In Delta, you have ethnicities that have a multiplicity of influences--Benin, Yoruba (Lukumi), Igala, and Igbo.
The Itsekiri's affinity with Yoruba is clear. The Urhobo's cultural proximity to Benin is equally conspicuous. And there are several communities who have gradations of connection to their Igbo neighbors across the Niger.
To add to the complication, some ethnicities who have been influences by multiple political and linguistic currents insist on and emphasize one of these influences over the others, even though their names may point in a different direction.
You might see a Delta person with the name Chukwuma Anielo, but he'll fight you for calling him Igbo. He'll educate you on his and his community's Benin origins even though his language, though an amalgam of different languages, has a dominant Igbo or Igboid inflection.
I was talking to a young mentee recently. She was conducting interviews in Agbor for her PhD dissertation on what she calls "Western Igbo," that is, Delta state Igbo and Igboid communities.
She had the privilege of interviewing the paramount ruler of Agbor. The traditional ruler told her strongly not to refer to his community as Igbo in her work because, as he told her sternly, the Agbor people are from Benin and are not Igbo.
Recently, the question of "Delta Igbo" came up in a Facebook discussion, wherein the confusion of non-Delta people regarding the identities of the Igbo/Igboid-speaking peoples of Delta was on full display.
I chimed in by telling my personal story of interacting with two Ika friends, who educated me on the Igala origins of the Ika people. I stated that this was a moment of reeducation for me as I had assumed from their Igbo names and their linguistic affinity that they were Igbo people from Delta State.
My two interlocutors stated that due to their proximity to the Igbo heartland, the Ika had been influenced by the Igbo as evidenced from their names and language but that the evidence of their Igala origins (origin story, culture, masquerades, kingship, and vocabulary) is compelling. As is the lesser influence from Benin.
Not only that, they said, but the people themselves say they are Igala and regard Igala people in the parts of Nigeria as their kinfolk.
When I narrated these interactions with two different Ika people who did not know each other, a few Ika people came to the thread and vehemently challenged me, saying that whoever told me that the Ika people are Igala was wrong. The Ika, according to my Ika interlocutors, are Igbo people.
I was left confused. I thought I had finally solved the identity mystery of the "Ika-Igbo" of Delta, locating their origins in Igala because of the authoritative testimonies of two of their sons. But now other Ika people were vehemently rejecting that identity narrative and saying that the Ika are Igbo.
How does one reconcile these two identity narratives and make sense of Ika identity?
I don't have a definitive answer, but it may be the case that the Ika are not one homogeneous community, that they're an agglomeration of different groups with different origins and origin stories, and with different levels of Igbo, Igala, and Benin influences.
It seems that some of the so-called Delta-Igbo (used to be Bendel-Igbo) communities are more Igbo than others, and that some of them are not even Igbo at all, despite their names being Igbo.
Ultimately, you have to defer to people's narratives of their identity and origins, but in the case of the Ika, there seems to be two or more conflicting narratives, which may point to the existence of multiple ethnic identities within the broader, constructed Ika and "Delta-Igbo" ethnolinguistic family.
I don't think my two friends are wrong, and I don't think my recent interlocutors are wrong either. They may come from different branches and parts of Ika, and in the different parts, different identity claims and stories may be preeminent.
There may also be reasons why some Ika communities sublimate their Igbo influence to the Igala one and why others do the opposite.
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