Onitsha, Balconies, and Gists

(Uzoamaka Doris Aniunoh)--I lived in Onitsha with my parents and siblings in a four-story building. My father was the landlord and going downstairs was against his many rules, so I always stayed on the balcony, watching things happen. In Onitsha, the height of a building was an indication of its owner’s wealth. (For some reason, it was mostly the bungalows that had badly spelt signs in red paint that read DIS HOUSE IS NO FOR SELL.) My father owned our building, so it was only natural that we lived at the very top.

Our fourth floor living quarters had four balconies: one in our flat, two in our father’s flat and one separating the two flats.

In Pursuit of Happiness

Source: pintrest.com

“In that Christ had suffered, and had suffered voluntarily, suffering was no longer unjust and pain was necessary. In one sense, Christianity’s bitter intuition and legitimate pessimism concerning human behavior is based on the assumption that over-all injustice is as satisfying to man as total justice. Only the sacrifice of an innocent god could justify the endless and universal torture of innocence. Only the most abject suffering by God could assuage man’s agony. If everything, without exception, in heaven and earth is doomed to pain and suffering, then a strange form of happiness is possible.”

Albert Camus (1956: 34)

The Rebel

When Prayer is Not Enough

Source: informationng.com

More often, Nigerians imply that God is responsible for their desultory condition. Obasanjo squandered something in the region of $16 billion on electric power, only to achieve the magic of a worsened power supply in Nigeria. Rather than offer a sober narrative about the anomaly, he asked Nigerians to pray to God to improve the situation. When we intone “God is in control” or “We’re trusting God” or “In God’s time,” we imagine that we are demonstrating profound piety. In reality, we are putting our infantilism, false sense of sanctimoniousness, and refusal to take responsibility on full display."   Okey Ndibe

200 Million Naira Prayers

Source: senatepresident.gov.ng

"Adamawa State is about to purchase prayers worth N200 million to ward off Boko Haram and other security challenges, according to the chief of staff, Abdulrahman Jimeta. I would suggest they go for a competitive bidding process so as to attract the best prayer warriors money can buy. If the state settles for only Muslim and Christian prayers, the contracts should be shared 50:50 for the sake of fairness. Prayers used to be free, but things have changed with the deregulation of spirituality and devaluation of the naira. Of course, the government has unconvincingly tried to clarify Jimeta's statement. Jokers."

Simon Kolawale

Choosing the Ooni's Successor

(Dele Momodu)--Fellow Nigerians, let me confess that my trip to the ancient city of Ife last Thursday was a most harrowing experience. As a matter of fact, the drive itself was very smooth devoid of the usual hurly-burly on that notorious Lagos-Ibadan Expressway. We set forth on our journey around noon not knowing what to expect along the way. Road travel in Nigeria has defied common logic. You require methods to the malfeasance and madness of our dare-devil drivers. We drove all the way to Ibadan without any major drama of bottlenecks and we thanked God for journey mercies.

The second leg of our journey was from Ibadan to Ile-Ife.

Nollywood: The Genesis, the Motivation

Okechukwu Ogunjiofor was a co-producer, with Kenneth Nnebue, of Nollywood's foundational movie, Living in Bondage. He actually sold the idea of the movie to Nnebue, who financed the film, becoming it executive producer. He became popularly known as Paulo, a character in Living in Bondage.

The Ooni of Ife and Tradition

Source: news punch.org

(Olusegun Adeniyi)--As a first year undergraduate at Ife in 1985, I was confronted with this myth that in the town on which our campus was domiciled, rituals were performed with human beings all-year-round except only on one day. But after Dr. Dipo Fashina (the ever-uncompromising former ASUU president popularly known as Jingo) had put enough sense into some of us (through Philosophy 101) to begin to doubt everything, I asked a roommate, indigene of Ife, whether the story was true. When he replied in the affirmative, I sought to know whether any member of his family had ever been lost to such practices and he responded: “A kii f’omo ore b’ore”.

That saying, crudely translated, means that indigenes can never be used for rituals involving human sacrifice. Of course, I must point out here that throughout my four-year stay at Ife, I was not aware of any incident of a student being lost to rituals. That is not to say we did not hear stories of some “strange” happenings at the period. That perhaps then explains why since the information broke last week that the Ooni of Ife, Oba Okunade Sijuade, had ascended into the spirit world, there are stories of people either avoiding travelling to/through the town or of residents going to bed earlier than usual.

Widowhood Rites: The Silent Pain of a Widow

Source: theleaderassumpta.com

(Kinda Delphine)--Few years ago, I was a radio presenter for a women rights program called ‘Every Woman’ (2006) Even though my co-presenter and I were still not very clear what women’s rights is, we somehow managed to hold inspiring discussions on air about gender inequality. On one edition, we got a call from a listener who was sharing her experiences about widowhood rights. She told us of the great love that she and her husband had once shared and how all of that was rub to the mud and she was abused and dehumanized by the traditional rites that her husband’s family put her through during the funeral.

