THE IGBO DELTA STORY

#igbohistory3000bc

According to Dennis Osadebey in the book, Building A Nation, Nnebisi was the

son of a Nteje woman, Diana, who had gotten pregnant to an Igala man, Ojobo
 

Nnebisi grew up in Nteje thinking he was of the kindred, but one day, after a quarrel, he was told that his father was not from there, so he could not take part in land sharing. 

He thus left Nteje with his followers and followed a route which brought him to the great river. If you look at a map of those areas, it is quite easy to trace the route taken by Nnebisi, which must have taken him through Nsugbe, and then along the Anambra River (Ọma Mbala), and then t the point where the Anambra River joins the Niger River.
 
That precise point where the Anambra River joins the Niger Rivers coincidental, the precise point where you can take an eight-minute boat ride and land at Cable Point in Asaba. Nnebisi and his people crossed landed at Ikpele Nmili and decided to plant their crops there for the year. A year later, after a great harvest was (of course the area is rich in alluvial soils brought from upstream by the river), they decided to settle there. 

Nnebisi called the place Ani Ahaba (We have settled in this land), and four hundred years later, some white chap hearing the name that the natives called their land, wrote Asaba in his map, and not Ahaba. That man was Carlo Zappa, an Italian priest who was appointed Prefect of the Upper Niger by the Catholic Church.

Zappa spent a lot of time converting the natives in both Asaba and Onitsha, and to Ojoto, East of the Niger, and Agbor, West of the Niger.
A look through Catholic records during the Ekumeku resistance will show that at the turn of the century, most of the Catholic priests in what is now the Diocese of Issele Uku in Delta State, came from the Onitsha area, as they were all under the same ecclesiastical province
 
A look at the roll call of the dead from the Aba Women’s affair of 1929, shows that the wife of the Sanitary headman in Opobo was from Asaba, which kind of tells you the direction in which people went before the split of Southern Nigeria into East and West in 1954.
Up until that point in 1954, many from the Igbo speaking areas just west of the Niger River, found it easier to cross the river to do their business.
And why not? 
The distance between Asaba and Owerri is just 102km.
Asaba to Enugu is 125km, while Asaba to Umuahia is 142km.

All of these places are closer to Asaba than Warri, which in modern Nigerian geopolitics is in the same state as Asaba. Warri is 176km from Asaba.
The Asaba man, when he arrives in either Enugu, Owerri or Umuahia, speaks the same language as the people in those places, barring the normal dialectal differences that occur in languages that are spread over large geographical areas.
This same Asaba man would arrive in Warri, and would be at a complete loss as to what the native in Warri is saying…

Anioma v Igbo

Written by Cheta Nwanze, a researcher, lives in Lagos

VANGUARD Nigeria, Saturday, May 2, 2020.

Last year I took my friend and partner, Tunde Leye to my homestead. In going to that area, we did not cross the Niger River (Oshimmiri in my native dialect) the way most people cross it these days. Rather, we went the old way. We took a boat from Cable Point (Ikpele Nmili) in Asaba, and 12 minutes later, we were sharing a beer with some of my acquaintances at Onicha Marine. You see, for those who know the history, Asaba and Onitsha, prior to the building of the bridge, both communities were quite closeknit, something we'll discuss later on today.

Tunde preparing to cross the Niger River at Cable Point, Asaba.

The third point in the dictionary definition of a mongrel is "any cross between different things, especially if inharmonious or indiscriminate."

As an aside, I think it's time for me to do my first social media appeal. Is anyone willing to finance me to go and sit with her in New Zealand once this pandemic is over? She lives there now, and she is such a repository of Igbo history. She was born in 1939 which means that at 81, the window for a comprehensive debrief of the stuff which didn't make any of her three books that focused on the Igbo people is closing...

Let me go back to topic.

In the last few days there has been a lot of argument on Twitter about whether the Igbo speaking people of Delta State in Nigeria are Igbo, or something called Anioma. Some people from this area have pointed out that they have been victims of taunts by some Igbos from the East of the Niger, who have themselves said that Delta Igbos are not Igbo.

Both sides of this argument are right, but one tweet I saw was an outright lie. There is no one from the East who will call a native Anioma person "Onye ofe mman. That particular slur is reserved for Yoruba people as the thinking behind that stereotype is that the Yoruba people cannot cook, but rather drown their soups in oil and pepper to cover the lack of culinary skills. My pot belly can tell you that that stereotype is way off, but that is another topic for another day...

The words used for the various peoples of the former Bendel are as follows - Nd‹ Ika to describe the Igbo speaking peoples of the Midwest; Nd‹ Idu to describe the Bini people; Nd‹ ohu (a slur) to describe the Esan people (and the history of this is actually linked to Benin); Nd‹ Usobo to describe those in the "proper Delta", that is the Ijaw, Ijekiri, Isoko and Urhobo.

Now, the problem with most of Nigeria, is that we do not know where we are coming from. Generally, if you do not know where you're coming from, it's kinda hard to know where you're going to.

Too many Igbo people both East and West of the Niger, do not know where they are coming from. Referring back to the piece I highlighted earlier, I pointed out that, " The Anioma sub-group is divided into two, Enuani and Ukwuani. Enuani and Onitsha people migrated from Igala along with Ishan." This is incomplete.

