourage their children to be proficient
in the use of their first language, pointing out that one’s language
is one’s identity.

Similarly,
the VC who praised the Americans for visiting Nigeria appealed to foreign
nationals to feel free to visit Nigeria, saying the country is safe, contrary to some negative reports in some quarters.

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