Why We Became The Prostrate People -By J. Ezike

In Orlu, in Umuhu Okabia, I had seen large numbers of masquerades. It was the first time I was matured enough to attend the Ofeke Day Festival. I think I was eleven years of age, a curious child, and in a precocious, fanatical kind of way Pro-Omenala. As an Igbo raised in Lagos, I grew up almost alien to my hometown. I studied my traditions with the eyes of a tourist, of an outsider whose strange affection for a far-distant land was an obvious target of a peculiar love story. Home, in my mind, was a primeval place called “village”. But the conditioning of that thought was afforded by the general acceptance of “home” as “village” by Ndigbo. It was the unbreakable title that contaminated Biafra land with the necessary culture of migration. But home wasn’t referred to as “village” for nothing. There were many reasons it had been looked upon from a condescending perspective.

I was young and ill-conditioned to sing in the bad chorus of the Igbo majority. This, in a way, oppressed my self-identity. And as a child I began to see myself first as a Lagosian, then an Igbo. I recognized Lagos with greater value than “home.” In one part of my mind, I thought of Lagos as a safe and civilized wonderland, as an imperfect Empire riddled with the sores of madness. And I fancied its upsetting pandemonium, its suffocating population that broke the souls of the prostrate people. And I patronized it more strongly than I could perhaps imagine. For at that time I had already agreed in my mind that being a wretched foreigner in the hard-knock ghetto of Iba Estate was far honorable than the redemption of living in the land of my ancestors. All I could remember was that I was trapped between my obsession for an Empire that bled away my consciousness and my love towards a “home” I barely knew but embraced as “village.”

On the other part of my mind I thought of this “village” as a mythical world of transcendental possibilities. It was mythical to me because from childhood I had heard and memorized stories of wild masquerades, of fantastic goddesses, of legendary spirit-children, of animated rivers, lands, winds and fires, of demigods, of brave super-warriors, of heavenly-divined female dancers, of talking trees, of rainmakers, of witchdoctors, of reincarnated beings…These stories fascinated my young mind. And though they seemed real enough from imagination but the older I got to maturity of Deeper Mind the factual they became.

As a young boy, I had always shown curious interest in Omenala. And to understand quickly, I turned to my father as a leading teacher. He became a sort of close, posing figurine, the mortal image of an Oracle. In my young eyes, he was an Oracle because he had met wisdom at a young age and was endowed with the speech of the ancients. His wisdom was alien such that at the age of 23, he was accorded a chieftaincy title: “Onyemaraihegesokwu” which meant – “He who knows and understands how to resolve disputes.” My father knew the way to the hearts of his people and was famous in Orlu as a traditional leader. His words were like parables as old as Eri. Though young, he commanded the attention of the Wise Elders. But, his deft command of the Igbo language was the greatest mystery of my childhood. For Lagos had stolen my identity. It stole my core essence with the innocence of a generous hand – a hand that showed me the eternal tricks of survival but at the same time, knocked me senseless to the realities of my origin and wired my thoughts to view “home” as “village” and to cage me in that mental box that restricted my mind from thinking Igbo and my feet buried on Yoruba soil that pretended as the greener pasture upon which the vision of Biafra was projected as Hell in the horizon and aborted from my consciousness. And that Hell became the disdain of Ndigbo – their shame, their disgrace and their object of scorn.

Today, the Igbos are lost in the pursuit of happiness and have sought to deepen their self-rejection with ideas of pre-ordained migration from their ancestral lands. And in accepting the chaos of marginalization and the fiction of a “village” that can never be “home enough” they slowly began to forfeit Omenala and placed their culture inferior to hegemonic legacies.

For me, migration is not a bad thing but rather “the migration” that promises to disremember the way to one’s ancestral land and marvels at the prospect of being a total stranger to the culture that unfolded one’s beginning and prefers the fruits and sweetness that a foreign galaxy affords without watering one’s roots. I am talking about the migration that dares with shameless pride to point at his father’s land and his people with his left hand. I am talking about the migration that forgets that it is how a man builds his tent that he will sleep in it.

I recall that my world had revolved round Lagos. I had not yet grappled with my ignorance and dogmas. Even till this day, I still have an abiding desire to learn and to unlearn. For no man is complete of knowledge. But as a young boy, I nurtured my ignorance nonetheless. It was as if the truth wanted to survive the conditions of my neighborhood that did well in transmuting fantasies into realities. Thus, Amadioha became in my mind, the distant cousin of Lucifer. And I never doubted that dancing with the masquerades of Umuhu-Okabia was a near-death experience. And I never disagreed with the famous story that walking alone in the midnight of Orlu was something akin to suicide. And I imagined every “village uncle” of mine as a staunch initiate of Otokoto. And I reckoned that my guilt that carried the old memories of stolen fried meats from my mother’s cooking pot could pronounce me “dead” in the eyes of the Bakassi Boys of Onitsha. And I was certain that the real versions of DISNEY’S Mufasa and Simba lived in the bushes that sprawled to Ihioma Junction. These were the summonses that arose from the conditioning of my thoughts, from the basic understanding of Orlu as “village” and Lagos as “city”…This notion is so common that today an Igbo can easily approach his fear of home with the excuse that kidnapping is rife and that security in Biafra land is as loose as the dripping holes between the legs of a notorious Ashawo in Ajegunle. Of course these are few of the realities that exist in today’s Biafra land. And no doubt, it is the only region left to rot and decay in perpetual neglect.

