Author: Chief S. T. Anga, JP
Reviewer: Chief S. M. K. Taribo, JP
Judging by its title, AMABARA promises the unveiling of historical episodes and circumstances that might have hitherto eluded the knowledge and attention of previous chroniclers of WAKIRIKE history. This factor portrays the work as an audaciously ambitious project especially where a claim to its historical authority and essence would derive validity from the breaking of fresh research grounds attributed to newly-discovered source materials. For while it may be easy to analyze, interpret and reconstruct cultured history, it ever remains daunting task to assemble, dissect and historicize oral recollections by different narrators whose memories and renditions could be no less varied and elastic than their moods and versions.
AMABARA brims with lucid style, witty language and creative brilliance. It surveys the patriarchal origins of each of the NINE WAKIRIKE KINGDOMS, exploring their respective migratory legends, genealogical patterns and regal succession systems. It further elucidates the absoluteness of the autonomy of each kingdom implying emphatically that none is either a suzerain or vassal of another. It likewise captures the mythological and cultural rites of the people as well as the evolution of their chieftaincy institution.
These qualities notwithstanding, AMABARA makes no pretentions to the merits of a historical literature amenable to citation as a scholarly authority in-so-far as it lacks the essential elements of Reference Notes, Glossary, Bibliography and Index. It rather approximates a fictional thesis ostensibly designed to expound and propagate a predisposed concept, interpretation and rationalization of the WAKIRIKE monarchical heritage. This probably explains the oddity of its surmises on critical issues vis-a-vis those in preceding publications that it courteously alludes to, notably: “The Historical Background of Ogu Kingdom” by The Redeemer’s Club of Ogu and “THE OKRIKA KINGDOM: An Analysis of the Dynamics of Historical Events” by Chief (Dr) Alfred S. Abam JP.
Indeed, as AMABARA narrows down its focus to OGU KINGDOM, it waxes cerebrally ingenuous in faking factuality out of fantasy but is not intellectually sublime enough to sift fact from fiction. As a result, it ends up believing and idolizing its own fabrications with a view apparently to fostering their acceptability. This is remarkably evident in the treatment of the KIRIBE myth, AGBABA/ATANDA saga and the SUCCESSION theme.
On page 22, KIRIBE, ALAME and EGBERE are conjectured as either one and the same person or three different persons vying for the honour of ancestorship of the Ogu people. But on pages 27 and 145, KIRIBE is categorically installed as father of EGBERE; later on page 304, the same KIRIBE is elevated to the position of undisputed patriarch of the Ogu people at the “(Alame Settlement)” and founder of the royal dynasty, thus implying that all Ogu people owe residual allegiance to KIRIBE!
Yet the author of AMABARA recognizes that a Kiribe family unit exists in Loko Royal House alongside three other older peers, namely; MERESA, ATEMIE and AGIJI (formerly OGONYO) – all claiming the same LOKO ROYAL Pedigree as Kiribe does. He needs, therefore, to clear the confusion surrounding the demotion of his created-progenitor of the larger Ogu monarchical lineage to the inferior rank of a mere father-figure of a smaller eponymous family unit at par with the three others under the LOKO ROYAL DYNASTY: a case of the patriarch becoming subordinate to the heir! Further notice has to be taken in this regard that the LOKO PERSONA (and not Kiribe) remains the common forefather of the LOKO GROUP OF HOUSES (OMUARU WARIYENGISE), namly: Loko (Royal), Chiri, Chuku, Ali-Igonibi, Opodere, Agbanida-Oju and Siereh.
In the case of AGBABA/ATANDA, all editions of Ogu history, oral or written, recount only one Agbaba – the deified warrior – leader, and one queen – Queen Atanda or Tanda. No mention has ever been made of two ‘Agbas’ as touted on page 304 (years “1120” and “1300”) nor a predecessor queen by the strange name of ‘Agba-ba’ (year”1300”) as also touted on the same page without attribution to a definite research source.
The SUCCESSION theme had occurred in two published documents before the appearance of AMABARA on the scene.
The first is the Memorandum presented by “all the chieftaincy units in Ogu clan” to “THE CHIEFTAINCY ENQUIRY COMMITTEE SET UP BY THE RIVERS STATE GOVERNMENT OF NIGERIA IN 1975.” The second bears the title: “THE HISTORICAL BACKGROUND OF OGU KINGDOM Vol. 1” edited by the Redeemer’s Club of Ogu (1991) to which AMABARA pays homage on page 143.