In the intervening years, I've had discussions with older men in Onitsha, Idumuje-Ogboko, Onicha Ugbo, Atani, Obosi, Issele Azagba and Ibusa, and built a more complete profile. Yes, some Onitsha people indeed came from the Igala area, but most claim their ancestry from around Benin (possibly from what is now called Igbanke), who fled East sometime in the 16th Century to escape the wrath of Oba Esigie. These people, under their leader, Eze Chima, founded a number of towns along the way - Œnicha Ugbo, Œnicha Œlna, Issele Uku, Issele Azagba, and then one of their number crossed the great river, and settled at Œnicha Mmiri, which is today known simply as Œnicha, or as the British colonists three centuries later transcribed it, Onitsha.

Female Traditional Ruler: At a point during my coronation I became a man - Obi Martha Dunkwu, Omu Anioma, Delta State

Written by Jimitota Onoyume, Asaba
Sunday, March 11, 2018

Omu Anioma

Obi Martha Dunkwu, Omu Anioma is a notable female chief in Delta State. In this interview, she speaks on how she oversees the affairs of her community. She spoke on the side lines of Peaceworks, a Niger Delta dialogue facilitated by Dr Judith Asuni of Academic Associates.

Were there battles you fought to ascend the throne?

There were no battles. Our forefathers set up the Omu traditional institution over 700 years ago. In Aniomaland, from Asaba to Agbor, among others, the forefathers designed that every community must have a traditional ruler but in Omu, we have a traditional ruler who is a man and another who is a woman. However, the male traditional ruler is superior in communities where there is also a female traditional ruler because man comes first, and, when you are crowned as in my case in Omu, you must come to the palace to reign; you must leave your marital home. At the point of coronation, you are bestowed male rights; that is why you can break the kolanut, you become a man and a woman put together. I tried to find out why. 


Research shows that God created man and woman, but it is the woman that is better positioned to understand woman. That is why the Omu means Eze Nwanye, female king in charge of women, female youths, markets, ancestral shrines, businesses. More importantly, she is the spiritual custodian, the one who advises the male traditional ruler and the town spiritually. That is why they felt this woman should not be married so she can be in a state of chastity. The woman is also seen as the mother of all in the town. If you are living with a man and he slaps you, it is believed to be a slap on the town. But as Omu, you can marry out children who will bear children for you. Female chiefs of Omu are patterned in a way that they are different from male chiefs. There is no contest. You don't aspire to it. It is God who reveals who will become the traditional ruler for women. In some Anioma communities, it is hereditary; in others, it is rotational.

What is the experience like? How do you operate in an environment in which many believe royalty exclusively belongs to men?

Because I am a media practitioner, I have brought visibility to the Omu throne. Definitely, men will not feel at ease. And of course some traditional rulers will not feel at ease but it is not a modern creation; it has been there for ages and there is nothing they can do about it. Our forefathers wanted the woman to play her role and the man to also play his role to move the community forward. I am a member of the Omu traditional rulers' council to speak for women. And in case there is trouble, it is easy for you to come in. I have my own palace and chiefs. In my area, you find men who are not comfortable with my status but I did not choose myself; it is spiritual. I just want the hand of God to continue to be on my head. I don't want anybody to like me. I just do the right thing, do what the ancestors want me to do.

IGBOCENTRISM AND ANIOMA ETHNIC IDENTITY

Written by Dr. Kunirum Osia - USA
Email: Osiadi@aol.com 
Kunirum Osia is the former Founding National President of Anioma Association, USA, Inc.

For decades we, Anioma people, have been buffeted back and forth by people attempting to impose a persona on us. Some described us as being neither here nor there. Others do not give us chance to define and describe who we are as a people. We know exactly who we are. We have no confusions about our geography and genealogy. We know that identity is like gold. Just as the gold bar stands behind a currency as a guarantee of its legal tender, so is identity to an individual or a group. The analogy is only partial, of course, the price of gold may rise or fall, but we tend to pride ourselves on the stability of our identity. Anioma ethnic identity is a value we must guard. In recent times we have contended with the intrusion into Anioma world what we might call the concept of, albeit, reality of Igbocentricism.


By Igbocentrism or Igbocentricity we mean an existential point of view that puts Igbo at the centre of Igbo people's cosmology. Central to Igbocentrism is the idea that people believed or assumed to be Igbo must acknowledge, understand and love their "Igboness" so as to understand and deal with non-Igbo. It is a conceptual approach to human relations from the Igbo point of view. It is an Igbo-centeredness of interpretation of such relations and quotidian realities. Because the vast majority of Anioma people speak dialects derived from the Igbo language, it is assumed that they are "Igbo." Anioma history records individuals from diverse origins. There are in Anioma the "Olukunmi" who speak a variant of Yoruba spoken around Owo. Ebu people in Anioma speak Igala as their mother tongue.

While language delimits cultural fields, it is not permanent because people have mastered more than one language. Language is one of many indices of a culture. Language is not enough to define who a people are. Because Americans or Australians speak English does not make them English. Because Mexicans, Cubans, or Argentineans speak Spanish does not make them Spaniards. The nationals of these countries will not introduce themselves as "English" simply because they speak English nor as Spaniards because they speak Spanish. Those of them who can trace their origin to England or Spain know that over time they have formed a new identity called "American," "Australian," "Mexican," "Cuban," or "Argentinean."