Oluremi Akintola-Samuel: Changing the Face of Traditional Wedding Compere

Oluremi Akintola-Samuel is a traditional wedding compere known as Alaga in Yoruba language. Rebecca Ejifoma reports that given her quest to empower women who are passionate about compering traditional weddings but are oblivious to how to, she established the Strictly Weddings Academy. Since its inception, over 100 women within Nigeria and across the globe have received tutelage in the Alaga business

Passionate about raising and empowering women who will become remarkably significant in the traditional wedding compere industry known as Alaga in Yoruba, Oluremi Akintola-Samuel, the CEO of Strictly Weddings Academy has trained over 100 women within Nigeria and across the globe in the alaga business.

The words of Caroline Ghose, “The difference between skill and talent: A skill is something you learn. Talent is what you can’t help doing”, has come into play in this situation. It tells the perfect tale of the traditional wedding compere, Akintola-Samuel.

With this unusual 21st century talent, she has willfully mentored women in various industries through her annual programme, The Complete Woman Conference.

Her background in filmmaking as an alumni of the Pencil Film Institute (PEFTI) gives her an edge. Hence, she has been able to take the business of hosting engagements to the next level. In an interview with her, Akintola-Samuel spoke about the pros and cons of the compere industry and the hurdles encountered as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic.

First, she pleasantly gushed about her life growing up in Lagos and how it has positively contributed to her career in Traditional wedding compere.

Akintola-Samuel acknowledged that Lagos is the place where a lot of parties happen on weekdays. “One of the major lessons I learnt in my journey is that I needed to be focused on what I wanted to do. I wasn’t distracted with the fact that I didn’t get any support from people.

“I keep training and disciplining myself. I keep learning everyday; learning new songs and dialects in line with my profession. One of the new things that is required in this Alaga profession is emotional intelligence.

“This intelligence is strongly required now in dealing with your clients and staff. I make sure I am not stereotyped and I keep learning, unlearning and relearning.”

With her quest to empower women, the entrepreneur soon discovered that a handful of women including educated ones are passionate about compering traditional weddings but are oblivious on how to.

“All that was needed was tutelage, which was how the Strictly Weddings Academy initiative started.”

To reverse the perception that the industry was designed for older people, Akintola-Samuel fashioned a space for younger women, too. She went ahead to vacillate the narrative of traditional wedding involuntarily perceived as mundane by the younger generation.

Owing to the fact that little things are significant, the young Alaga spiced up the feel of traditional weddings with more hands on her side.

“I decided to kick off the training by empowering five women. Then we increase to 10. Now that the academy is also online, we have students home and abroad.”

Driven by her endless passion for expressiveness and thorough anchoring of activities, the Lagos-born Ogun State indigene dived into the industry professionally having seen the gap – absence of young compere.

Today, she prides about having younger people in the industry doing ‘Alaga iduro’ (compere from the groom side) and ‘Alaga ijoko’ (compere from the bride side).

She, however, listed some of the hurdles faced in the industry including time, chosen venue, couple families rivalry. Time, she emphasised, is a major challenge.

“My protégés outside the country charge per hour. But here, time is almost of no value. Unfortunately, after delaying the start of the event, clients will tell you to hasten up. And that is another major barrier.”

Akintola-Samuel is an innovative compere. She employs technology to suit today’s world as COVID-19 persisted. “We initiated the intimate (smaller guest) wedding last May, but picking it up wasn’t so easy because a lot of people were scared. It wasn’t even the virus itself that scared people; they didn’t want to have hiccups with the government who would abruptly stop their ceremony halfway through.

“So, one of the things we did during the lockdown was to empower women in the industry who are single mothers and widows.’