Ogbunigwe, also known as "Ojukwu Bucket," was a series of indigenous weapons developed and used by the Republic of Biafra during the Nigerian Civil War (1967-1970). Here's a detailed introduction:
- Initial Form: Originally a non-guided surface-to-air missile (called "Flying Ogbunigwe") designed to counter Nigerian MiG-15 fighters, it was later converted to surface-to-surface use.
- Variants: Over time, the term expanded to include command-detonation mines, improvised explosive devices (IEDs), and rocket-propelled projectiles. Shapes ranged from cones to cylinders.
- Key Parameters: Warheads weighed 5-500 kg, with an effective range of up to 8,000 meters for rocket-propelled versions. The killing range of mines and warheads was 180-800 meters, with shrapnel covering a 90° arc.
Operational Use and Impact
- Tactical Effectiveness: The Ogbunigwe was highly effective against infantry and armored vehicles. Its most famous use was in the 1968 Abagana Ambush, where Biafran forces led by Major Uchendu used it to kill up to 6,000 Nigerian troops from the 2nd Division.
- Psychological Impact: The weapon struck fear into Nigerian troops, becoming a symbol of Biafran ingenuity during the war.
Name Meaning
- Originally, "Ogbunigwe" meant "a killer in the heaven or vast sky" in Igbo, reflecting its initial role as an anti-aircraft weapon. After the war, it came to be associated with landmines or "instruments that kill in multitudes."
THE STRENGTH
From a scientific perspective, the Ogbunigwe's strength lay in its clever application of basic explosive physics, adaptability to limited resources, and effective integration of tactical design. Here's a detailed breakdown:
1. Core Scientific Principle: The Monroe Effect
The Ogbunigwe was based on the Monroe effect (also known as the shaped charge effect), a fundamental concept in explosive engineering. When an explosive is shaped with a concave cavity (often lined with metal), the detonation wave converges at the center, creating a high-velocity jet of molten metal or gas that can penetrate armor or disperse shrapnel with great force. This design allowed the Ogbunigwe to maximize damage despite using relatively small amounts of explosive compared to conventional weapons.
2. Technical Specifications and Performance
- Warhead and Lethality: Warheads ranged from 5 kg to 500 kg, with killing ranges of 180–800 meters and a shrapnel arc of 90°. Larger versions could wipe out entire infantry companies or disable armored vehicles, as seen in the 1968 Abagana Ambush where it killed up to 6,000 Nigerian troops.
- Propulsion and Range: Rocket-propelled variants had an effective range of up to 8,000 meters (8.7 miles), making them suitable for long-range attacks on troop concentrations or convoys.
- Guidance: While unguided, the weapon's simple design made it easy to deploy quickly in guerrilla or defensive operations, compensating for the lack of advanced targeting systems.
3. Innovation Under Adversity
The Ogbunigwe's greatest scientific achievement was its development and mass production under extreme constraints. Biafra faced a total economic blockade, so scientists had to:
- Use locally sourced materials (e.g., recycled metal, homemade explosives) to manufacture warheads and launchers.
- Adapt the design from an anti-aircraft missile to a surface-to-surface weapon after the fall of Enugu in 1967, demonstrating flexibility in response to battlefield needs.
- Achieve high production rates (up to 500 units per day at its peak) using improvised factories, a testament to their engineering ingenuity.
4. Tactical Effectiveness
The weapon's design was tailored to Biafra's defensive strategy. Command-detonated mines and IED variants could be hidden in terrain, while rocket-propelled versions provided long-range fire support. The psychological impact of the Ogbunigwe was also significant—Nigerian troops became so fearful that they often used cattle to clear paths ahead of advancing columns.
In summary, the Ogbunigwe was not a technologically advanced weapon by modern standards, but its scientific strength lay in its practical application of basic physics, resourcefulness in production, and alignment with tactical needs, making it one of the most effective indigenous weapons of the Nigerian Civil War.