You may not have heard it, but there is something called Widowhood rites in most parts of Africa and maybe in other parts of the world too. These are specific things that the wife of a deceased man has to fulfill but there is no such thing as widower rites. At least I have not heard of it!

When a WIFE dies, society sympathizes with the widower. When a HUSBAND dies, the community starts questioning the circumstances surrounding the death of the man and examine ‘invincible’ motives that his wife may have to kill him. Without any proof or trial, widows are accused of killing their husbands.

Growing My Hair Again, by Chika Unigwe

Source: vowinitiative.org

(Chika Unigwe)--"I am crouching beside the bed, my palms flat on the deep red rug that swallows my sobs. The rug is warm. It is a mother's hand. My posture is--I hope--appropriate to the occasion. My mother-in-law is watching me, her eyes hawk-like even through her own tears. She sniffs and says, 'You're not crying loud enough. Anyone would think you never loved him. Bee akwa!'

She never approved of me. I had an excess of everything. Education. Beauty. Relatives. Hair. Sure to bring any man down. At the thought of my hair, my palms go cold. By this time tomorrow, it will all be gone. I shall be taken to the backyard by group of widows, probably all of them strangers. One of them, the oldest, will lather my hair with a new tablet of soap (which will be thrown away once it's been used on me), and then shave all of is off with a razor blade. I shall be bathed in cold water. Strange women splashing water on me. Cleansing me to make my husband's passage easy on him: a ritual to make the break between us final so that he is not stuck halfway between this world and the next shouting himself hoarse calling for his wife to be at his side when he joins his ancestors.

'You should cry louder. You sound like you're mourning a family pet. You are a widow, nwanyi a! Cry as if you lost a husband! Bee akwa. Cry!'

Discovering Things Fall Apart

Source: reading.cornel.edu

(Chinua Achebe)--"Soon after [an] encounter with my future father-in-law I moved to Lagos to interview for a new position at the headquarters of what was now called the Nigerian Broadcasting Corporation (NBC). The Talks Department hired me to maul over scripts and prepare them for broadcast. A tedious job, it nevertheless honed my skill for writing realistic dialogue, a gift I gratefully tapped into when writing my novels.

In my second or third year at University College, Ibadan, I had offered two short stories, 'Polar Understanding' and 'Marriage is a Private Affair,' to the University Herald, the campus magazine. They were accepted and published. I published other stories during that time, including 'The Old Order in Conflict with the New' and 'Dead Men's Path.' In my third year I was invited to join the editorial committee of the journal. A bit later I became the magazine's editor.

At the University College, Ibadan, I was in contact with instructors of literature, of religion, and of history who had spent several years teaching in England. Studying religion was new to me and interesting because the focus went beyond Christian theology to encompass wider scholarship--West African religions.

Clashing for Foreign Gods on Home Soil

Source: tuesdaywithmorris

"Nnobi has three major institutions--the Catholic Church as represented by Madonna Catholic Church, the Anglican Church as represented by St. Simon's Church, and Chief Zebrudaya Okolo Igwe Nwogbo, alias '4:30.' The Catholic and Anglican Churches are our own Muslim and Christian divide. The Catholic Church would excommunicate a member who allowed his or her daughter to marry an Anglican.

Merely walking into an Anglican church would bar a Catholic from receiving communion until he or she undergoes opipia (atonement). The Catholics run the Boys Scout while the Anglican run the Boys Brigade. Catholic mothers join the M'ambo dance while the Anglican mothers join the Awelenma dance."

Rudolf Ogoo Okonkwo (2006: 34-35)

Children of a Retired God: Notes from An African Exile

Miracles and Wonders, Faith and Diaspora: On Tope Folarin's Miracle

Source: humboldt-foundation.de

(Aaron Bady)--Read Tope Folarin’s “Miracle,” in its entirety here.

That “miracles” are not real is, I think, a secular assumption that many of Tope Folarin’s readers will share. Some of us might say that we believe in miracles, and we might enjoy indulging in the fantasy of divine intervention, or biblical stories that describe Jesus’ ability to turn water into wine, or a few loaves and fishes into many loaves and fishes. But to turn one thing into another thing is the provenance of medieval alchemy, and we are moderns. We might say we believe in angels, but we tend to put the lives of our loved ones in the hands of doctors, instead of prayer. We believe in science.

Miracle, by Tope Folarin

Source: missoulian.com

(Tope Folarin)--OUR HEADS MOVE simultaneously, and we smile at the tall, svelte man who strides purposefully down the aisle to the pulpit. Once there, he raises both of his hands then lowers them slightly. He raises his chin and says let us pray.

“Dear Father, we come to you today, on the occasion of this revival, and we ask that you bless us abundantly, we who have made it to America, because we know we are here for a reason. We ask for your blessings because we are not here alone. Each of us represents dozens, sometimes hundreds of people back home. So many lives depend on us Lord, and the burden on our shoulders is great. Jesus, bless this service, and bless us. We ask that we will not be the same people at the end of the service as we were at the beginning. All this we ask of you, our dear savior, Amen.”