I admit that Lagos drummed its soul into my Soul. And overtime, I learnt to appreciate its local cuisines, its parlance, its sins, its taboos, its fast-pace lifestyle that could transform even an Oyibo Catholic Priest into an Agbero. Someone had said that there is no real distance between Lagos and a Mad-Town. And that if you are not “slightly mad” or “crazy enough” you cannot survive the Fever of Lagos. I think that somehow my lack of Igbo experience on Igbo soil robbed me of the lifestyle I could only struggle to become. And sometimes I look with envy at the “destined ones” who were groomed like flowers in Igbo land and grew up to become as real as the sun above their petals. These days I consider myself a “conscious Igbo” and in another term – a pan-Igbo. I dream Igbo and I think Igbo. And to break it down in context; when I want to laugh and be entertained I watch comedy movies by Aki and Pawpaw and Mr. Ibu. When I want to be happy and feel the impulse to dance away my sorrow I listen to the philosophical songs of Umu Obligbo. When I need to stay focused in the long struggle to Biafran Referendum and pursue the advancement of Igbo Civilization, I pay attention to Mazi Nnamdi Kanu and Barrister Tony Nnadi. When I yearn for spi-ritual guide I lean on Prophet Remy Christian. When I seek the perseverance to face the hurdles of life I draw courage from my Father’s survival footprints. When I am in need of a friend to confide in, someone I can trust, I seek no one but myself. And when I feel my mortal strength and carnal flesh failing, I call on the Most High, Chi-Ukwu Okike Abiama to grant me grace to continue…

The powerful thing about migration is that even though you retained the culture of your ancestral land, you will end as a living expression of the foreign land you occupied. For instance, there are Igbos in Northern Nigeria whose core essence is an expression of the Fulani lifestyle. We have seen this phenomenon on display even in far distant lands. And I have met Igbos in Barbados and Guyana and felt that something alien within them, some energy, peculiar and strong, had robbed them of their natural identity and cultural behavior. I found them in acquaintance with the Rastafarian rules and in semblance with the physical outlook and mannerisms of the Reggae Men. This is also true about Igbos in the United States of America who have embraced the gun culture that is concerned chiefly with promoting a mindset of violence. We have also seen our wives in Europe who believe that submitting to their husbands is to subscribe to domestic abuse and that there is nothing sanctified about the laws of nature and the culture of Omenala that positions Man as the “Alpha.” And that “rebellion” in marriage is an attribute of a “strong woman.”

It is true that I am Igbo and a denizen of Orlu. But it is also true that I carry the Fever of Lagos, which means that I am stuck between two identities – an Agbero and a Hustler. Though I grew up in Lagos but studied Omenala in Orlu during Christmas. December was usually the sweet season that lent “village” a tasteful sight. It was the time when Igbos abroad would suddenly become fearless of their perceptions about home and ventured out in their millions, like tourists escaping for some short-lived adventures. Their patronage of “village” would peak at New Year. Then, they would drag their legs around town like explorers, like men and women who had discovered Ancient America and its aboriginal people. They would prance and strut their wealth and ego like people from a sophisticated planet, like foreign gods inspired by humility had chosen to dwell amongst primitives. For me, the 1^st of January marked the climax of New Experiences. It was special not because it was the first day of the New Year. Rather, it was special because it was Ofeke Day – the day of the masquerades.

On that day, thousands of people who had mastered their fears would crowd-in from all corners of Biafra Land. Their excitements acting as Viagra for the brain, drugging them into five hours daredevilry. Fearless “village” kids trooping in peer groups full of jest and sport, playing mischief at the masquerades inert with their cheerleaders, renting the air with a pandemonium of songs and happy-natured banters to stir the entertaining villains into action. The whole idea was to persuade the masquerades to chase after the crowd and prove that they had the fast legs of spirits and the intelligence of the wind…

Youths who were mostly “boiboi” in Alaba market and Olodi-apapa would present themselves as “bigger boys” flaunting their Nokia 3310, their newly acquired Christmas clothes and snickers. They would copy the walking steps of JAY Z and vocalize their words with a bogus American accent that clashed with their Igbo tongues…