I always insist that the greatest merit for Igbos in recent times is *not simply the advent of the internet on the surface!* _It is the social media aspect of the internet_ which now allows independent thinkers to *challenge the lies of history.* In Nigeria, our little corner of the world, *through social media presentations,* scholars are now debunking the false stories perpetuated by the Yoruba press *(with the help of the north who has always been paranoid about Igbos).* The Yorubas took advantage of their civil war take-over of the press *to rewrite the history of Nigeria as it favors them...,* and if you believe them, *"every post independence success in Nigeria was Awolowo influenced"* and every problem in Nigeria was *"instigated by Azikiwe, Ojukwu and the Igbos!"*"The truth is reluctantly coming out"* and _Igbos are gradually being vindicated!!!_ Read this masterpiece below by *Professor Tekena Tamuno.* By the way, he's not an Igbo man!
" *IGBO ARE THE MAKERS OF MODERN NIGERIA" -- PROF TEKENA TAMUNO*
*Fact, not twisted stories to misinformed and mislead*
The problem with writing skewered history is that it equally misinforms its target: Kayode Esho was a great jurist, but Akunne Oputa was the "Socrates" of the Supreme court. Enahoro was a young editor, but Azikiwe made him that young editor with Osita Agwuna as his assistant, at his paper, the Southern Nigerian Defender in Ibadan, where my own father incidentally started as a rookie before shortly abandoning journalism for the stable berth of the civil service. The myth of Awolowo as building the first this and that does not match the documented economic history of the period.
Between 1954 and 1964, Eastern Nigeria was described as "the fastest growing economy in the world," by the Harvard Review; faster than China, faster than Singapore, and all the so-called "Asian Tigers." Awolowo is often credited with "free education".
But no one yet has pointed out any surviving school buildings of the period built by Awo. But all over the East there were quality schools built by the various communities using the Town Development Unions from 1954, and acessing the matching grants of the Eastern Nigeria Development Corporation. And this was the East with the poorest revenue resources of any of the regions. The Mbaise secondary school exists, the National High School Okigwe exists, the Ngwa High school exists, the Enyiogugu Grammar School exists, etc. These were solid schools built all over the East with matching goverment grants. But where are the buildings of the Modern schools in Western Nigeria? They do not exist. They were makeshift.
The Catholic church forced the Azikiwe government from its scholarship program, but it is also on record, that the Eastern government was the only government in the world that invested 45% of its revenues in education. The East had the highest number of schools; the highest school enrollment; the broadest penetration of medical services; and the best modern road network in west Africa.
Indeed if we look carefully, the only public hospitals and most of the schools still standing in the East today, at various stages of run down are the schools and hospitals built by Azikiwe/Okpara. Every division of the East had a Joint Hospital as part of the Eastern Medical services. So it is often claimed Awo built the first television station; the first sky scraper, and the first Sports stadium, the liberty stadium in Ibadan. Well, these are prestige or white elephant investments.
First, the Eastern Outlook, the government paper of Eastern Nigeria was the first newspaper established by any government in Nigeria, and it was of such quality and impact that the literacy level of Easterners, and the depth of public information retailed by Outlook was without compare. This is besides the fact that Western Nigerian Broadcast Services, WNBS-TV founded in 1958 only preceded the ENBC-TV founded in 1959, by only seven months. But Outlook preceded Sketch by about 15 years.
Now Azikiwe built the Onitsha Modern market, the first modern mall or trade emporium in West Africa. Onitsha was effectively Dubai before Dubai. People traveled all over Africa, from as far as the Congo and Sudan and Egypt, to come and buy and trade in Onitsha. The economic impact of this was humonguos. So, give me the vast Onitsha modern market over Cocoa House in Ibadan.Azikiwe built the first Nigerian University at Nsukka with the first School of Law, the first School of Engineering, the first Business School; the first school of journalism, and the first school of music and performance, etc. By the time its first graduates took the Nigerian civil service exams in 1963, everybody began to raise the cry of "Igbo domination"starting with Akintola and Ayo Rosiji. Give me UNN over Liberty stadium.
Azikiwe began the first modern library system in West Africa. The East had a system of city libraries starting with the very modern Ziks Library in Enugu. I Literally grew up in the Umuahia Divisional Library. These libraries were built all over the East. Schools in the East were built with libraries. Moreover the Eastern Nigerian Library Board had a sysem of rural amd mobile libraries. There was nothing like it anywhere else in Nigeria: kids having library cards and able to borrow or order books from the public library. Give me the the first library over the first TV. I do not by this mean that Awolowo did not make his contributions, but the regular skewering of the facts, and angling of contemporary national narratives often makes it seem these days like the greatest contributor to the founding of Nigeria and its development is Awolowo and the Yoruba, when the actual facts speak differently.
