The theme of this write-up is OGBENYEALU, and in case you don’t understand it, you can google it. But I think the better option is to be patient, until you have read up to the last paragraph. I can’t have waited to tell that OGBENYEALU is a feminine Igbo name, from time immemorial, given to new born baby girls, at christening, by their proud parents, who have extricated themselves from the shackles of poverty.
And in order to bind the force of poverty forever in their lineage, it is not difficult to choose a suitable name. They vehemently name their daughters thus: Ogbenyealu. They hate to go back to their ‘‘Egypt’’, once they have crossed their ‘‘Red sea’’, even when they have not got to their ‘‘Promise land’’.
By the time you have read up to the last paragraphs, the theme would have become clearer and loosely mean, ‘‘any abject poor man will never marry my daughter.’’ Emphasis belongs to ‘‘abject’’, because it comes with a vow on the part of the parents. Believe me.
The Igbo people of Eastern Nigeria are a kind of people; my kind of people; so Jewish. And perhaps this is why most neighbours misjudge them, even though no one can know all about them. Can you imagine a man who goes to consult an oracle with a predetermined mindset on what to expect from divination, like, if it is not definitely ‘‘this’’, then ‘‘that’’ definitely isn’t correct? And if the oracle predicts something contrary to his expectation, he will just do away with such a god. He disposes of his symbol – Agwuishi or Amadioha, and probably points out to it the wood from which it was carved out.
A legendary story was told of an Igboman, who had gone to consult an oracle on his misfortune. When the oracle demanded that he sacrificed a bullock to his ancestors, this Igboman refused and, instead, requested, on the spot, that his ancestors should be asked if they ever left even a cockerel behind. An Igbo fears neither man nor god. All his life, he struggles to be able to say tiihoo – be heard loudly, amongst kinsmen. This is Igboman’s life wire and aspiration: Tiihoo amongst kinsmen. And he can trade anything to achieve this, except his scrotal sack, which is the ‘‘rock of ages’’ of his family lineage. The day an Igboman is born, a king is born, but his kingdom is only his household. He desperately searches for a son, who will be his heir. Simple as!
In the award winning novel, Half Of A Yellow Sun, by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie – an Igbo, a revolutionary lead character, Odenigbo, and his fellow intellectuals argued about capitalism and socialism, (it is beyond the scope of this article to define these two concepts, but you can at least figure them out). In that argument, Adichie’s Odenigbo favoured Socialism as a way forward for an egalitarian society, such as Nigerian society. One of the intellectuals was quick to tell him [that] socialism wouldn’t work for the Igbos, and subsequently asked him to explain why Igbos name their daughters ‘‘Ogbenyealu’’, which is an eloquent stamp and seal of capitalism.
Igbos are capitalists, forward looking, ever moving, always striving to do tiihoo wherever they find themselves, including emerging as leaders at the slightest opportunity, a trait [which] the late Sarduana of Sokoto detested, which is at Nigeria’s detriment. Had the Igbos not been so forward looking, ever moving, they wouldn’t have accepted the Christian god the way they did, en masse, abandoning their native religion and their ‘‘faithful’’ gods at the slightest promise of ndu-ebeebe n’eluigwe – everlasting life in heaven. Emphasis is on ‘‘ebeebe’’.
They checked out of their shrine and off to the church, where they were taught basically the same things. They accepted it so much that a people reputed for being pro-family could churn out Christian god priests, who vow never to marry, talk less of having offspring, which sustains family lineage – as a matter of ‘‘ahu ihe ka ubi, ere oba’’. Yes! You measure their extreme readiness to adjust to their most pressing priority. Emphasis on ‘‘ihe ka ubi’’. Today Ahiara diocese in Mbaise, Imo State of Nigeria, is said to have produced the highest number of Christian god priests (of ‘‘Roman’’, as Anglicans would prefer to call it) in this world. Igbos don’t look back really.
The day I was actually telling a friend of mine about these, he never realised I was talking about the Independent Peoples of Biafra, IPOB. And probably you, my reader, have not realised it too. My friend, an English, had asked me why the Igbo elites, home and in diaspora, have kept quiet while the ‘‘poor’’ IPOB members are trampled upon in the streets, killed by police and soldiers, without provocation, even at peaceful protests. My answer startled him. I told him that those who drive the IPOB agenda have no ‘‘surname’’. In an Igboman’s worldview, a man must first secure a surname, by his ability to make a resounding tiihoo, before coming on stage, and of course, after he had extricated himself from the shackles of poverty. He does this through his life’s honest achievements in politics, business, academics and public service. Whatever! Poverty, also known as ‘‘ubiam’’, is a negative force! It is a disease! Igbos don’t glorify in it. They abhor it.
Nnamdi Kalu and his cohorts, up until their arrest and incarceration, were near heard of among the Igbos, not even in gossip circles. Igbos are never revolutionary either, because they have a profound system in place and also detest blood, (a story for another day). So it is difficult for the elites to join ranks from their lofty heights. For instance, Ojukwu had a name, first from his bourgeoisie father and then from his personal achievement at a young age at that time. Long before ‘‘Nweje’’, of Anglican Communion, was attributed with holiness, Sir Ojukwu had already become ‘‘friends for life with A. G Leventis and with the family of John Holt.’’ He had as well almost become richer than Nigeria, if you minus the raw material and some mineral deposits from Nigeria.
Another way to describe what Nnamdi Kalu and his cohorts are not crème la crème of the society, which Rev Father Ejike Mbaka, of Catholic diocese of Enugu, bemoaned. Many refused to understand the clergyman, especially IPOB high Command and Control, when he emphasised on ‘‘Ndi obodo ji biri’’.
There is no point to overlabour the obvious. And the point is OGBENYEALU. Whoever is killed in the present struggle dies in ‘‘vain’’. In the present circumstance of the Igbos as Nigerians, what Igbos are asking for are fairness and equity. Not secession. Nnamdi and his cohorts can’t lead this dialogue for one simple reason – Ogbenyealu!
Contact the writer: kabonuyo@yahoo.com
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