By Michael Kofi Kenetey
All is set for the chiefs and people of the Manya Krobo traditional area to celebrate this year’s Ngmayem festival.
The festival, which will commence on Saturday, October 21, and end on Sunday, October 29, 2023, has the theme “Development in Unity: Reviving Patriotism through Unification”.
Activities lined up for the celebration include a health walk and screening, traditional supplication, cooking competition, ideal woman’s day, Krobo dance parade, educational forum for Senior High Schools in Manya Krobo, pilgrimage to the royal mausoleum called Akleme Yami, and also pilgrimage to the ancestral home called Klowem Yami, among others.
The grand durbar of the festival comes off on Friday, October 27, 2023, with the showing of the documentary on the silver jubilee celebration of the enstoolment of Nene Sakite as the Konor of Manya Krobo Traditional Area.
In an interview with GBC Sunrise FM, the Treasurer of the 2023 Ngmayem Festival Planning Committee, a retired Educationist, Dr. Harriet Narkie Amui, noted that the committee has realised that the enthusiasm and participation for the celebration of the festival have gone down for the past few years, hence the choice of the theme to help bring all the people in the area on board to revive the festival and help promote the development of the area.
She urged all indigenes, both home and diaspora, to come together to support the development of Kroboland.
Dr. Narkie Amui added that there is an abundance of tourism potential in Kroboland, and it is only when the people are united that they will be able to utilise the tourism potential to help in the development of the area.
Ngmayem Festival is an annual harvest festival celebrated by the chiefs and people of Manya Krobo Traditional Area in the Eastern Region of Ghana.
The festival was established by the late Nene Azu Mate Korle in 1944 to replace the already existing festival called “Yeliyem”, which literally means eating of yam. It is usually celebrated in the month of October in the towns of Odumase in the Lower Manya Krobo Municipality.
The festival is celebrated for one week, mostly on the last two Sundays of the month of October.