The great Ibadan historian, Tekena Tamuno, was unambiguous in stating once at NIPPS, Jos, that"the Igbos are the makers of modern Nigeria. When they abandoned their project, Nigeria collapsed."We must remind Nigerians, particularly Igbo children, daily of these fact, to achieve what Achebe called " a balance of stories." And that also means we must read beyond the surface of things. Babarinsa's Guardian essay is angled carefully to maintain a revisionist narrative. And that is to be always challenged, however innocent it might seem.
Even today, most Yoruba think that Awolowo founded the Universities of Ibadan and Lagos. No one has reminded them that it took Azikiwe's pressures for a university for Nigeria, in his meeting with Arthur Richards in 1946, that led to the cobstitution of the Eliot commision and subsequently the founding of the University College, Ibadan. This fact is even clearly conveyed in Michael Crowder's eponymous book, The Story of Nigeria. Nsukka was Azikiwe's critique of what he felt to be the conceptual limitations of Ibadan. The University of Lagos was the result of NCNC's ideological contributions to the federal policy during the ill fated coalition government with the NPC. UNILAG was an NCNC project, shepherded by Aja Wachukwu as minister for education. Even the great UNILAG in her 50th anniversary failed to mention Prof Eni Njoku as the pioneer Vice Chancellor of the university, a man that layed the solid foundation of what made Unilag what it is today.
These facts must be made known and put as forcefully accross as possible, without any bias towards our Yoruba Brothers, who equally have contributed immeasurably.
Again, until the lion tells his own story, the story of the hunt will belong to the hunter.
The conversation we don’t want to have about Biafra
By David Hundeyin
Published on May 31, 2019
Ten years ago, when I was a 19 year-old fresher at the University of Hull, I met Ify. She was at that time, probably the most beautiful girl I had ever set my eyes on. I immediately tripped, hit my head and went into an infatuation coma. Ify was the quintessential social butterfly – witty, friendly, distinctly intelligent and culturally Nigerian, with a few notable modifications like her South London accent and a slight tomboy streak. I think my eyeballs actually turned into heart emojis everytime I saw her, and within a week of starting university, my mission in life was to get Ify to be my girlfriend. The problem was, it didn’t matter how much time and attention I dedicated to her – Ify was not interested in me. We were very good friends, but as time went on, it became clear to my great dismay that she and I as an item, was just never going to happen. Eventually, I gave up on Ify and retired to lick my metaphorical wounds, completely assured in my 19 year-old wisdom that I would never love again. Same Country, Different Worlds
Then one day, I happened to stumble into a conversation with our larger group of Nigerian friends, about what brought their families to the UK. Unlike the others, I was not an immigrant, so as a full fee-paying international student, I was effectively not part of the conversation. Our friends with names like Timilehin and Tunde all had similar stories – born in Nigeria, parents wanted more out of life, family moved to the UK. It didn’t occur to me or anyone that Ify – normally the life of the party – was not talking. Then Ify spoke. She was also born in Nigeria – Kaduna to be precise, and she lived there until 2000. That year, a religious crisis broke out in the city, and the Hausa natives embarked on a frenzied pogrom of their Igbo neighbours. According to her, a Mercedes-Benz lorry filled with the dead bodies of slaughtered Igbo people was dispatched from Kaduna to Onitsha. Ify and her family had to hide from their neighbours whom they grew up with, until her dad was able to sneak them out of Kaduna and on a flight to London, with nothing more than the clothes on their backs. That was her “immigrant” story.