I remember being entranced that mystery and beauty could spi-ritually rise up from the vanity of Igbo festivals. I knew that Igbo land, especially Orlu where I originated was the realm of the black gods. But as a child, I came to understand by societal indoctrination and media inoculation that “black” was the symbol of “evil.” Therefore, I viewed the complete collection of Igbo pantheons as dark powers affiliated with the forces of Hell. I obsessed over the difference between the Christian god and the gods of my ancestors. I came to understand that Omenala was pagan. And that my belonging to such culture brought me in marriage with the Devil. I never doubted the constant narratives that charged the myths that conjured the stigma of Biafra. And I believed that Omenala was the greatest danger to Igbo advancement. And that the recognition of our “black gods” funded our miseries and designed our lands into a universe of medieval trees and chaotic roads. And our “home” was bent toward a kind of backwardness that concluded its fate as “village.” I felt my love for home contaminated with disdain that made me sense that everything Igbo was inferior and that Good Fortune was never on our side. But I was wrong. For my understanding of our home, our land, our people and our struggles was elementary…

I did not know what “being Igbo” translated in the Nigerian context. I did not understand why we became the “prostrate people” who had to kneel before their fate. Even though we were intelligent, smart, industrious, resourceful, innovative, creative, spi-ritual, sophisticated and well-articulated but we also suffered a powerful fear. It was the fear that would not speak loud enough to be heard. It was the fear that would stand to the Nigerian Anthem that drew down the curtain between “us” and “village”. Thus, we did not remember home or recognized our roots except during festive periods.

I was a curious boy, observant and keen to know the unknown. I knew a lot about my lineage, about my ancestors. I knew that polygamy ran in our blood. And that my grandfathers and grand-uncles were kings (Eze) and chief-priests (Dibia). And I was taught by my father to collaborate Omenala with Christianity, by which I mean not simply subscribing to one school of thought, but merging them as a means of marriage – even though they both contradict each other, in the sense that the former is a culture and the latter is a religion. Christmas and New Year provided me an entitlement to tutelage. On the soil of my ancestors in Orlu, my father and my kinsmen taught me the Igbo rituals that sought to honor the land, the rain, the wind, the air, the ancestors… I was taught the incantations that recognized the dead, the departed, the transcended souls, Ndi-ichie, Ndi-mmuo… I learnt all these with the curiosity of a foreigner. Nonetheless, and fortunately, my Lagosian fever could not curb my psychic and Inner-man that wanted to draw me into Igbo-consciousness – the consciousness that reminded me that my “Igbo dialogue” was unnatural, inorganic and a foul pretender of substance. For I had suffered the fate of the new generation of Igbos raised in an alien world that was the weaponry of an official power that ensured that “home” remained exactly what we had deemed it to be – “village.” It was a world that broke the minds and stole the core essence of a people who proudly proclaimed that their Igbo identity, culture and patriotism were secondary and in servitude to the land that nurtured their Selfish Dream, their pursuit of happiness. And so my “Igbo dialogue” became, in Osadebe’s words, “Ingli-Igbo”. Such artificial language rarely spoken by the “destined ones” raised in the land of their ancestors…

In our intimacy with terror, we became the prostrate people who preferred “personal bliss” to “cultural emancipation.” We became the prostrate people whose “self-rejection” was physical but whose “value of self” was imaginary. We became the prostrate people who feared to judge the ill-conditions of their lands and did not question the morality of the “official power” that ruled by savage means. We became the prostrate people whose mental world thought of “home” as “village” and “abroad” as “city”.

Growing up in Lagos, my father and mother spoke little about the Biafran experience and all the ruthless memories of those years. For them, it was an intimate hell that was far-flung from magical. It had cost them many decades to purge the gripping horrors that girded the War Scenes in their minds. And in their display of intense disremembering, of forging political silence, they were not alone. Millions of Biafrans who had survived the war had maintained dead lips till this day. They had not forgotten the atrocity planted in 1966 which sprung up like a cursed seed and bore fruit in 1967. They had not forgotten the gripping agony and the suffering that grinded the soul. They had not forgotten the unceasing fear that pulsed through their broken hearts. They desire freedom like those of us in IPOB, LNC, MASSOB but would not permit themselves to hate their enslavement. They would not permit themselves to recover from the fear that proscribed their minds. And for 52 years they turned the other cheek and offered their bodies for slaughter and auctioned their ancestral lands in the market of slavery and feudalism and rejected the “Ministry of Freedom”. For 52 years, they wielded the same old fear that made their “home” a “village” and processed their people into wanderers and migrants of distant lands and seekers of Dream Worlds. And slowly they began to forfeit their Original Self and all that made their land “the cradle of culture, education, trade and investment…”

If only they could wake up and see the dawn of the Rising Sun, if only…