As the Ooni Retires to the Penthouse

Ooni of Ife; source: informationng.com

(Pendulum by Dele Momodu)--Fellow Nigerians, the controversy surrounding the health status of The Ooni of Ife would have been unnecessary if many of us had understood or respected the Ife tradition. Ile-Ife being the cradle of civilisation is steeped in endless myths and the ancient town parades countless pantheons for about 401 deities who are worshipped all year round. 

Ile-Ife and Benin City cherish their culture and never joke with tradition. They revere their kings and hold on fastidiously to the belief that these kings can never die, they can only retire to the ceiling, a concept that is probably alien to members of the modern generation. This is why it is possible for a powerful king to depart this terrestrial space unannounced for months by the traditional institutions. The people have accepted a system that may seem abnormal to foreigners but not to us.

What has made The Ooni’s case so contentious is because the news of his departure escaped and exploded from abroad and our Ife Chiefs are righteously miffed about the antics of some busy-bodies who seem hell-bent on rendering them irrelevant. This is unacceptable no matter how modern the world as become. Traditions the world over are either kept or wholly jettisoned. There are sacred rites or protocols that are observed and performed by the Catholics at The Vatican. For example, there cannot be an emergence of a new Pope without the appearance of the famous white smoke. It is the same for the Muslims who must search, find and sight the moon before proceeding on starting or ending the Ramadan. Modernity has not been able to obliterate those age-old traditions.

The "Great Journey" of Ile-Ife's "Great Crown"

Source: exploringafrica

"In the history of Ile-Ife, 1903 was an earth-shattering year for the yoruba people. It was the year that the Ooni, the god-king of the Yoruba, encountered directly the full impact of British modern colonial rule. From the perspective of the Ooni and from the perspective of the colonial governor in Lagos, the year ended the preceding era and opened a new investiture for Ile-ife City and the Yoruba states of south-western Nigeria.

Although the governor, Sir William Macgregor, referred cursorily to the occasion as the 'Great Crown' case, to Ooni Adelekan Olubuse 1 (1894-1910) and to the Yoruba people, it was a precedent-setting 'Great Journey' because it marked the first time in the history  of Ile-Ife that an Ooni would venture out of his palace and beyond the center of the universe.

For Westerners, the occasion would have been tantamount to asking God to leave heaven to answer the call of a mere mortal.

The Ooni traveled to Lagos, then the center of British regional administration. For the Yoruba, news of the unprecedented journey provoked fear, anxiety, and uncertainty because it was a great taboo for the Ooni to vacate the sacred city of Ile-Ife to travel to another seat of power, however that power might be defined."

Jacob K. Olupona (2011: 77)

City of 201 Gods: Ile-Ife in Time, Space, and the Imagination

Orisha--Triumphing Territorial Challenges

Source: fineartamerica.com

"Currently, new religious movements active in Ile-Ife are engaging in a second wave of missionary efforts (begun in the 1970s and 1980s) to achieve the people's radical and total conversion to Christianity (or Islam), to create a new worldview based on Euro-American conservative Christian values (or conservative Islamic values), and to sow intolerance of indigenous cultures and traditions.

These efforts threaten the destruction of indigenous culture, values, and even language. Indeed, in a number of churches it is forbidden to speak the Yoruba language! There is also an attempt to creat a new space in which these new religions will increasingly challenge the authority and privilege of orisa indigenous culture at the center of Ile-Ife city life.

Although there is ample evidence that orisa traditions are in retreat, there is also significant evidence of their renewal. Throughout the world, Yoruba diaspora communities of the Caribbean and the Americas are repositioning Yoruba-derived traditions--Santeria in Cuba and the United States, Candomble in Brazil, and new orisa traditions among african americans in the United States and Trinidad--as global religious traditions whose influence and consistency extend far beyond the home base in Ile-Ife."

Jacob K. Olupona  (2011: 17)
City of 201 Gods: Ile-Ife in Time, Space, and the Imagination

Ile-Ife: City of 201 Gods

Photo source: wikipedia

"In The Pivot of Four Quarters, Wheatley indicates that no place in sub-Saharan Africa has such cosmic significance as the Yoruba city of Ile-Ife. Known as the City of 201 (or 401) Gods, Ile-Ife is the base of the entire Yoruba civilization and culture, and its significance goes far beyond the immediate geographical boundaries of Nigeria. The religious culture of Ile-Ife has influenced the development and growth of new African religious movements as far off as Brazil, the Caribbean, and the United States.

Ile-Ife, a city of about half a million, is situated at the geographical center of the Yoruba city-states. To the west lies Ibadan... and to the east lies Ondo, gateway to the eastern Yoruba city-states. Isle-Ife is about two hundred kilometers from Lagos, which was Nigeria's coastal capital city for over a century.

Unlike the political, commercial, and administrative cities of Ibadan and Lagos, contemporary Ile-Ife is a ceremonial city par excellence; like the cities of Banaras, Jerusalem, and Mecca. [I]n the people's imagination it is the preeminent sacred place, beyond the secular and the profane."

Jacob K. Olupona (2011: 36)

City of 201 Gods: Ile-Ife in Time, Space, and the Imagination