When she finished her story, a kind of dead silence followed as our small group of 17 – 20 year-olds tried to process probably the heaviest thing our ears had ever listened to. Suddenly I understood why Ify would never be interested in me, despite seemingly sharing every interest and identity in common – we came from two different worlds. I came from a Nigeria that I spoke of with pride, based on a privileged background and a Lagos-centric worldview. She also came from Nigeria, but her Nigeria was a place of fear, darkness and dread where the kids you grew up playing hopscotch with could at a moment’s notice become your executioners for an offence none of you understood. I remember hearing of the corpse-filled truck incident in Onitsha as an 11 year-old, but it seemed as distant to me as a bombing in Lebanon. “Kaduna” and other exotic places like that were just names I heard in the news. Listening to Ify’s story was the first time any of it felt real. It was the first time the word “Igbo” – pejoratively thrown around in Lagos as a sort of light-hearted insult took on a new meaning to me. It was the start of my struggle to engage with the word “Biafra.” Biafra is a very dirty word Prior to meeting Ify and a number of friends whose experience in Nigeria substantially broadened my worldview, my only knowledge of the Biafran war was a book called ‘Sozaboy’ by Ken Saro-Wiwa, which I found in the family library. The book was written from the point of view of a barely pubescent protagonist thrust into a war he did not understand, and forced to witness acts of incredible violence. He returns home at the end of the war, only to discover that his hitherto innocent sweetheart now has a child conceived through rape. Amidst all the death and carnage, this for him, is the biggest tragedy of the war. I grew up thinking of the Biafran war as this huge, avoidable playground fight between two sets of silly boys who have now learnt their lesson. My parents – like many other Nigerian parents – hardly ever spoke about the war. Occasionally, when someone like Ralph Uwazuruike, the MASSOB leader, appeared on the news, one of them would drop a dismissive comment about “omo Ibo” and that would be that. It never occurred to me that Uwazuruike and his group were not just some asshats on the TV talking about something that happened in 19-gboboro, or that the “omo-Ibo” thing, was a term that carried a certain weight with it. When you grow up and go to school in Lagos, you and your mates all wear the same clothes, speak only English – because your parents won’t speak their language to you at home – listen to the same music, watch the same movies and read the same books – “Igbo,” “Yoruba” and “Hausa” are just annoying subjects at school taught by frustrated teachers with anger issues. You also learn nothing about Nigerian history beyond a few vague soundbites about Herbert Macaulay, Ahmadu Bello and Obafemi Awolowo. The word “Biafra” is completely absent from your syllabus from Primary 1 through to SS3. Even the maps on the wall of my dad’s study which had a water body called “Bight of Biafra” were later replaced with maps labeling the same body of water as “Bight of Benin.” Absolutely nobody wants to talk about Biafra, what came before, what happened next, and how it connects to our modern Nigerian reality. This goes to the heart of Nigeria’s cultural problem – a belief in using silence and hope as a strategy instead of engaging in the messy process of working out a solution. As a country and as a civilization, we believe that if we not-look at a problem hard enough, it will get tired and go away. As we know all too well, that is never going to happen. Civil War or Genocide? Why It Matters Why is our awkward silence on the subject of Biafra extremely problematic? There are several reasons, but to begin with, I think it feeds into our lack of historicity, which manifests itself in our national decision making. If it was general knowledge for example, that a certain Muhammadu Buhari was involved in the so-called counter coup of 1966 – essentially a horrendous massacre of Igbo army officers that directly led to the general pogroms that started the war – even the best efforts of marketing communications agencies in Lagos back in 2015 might not have sufficed to convince Nigerian voters that he was a suitable presidential candidate for the 21st century. But I digress. The Nigerian civil war took place between 1966 and 1970. The Kaduna pogrom mentioned at the outset happened in 2000. What connects the two events and why is it important to break the suffocating silence and delineate what happened as a war or as a genocide as many now say? Well for one thing, it’s the same people who died in both cases – innocent civilians whose crime was being born within an ethnicity called “Igbo,” which didn’t exist 200 years ago. Assuming these “Igbos” as a group genuinely did something to warrant furious retribution – that included having their children poisoned with rations laced with rat-killer – were they again doing that something – whatever it was – in Kaduna in 2000? Since the evidence would suggest not, that points to another motivation for the constant and continued need to massacre a specific group of unarmed civilians. Whatever that motivation is can only be identified by those who hold it – a harmless, eyeglass-wearing Lagos yuppie like myself cannot possibly answer that question. The point however, is that to begin with, “Igbos” did nothing as a group to warrant their wholesale slaughter – both before 1966 and after 1970. If a group of five army majors including a man named Adewale Ademoyega carried out a coup, and the response was to slaughter Mama Nneka the rice seller in Sabon Gari market, along with her entire family and thousands of others, then the question is not “What did Mama Nneka do?” (And for the love of God, don’t say that Mama Nneka allegedly sang a song about somebody shooting somebody because if that is a capital offence, then we might as well just throw the