This is another avenue for those ignorant racists to insult us some more under the guise of referring to the sculpture! It is like putting a target on the back (and front) of every Yoruba teenager and young adult named Bamidele and Abeke and their friends! Can you imagine the ridicule they could face in school? Can you imagine how our children might respond to someone who openly calls them an ape? Now, given the very meaning of the name Bamidele..., need I say more? I am sure that is a lot of percent of our teenage boys who might suddenly start to have new entries in school reports like, "uncharacteristically got into trouble” or worse - if we do nothing!

For those who are not aware, the names “Abeke” and “Bamidele” are revered Yoruba names, names that are heavy with meaning, names that Kings and Queens have carried proudly, names that have been used in Yoruba Nation for hundreds of thousands of years.

I am infuriated that these names have been “awarded” to chimpanzee sculptures that have appeared in some art trail in the centre of London! And it plans to stay there until October 2022! Naming chimpanzee sculptures with Yoruba names is not only insulting and degrading to us, but it also allows targeted racism to be taken to a whole new level!

Why use original Yoruba names for that matter, for chimp sculptures when the most esteemed racist would gladly shove a banana in a black person’s face if they could get away with it! In fact, there has not and neither shall there ever be a chimp in Yorubaland who would be so disrespected as to be given a name, let alone one reserved for people, when they have their own! If you haven’t signed already and just in case you were thinking it, this does not even honour a chimp on Yoruba soil – chimps are proud and strong and wild, not to be caged and prodded and studied!

Please sign this petition to have those names changed before the Met Police are given a valid reason for arresting our children for defending themselves against blatant, in-your-face racism, the type that even us parents would not be able to shrug off. Let us refuse to populate their prisons because of an ongoing insult to our race and culture by someone who obviously has never experienced racism nor had the decency to ask. Perhaps they too are just being in our faces about it, perhaps it is ignorance, perhaps it is hoping that a small group of people who do not naturally like to stir up trouble, would do nothing and just... “let it go”.

RACISM UNDER ANY GUISE IS NOT OK. Don't encourage it by being passive. Please sign the petition.

As Ọmọlúàbí, lets get them to CHANGE THE NAMES TO ANYTHING BUT YORUBA NAMES.

Èmi àbúrò, ẹ̀gbọ́n, ọmọ, aya, ìyá, ọ̀rẹ́ yin ni mo fi tọ̀wọ̀tọ̀wọ̀ béèrè o.

Ẹ seun.

Títílọpẹ́ Ọ̀ṣínáìkè (Aunty Pat to some :))