Oke-Onigbin is a community in Isin Local Government Area, Kwara State, North Central Nigeria, and is mostly inhabited by the Igbomina people.

Understand

History

The founder of modern Oke-Onigbin, Baba Akoo, was, according to oral history, said to have migrated from another Igbomina settlement known as Ikosin. This was because of a misunderstanding about who would become the next king of the town. Baba Akoo wanted to avoid an intertribal war and so migrated to settle in what was then known as Oke Igbo with his wife. He then erected a staff in front of his house, on which he typically hung his hunting pack. After moving in, Akoo's wife asked him who would be their mediator in the event of any misunderstanding between the two of them as no third party was available. He said to his wife that if she could make it to the staff erected during a quarrel, he would no longer touch her. The staff is now referred to as "Igi Dudu," and is the origin of the common phrase "Igi Dudu Keta Opo," which means "Igi Dudu makes up the third person," referring to the staff's role as the third party in the event of an argument between Akoo and his wife. After many years of living together, they were joined by one of the in-laws from Ora, who was the Aros in Aro's compound.

The town was reportedly renamed as "Oke Onigbin" by the Alaafin of Oyo in an era during which the town paid homage to the ruler with a basket full of snails in the dry season. The town is believed to have been named because of its abundance of snails. Thus "oke" in the Yoruba language refers to a hill or upland, while "oni" signifies possession and "igbin" means snail(s). And during the reign of Aniyaloye, the king's title changed from "Bara" to "Onigbin."

Connect

All major mobile phone service networks are available in Oke Onigbin but with varying degree of reliability and usability. Since it is a relatively small town, it is customary to experience network outage for all or some of the mobile phone service providers. Such situation is particularly prevalent in some remote areas of the town. And it is also common for different networks to be more stable and reliable in different locations of the town at different times.

It is preferable if you are planning a visit to this town to have multiple SIM cards that cut across all the mobile service providers as you can't tell which will be more stable and reliable at a time in your location during your visit. And if you will risk not having any of them, you might be better off not risking the MTN network, because,from indications, it seems to perform well than the others, though their rates may be high and their offers and services might be stringent, but you might be more assured of seamless voice and data connection. The various broadband cellular network available include 2G and 3G. 4G networks is almost unavailable.

Glo (Globacom) boasts of fast network speed for internet browsing activities, but that might only be enjoyable in limited locations. 9mobile also performs well in internet browsing speed but not without locational limitations as well. As for Airtel, it is fairly satisfactory for all you might need to connect to the world, including rates and network stability.

Go next

• Omu-Aran, about 18 min southeast of Oke Onigbin
• Òró, about 17 min drive west of Oke Onigbin
• Esie, about 22 min west of Oke Onigbin