whole country away.) The proper question is “Who felt a need to kill Mama Nneka and why?” It is a similar situation to that of a rape victim in Nigeria who is asked what she did to provoke the aggressive penis, rather than directing a question to the penis-owning rapist. Victim blaming is a product of our toxic cultural silence – which has been fed by our 49-year silence about Nigeria’s most momentous national event. When we ask the right questions and determine that Nigeria’s historically dreadful treatment of one of its three biggest ethnic groups is neither deserved nor justified, but is actually genocidal and irrational, then we can start making progress in our national discourse. If we admit that something is not fair, then that makes us commit to changing it. If we forever continue rationalizing stuff like this, we are merely ensuring that Nigeria will never change the record and dance to something new. The usual saying makes it seem as if when two elephants fight, they get to walk away unscathed while the grass groans in distress. In reality, grass regrows rapidly, but the elephants sustain severe injuries when they use their tusks on each other. In Nigeria’s case, one such severe injury is the moribund, obsolete and miserable Ajaokuta steel mill. At the planning phase, consultants recommended siting the steel mill just outside Onitsha for reasons of proximity to iron ores, cutting down the need for imports. The Nigerian elephant delivered what it thought was a huge blow to the Biafran elephant by moving the mill to Kogi state for purely political reasons. That was over 30 years ago. Today in 2019, Ajaokuta steel mill remains as unused as the day it was commissioned, but with thousands of salary earners and pensioners on its books who have sat there for decades without a single productive day’s work. Nigeria still imports every kind of steel product it needs, and the technology used at Ajaokuta is at least 20 years out of date, making Chinese steel imports cheaper than whatever it could theoretically produce today. Oh, and guess which group of people control that import industry? Yes. Clearly, it wasn’t only the grass that suffered. Now let’s do a quick mental experiment. Inside your mind, picture the map of Nigeria. Shade the parts of the map where Igbo pogroms have been commonplace over the past 70 years. Now select a different mental colour and shade the parts of the map that are currently suffering from near-total breakdown of security due to violence from non-state actors. Notice how you end up shading the second colour almost exactly over the first. Precisely. This is not because of some dead-mans-curse/karma hocus pocus. There are of course numerous political and economic factors contributing to the toxicity of such spaces which cannot be explored in this article. However, a key reason is that after decades of the Nigerian state allowing human beings to be slaughtered at the drop of a hat in those places – because said human beings are named “Chukwuka” instead of “Aliu” – the people there have internalized and normalized such violence. Long after Chukwuka and Odinanka have fled or died, the sense of total impunity and the feeling of power associated with unpunished violence remain firmly rooted in those places. Inevitably, such people turn their weapons on each other and continue acting out what they first practised on “Igbos.” Southwestern Nigeria, which has managed by and large to restrain itself from such orgies of violence is unsurprisingly Nigeria’s safest, wealthiest and most stable region. This is not rocket science. As Chinua Achebe eloquently put it: “We cannot trample upon the humanity of others without devaluing our own.” An Igbo proverb expresses this thought more starkly as “Onye ji onye n’ani ji onwe ya,” which means “He who will hold another down in the mud must stay in the mud to keep him down.” Pain Gives Birth to Strength and Resilience Back when I worked in Marketing, I had a boss, Ayeni Adekunle who was fond of the Yoruba proverb “Ninu ikoko dudu l’eko funfun ti’n jade,” which means “White eko comes out of a black pot.” After 49 years of painful, injurious silence about Africa’s biggest-ever genocide, the cleansing effect of finally speaking up will be a great thing. These conversations will be painful. My good friend Charles Isidi is a good person to talk to if you want to get an insight into how raw, pervasive and real the pain still is, after all these years. I remember being gobsmacked when he informed me that he knows people whose birth certificates read “Republic of Biafra,” because they were born during the war in a country called Biafra. “Nigeria” to them, was simply this big bully next door trying to kill them for no reason – which by the way, is pretty accurate. So what do we do when confronted by stories that we don’t really want to hear, and that we don’t know what to do with? The first thing is probably to listen. Just, listen. Really listen. Don’t interrupt with “Ehn. but you know they couldn’t have known that…” It’s not your story, and it’s not about you. Listen and let people tell their story. Nigeria is not going to fall down and die if we listen to one-third of our population telling us “You know, dropping bombs on my daddy’s head because some guys we never met did something that had nothing to do with us in a place we never saw wasn’t really called for.” It’s a difficult conversation, but not a world-ending one. Ultimately, the Igbo ethnic group is now probably Nigeria’s most widely-recognised and diffused ethnicity, with the vast majority still holding on to their Nigerian identity. My friend Ify whom I mentioned at the outset still identifies with Nigeria and visits from time to time. Despite all that has happened, what binds us all together is still more powerful than what sets us apart. We may have a troubled relationship across ethnic lines in Nigeria, but it can still be salvaged. Like all troubled relationships however, the first and most important step is to have the conversation.