The Memorandum was composed by a galaxy of knowledgeable chiefs and elders in their collective capacity as accredited documentarists of Ogu tradition, culture and custom. As its presentation was done on behalf of the community, it can be rightly described as the Statutory Testament of the Ogu Kingdom.
It spells out the mode of secession in the following unequivocal terms:
“The succession to the throne of Amanyanabo was not and is not strictly hereditary. At the death of an Amanyanabo, the Royal House had discussions on the question of the most suitable person to succeed. The most qualified person who commanded the general acceptance of the Royal House was always chosen.” The
figure of Kiribe does not feature at all anywhere in the document: it is not mentioned either as founder of a lineage or father of any creature. Rather, only one Agbaba is projected as the “original founder of Orubieana” who “migrated from the upper Ijaw-Land with his families” comprising “LOKO (Agbaba’s original family), Ama, Kurukuru and the Ofiamani families”. Agbaba is further depicted as follows in the document:
“Ogu has twenty-one groups of families traceable to a common ancestor or patriarch whose name is “AGBABA.”
“The Historical Background …” is a compilation of articles written by a select-educated elite of Ogu, Including the author of AMABARA and the present reviewer, at the instance of the Redeemer’s Club. Relishing the support and patronage of the then AMANYANABO-IN-COUNCIL to which the author of AMABARA was Secretary par excellence, the Club went ahead to publish the book without submitting the manuscripts to the contributors for proofreading as normally practiced. In it, the succession theme is treated with ridiculous clumsiness. For whereas the narration about the ancestors’ migration, ultimate settlement at the present Ogu location, and royal succession on pages 10-12 identifies no Kiribe, the character is suddenly conjured up from nowhere and cast on page 12 as follows, apparently by passionate votaries of the Kiribe myth and hereditary succession.
“It must be noted here that the ten Amanyanapu (Kings) so far produced are from the same lineage of Kiribe family, though it was a mutual agreement between the two royal families (Meresa and Kiribe)’.
How bizarre, even if tenable, can such an assertion be that only one out-of the two “royal families” could be producing a succession of Kings! Contrast this with the position stated on page 39 of the same book:
“The succession to the Royal Stool in Ogu was strictly hereditary for the fact that the Royal house or families (Omeresa and Kiribe) had to discuss the issue of the most suitable person to succeed, and the most qualified person who had the general acceptance of the Royal House was usually chosen.”
Does it need stressing that the phraseology of this claim is a perversion of the provision in the forerunner 1975 Memorandum cited above even-as it debunks the very gospel of hereditary succession that AMABARA strives to proselytize?
Of a truth, AMABARA exhibits so much pathological obsession for hereditary succession that it misrepresents even such a recent contemporary event as the emergence of King Elliot I. Ada as Amadabo-Elect in 1976. Contrary to the erroneous version on page 47, the LOKO ROYAL HOUSE conducted a screening/selection process under the joint supervision of Chief James Ebenezer Opudere and Retired Rev, Vincent Arukulo Anga in the absence of an incumbent House Chief. At the end of the deliberations, none of the eligible contestants was adjudged suitable and qualified, and these included the only surviving aspirant, Mr. Napoleon Obianime Bipisenyanama (aka Prince Loko). However, to avoid the humiliating embarrassment of failing to parade a recognized monarch in the comity of Rivers State Kingdoms, the House desperately besought the only suitable and available member, Elliot Ada, to ascend the Throne. Although Elliot demurred initially, he eventually accepted the offer with alacrity. The elder brother, Geoffrey, was never reckoned with and could not have ipso facto exercised the privilege of abdication as deceptively imputed to him on page 47 of AMABARA. Likewise, neither the non-existent factor of Kiribe nor the thought of hereditary succession came into consideration at the time.
Against the foregoing background of the review, the fixation of AMABARA insinuating the theory of hereditary succession into Ogu history seems seditious without being malevolent This is so because the position in the Community Memorandum, as conveyed to government in 1975, constitutes the SOVEREIGN WILL and TRADITIONAL ORDINANCE of the people. It, accordingly stands perpetually legalized as the sacred and. inviolable TESTAMENT on the issue. In the final analysis, therefore, and as it concerns the evolution of Ogu Kingdom in particular, what AMABARA has laboured to magnify as “The Untold” about the “History of WAKIRIKE” is not the product of empirical research; it is the tissue of deft concoctions from a fertile imagination that not only pollutes the history of Ogu Community but jeopardizes the image and stability of its traditional rulership: and this is surely a disservice to current and succeeding generations.
