Patrice Talon on the festival budget “Vodun Days” : " In numbers, it wasn’t huge”

The first edition of Vodun Days took place in Benin on 9 and 10 January 2024. For this purpose, the Head of State Patrice Talon gave an interview to the international press and took the opportunity to discuss the festival budget. We offer you here the interview published by our colleagues from the Ecofin agency who was also there relayed by Peace Fm. Here are some selected pieces

During this edition of Vodun Days, was there a desire to reveal Vodun to the world ?

Maybe that's too much said, “reveal Vodun to the world”. The world knows Vodun. Have you been influenced by them in your work, it’s a spiritual trend, religious who is already quite well known in the world. It turns out that Vodun left mainly from Benin. It is true that the Gulf of Benin region... which is on the borders of two civilizations, Yoruba et Adjatado, has given birth, here then, on our land, to this religion which was widely expressed in Africa south of the Sahara, particularly in the West up to Central Africa and a little further. After, by the slave trade, this religion has spread beyond the Atlantic.

Unfortunately, the expansion of book religions, especially Christianity and Islam, painted the Vodun religion so blackly that Africans abandoned their own identity, of their history, of their heritage, for the benefit of imported religions, which is not a drama because the world is dynamic. The human community moves a lot. She changes her practices, of culture and adopts other modes of thought and existence. More, at the community level, what concerns identity must be able to be preserved in a certain way. And that, it is useful for communities, in the concert of nations and in global competition, can express themselves with all their full potential. Unfortunately, as I said earlier, Vodun was a victim, A little, of the assimilation of Africans by another civilization. And religions carry civilizations. Religions, in general, are the vector of a culture, or the resistance of a culture. So, Africa has lost a little, especially as far as we are concerned, his soul in this matter. On a spiritual level, we think that everything that is religion today, new or modern, comes from faith in a creator God, then after, in various vehicles which allow one to address this creator God. For Christians, it's Jesus, the son of God, for Muslims, it's the prophet Mohammed. And for the Vodun faithful, these are the deities, the Vodun, who are the intermediary between the creator God and men. We share practically the same spiritual value, the same value of understanding the world, and interaction, of the relationship between men, nature and the creator. And by the way, in this matter, I can quickly tell you that the Vodun religion seems to me to be the one that truly integrates the symbiosis between the creator God, men and nature globally. Since she advocates an intimate relationship, respectful and even a little progressive between God the creator and men. Earth, the water, l’air, After a mid-term evaluation in, the sun are for the faithful of Vodun the essential elements of God's creature, Creator, which offers men existence and requires their respect for harmony on earth. And so, by deduction, nature, in these four elements, constitutes the elements of daily exchanges between man and the creator. That's all, Vodun, that's it. We have abandoned it in favor of other spiritual and religious philosophies. This is not a problem. But we have also given up a little or we have even started to be a little ashamed of this beautiful philosophy that is the African philosophy of the relationship between God and men.. And Vodun is sometimes practiced secretly or we are ashamed of it. And many of our Christian or Muslim compatriots have a bit of this dual religious practice.. In broad daylight, what is imported religion, and more discreetly, what relates to our real identity. We said that for the influence of Benin, For the development, for everything, it would be good to take shape in our own identity. And to first reveal to ourselves the values ​​of Vodun without compromising the faith of everyone. Moreover, Vodun does not convert. It is not an expansionist religion that converts. We adhere to Vodun when we take the process ourselves. So for us, whatever the current beliefs of each person, it was useful to reveal, to ourselves first, the values ​​that Vodun carries, the harmony that Vodun requires and establishes between men, nature and the creator God, and this so that we can in this concert of nations, restore our contribution to humanity. Which is therefore another way of living a spirituality of living the relationship between men, nature and God. We therefore felt that it would be very good for Africa to renew these values ​​a little to the world., while living, for those who are faithful to Vodun, their spirituality fully, without shame, shamelessly. And on occasion, we also want to succeed in deconstructing everything that has been wrongly portrayed negatively, everything that has been said about the Vodun religion, by saying that this religion is the emanation of evil and others. Well, it's normal, the expansion of religions goes through this too, denigrate, show that the other religion is bad. This is a bit of what guided, me a little bit, personally, my reflection, then after that of the Beninese government. And at the level of all of Benin, what guided our desire to rehabilitate the real values ​​of Vodun […]. And everything that is cultural, artistic, which depends on oneself, which relates to the identity we share with the world, today fuels tourism, which is an important economic sector. So you see, the relationship is quickly made between reestablishing our identity, to find her, share it with the world, and also develop the economy from this.

Vodun is a religion common to several peoples and communities. Does the government have a strategy to make Vodun Days an international event? ?

Yes, so we did a test yesterday. If you usually come to the Vodun Festival, you must have noticed that there is a new model for the festivities. Until there, it was only during the day (of 10 January ; editor's note) that everyone was walking in Ouidah, visited the temples, went to the squares to discover the Vodun rhythm there. But since this edition, which is the very first of this new dynamic of presentation, we showed the participants yesterday, to all those who came to Ouidah, a Vodun ceremony. In terms of ceremony, it’s not really a Vodun ritual. Not as such, but it’s explaining to the participants what Vodun is, what are its concepts, both spiritual and sociological. And by this, our intention is simply to fully reveal, in whole mode, what Vodun is, what is the practice, and by this means, I wouldn't say conquer, but attract more the curiosity of one and the other. A bit like when we go to certain regions of Asia, discover Hinduism, discover the temples, attend a Balinese-style cremation of the dead (cremation of the dead as practiced in Bali, in Indonesia ; editor's note). And so, the goal is to ensure that Vodun, or what Vodun conveys as art, as a way of life, as culture, of increasing interest to the whole world, that people come to discover Vodun in its various facets, even if spirituality is not our main interest. Moreover, Benin is secular, the state is secular, and we did not promote one spirituality against another. This is why we present more of the cultural sides, artistic, identity of Vodun, without promoting Vodun spirituality. I don't know if I answered your question.

Sure. This gives me the opportunity to ask you the following question. We saw a very good organization. What is the budget that was put in place to organize this festival? ?

A great organization ? I wouldn't say that I am an eternally dissatisfied man... But I think that yesterday, you must have noticed that this is a start.

Ouidah is under construction. Mobility problems were very serious. This is the year 1, so the test. We tested this model to see if it meets people's expectations.. And it looks like the model is good. We did a Vodun ceremony to further explain what Vodun is. So, we will continue in this direction.

But the budget, I can't tell you about it. In numbers, it wasn't huge. It's all about ventilation (budgetary ; editor's note), it wasn't big at all. But as much as Benin devotes resources to developing the agricultural sector, to develop the industrial sector… we said that Vodun has for us an economic interest as well, since tourism is an important sector of activity. Today, the world is moving more towards tourism consumption. And it’s an opportunity to seize. This is of major interest to us. So, if we invest in Vodun, it is not simply because we want to reveal our identity to ourselves and others, but above all also because we want to make it a sector of economic development. And then there, all the most rational and profitable investments can be made as long as we project what this can create in terms of employment, in terms of wealth, in terms of visiting Benin, in terms of tax collection, resources for the State.