What Igbos Need to Know About Isiagu Symbol(by Anozie Awambu)
In this essay, I use “akwa isiagụ” as metaphor to illustrate that Igbos have not done exactly well to preserve their language and culture. I posit they have abandoned their unique cultural symbol. That they are now parading a symbol of foreign popular culture as their foremost emblem. But I also present perspectives that might ignite a quest for self-rediscovery.
Akwa Isiagụ
Akwa isiagụ is the clothing fabric patterned with motifs showing fierce-looking lion’s head and mane. Some designs show a less stern lion’s head, with two or three cow horns besides it.
Since the last 50 to 60 years Igbos have managed to portray this fabric design as their classic cultural emblem. In fact, as something of a totem. Igbo chiefs and nze and ọzọ titleholders use it to make their ceremonial gears. At native marriage ceremonies and similar cultural events, isiagụ garments of different colours and styles grace the day. Igbo people feel a certain sense of pride when they dress in isiagụ attire. Even non-Igbos regard isiagụ as being to Igbos what the tartan is to Scots. Or the yarmulke is to Jews. Such is the impression, that when they are identifying with or participating at an Igbo traditional practice (eg taking an Igbo chieftaincy), they dress in isiagụ gear. Recent examples include President Buhari, Fayose, Zuma.
But this is an imported foreign popular culture. Neither the lion nor the lion icon has any significance in Igbo cultural foundations. Indeed, using the descriptor ‘isiagụ’ to refer to a lion’s head motif is wrong use of the word “agụ”.
Incorrect Language
Agụ is not lion in Igbo. Agụ is leopard. Folks have written about this before, and I’ve discussed in other forums on the subject. It is pitiful that it remains a source of confusion to many adult Igbos. There is just little understanding of Igbo origins and names of the feline (cat species) animals. You hear all manner of names that contradict biogeography. Like, “agụ is lion, and ọdụm is tiger”. Or, “agụ is lion, and leopard is edi abalị”.
But let’s clear this.
Just as jaguars and cougars are found only in the Americas, tigers inhabit only in Eurasia. They do not belong to the fauna (native animals) of sub-Saharan Africa. Ancient Igbos did not see nor know about tiger, so did not have an indigenous name for it.
Edi or edi abalị is the African civet. One of the 38 viverridae species, it is slightly smaller than the leopard. A carnivore, no doubt, but it is timider, less agile and far less specialised in opportunistic hunting. It has a broadly cat-like general appearance, but its muzzle is more pointed than that of a typical feline. Leopard has distinctive camouflage spots that help it to use forest canopies for cover, enhancing its abilities for surprise hunting, But the African civet typically has black and white spots.
A nocturnal creature that sleeps for about 20 hours a day, the ancient Igbos knew the edi abalị very well. Which is why I[[gbos still use “edi” as metaphor to refer to a person who sleeps a lot. The leopard is bold, agile, versatile, and highly admired in Igbo cultural foundations. But edi is loathed and associated with negativity, because it smells and relies more on con and coy to lure its preys. That’s also why in Igbo language “edi aghụghọ” is a metaphor that references a deceptive person.
Knowledge of the Igbo language structure will indicate agụ is not lion. Many Igbo words were created from metaphorical use of existing words. To form names for creatures or objects, Igbos often devised a two-word metaphor comparing what is sought to be named to an another named object or creature. For example, ụlọ is house, and school is “ụlọ-akwụkwọ” (house for books), while hospital is “ụlọ ọgwụ” (house for medication).
Leopard – agụ – preys on mammals and has spots on its furs. That is why the wall gecko, that preys on insects and has spots, is called agụ ụlọ (ie house leopard). And the crocodile, that preys on water creatures and has patches that resemble the leopard’s spots, is called agụ iyi (leopard of the waters). Similarly, the palm genet, a small mammal that resembles the squirrel but unlike the squirrel has spots on its furs, is called “agụ nkwụ”. In contrast.] the lion has no spots on its furs. The lion’s fur is generally plane brown.
The leopard is Igbo animal totem
Leopard
Being about 3 times the size of a leopard, the lion is stronger and sometimes even preys on the leopard. The Igbo say “ọdụm na-egbu agụ”. Despite this, the lion has no special recognition in Igbo cultural systems. Ancient Igbos likely did not even have any or much contact with lion as a species. For whereas leopards inhabit in rainforests (although they are very adaptable and thrive in other vegetations), lions inhabit mainly in savannah or grasslands. Savannah vegetation do not exist (and likely never existed) in Igboland. Igboid areas sit generally on lowland rainforest.
A lion can occasionally stray into a rainforest or can refuge there if persecuted in its usual habitat. It must have been in such circumstances that Igbos came to know about the lion. Yet that was not enough to diminish their fascination for the leopard, a beast with which they had contended for thousands and thousands of years.
It should be noted that whilst leopards operate solitarily, lions are the most social of the cat species. Lions operate in close-knit social groups called “pride”. Ethologists (scholars of animal behaviours) have observed that this sociality makes the lion a better communicator than other big cats. But it means lions roar frequently and easily broadcast their presence and emotions. Conversely, a leopard’s solitary lifestyle makes it less detectable, and more perceptive and reactive to intrusion. For this reason, its senses of vision and hearing are sharper than those of a lion. Ancient Igbos witnessed this first-hand. They saw how a leopard, hiding stealthily amongst forest canopies, would detect the slightest animal or human movement, and chase and pounced savagely.
In forest environment, a lion has little chance to fight down the more agile leopard. A lion’s size and weight render it less agile to climb high. But a leopard can climb to the top an iroko tree in less than 10 seconds. Leopard is probably the only big mammal that can descend a tree head first. It uses its long tail to maintain perfect aerodynamic balance.
With top average speed of about 80 km per hour, lion is faster than leopard. But it can only run for very short bursts and needs to be close to its prey before starting an attack. But the leopard can run for far longer stretches, at average top speed of about 58 km per hour. A leopard can make a single leap of over 6m (20 ft) horizontally and can jump up to 3 m (9.8 ft) vertically. And it is a powerful swimmer. Although its vision is sharpest in the dark, it can equally be eagle-eyed in the day.
Incredibly versatile, leopard hunts on land, up on the trees and in water. On the trees it can out-manoeuvre specialised climbers and jumpers, including monkeys and baboons. Leopards have been observed leaping and snatching a monkey with a bite mid-air and regaining grip of tree branches. That is, it successfully launches mid-air strike from a treetop and lands back on the tree. It goes into rivers and streams where it overpowers creatures like alligators, and hauls them off the water, all the way up a tree.
A silent predator, when discreteness will give it advantage, it can be elusive. It has a pad of tissue in the flat of its claws that act as silencers when it walks. It can literally hide in plain sight. When it tucks itself in between the fork of tree branches, it just blends with the tree trunk. It can create optical illusion to deceive its prey, including humans. A Leopard will coil its head and tail into its body and crouch flat on the ground appearing like dry wood lying about. Very patient. If its target are animals in a troop, it can hold its cool and then attack the last of the troop from behind.
When persecuted by humans a leopard is more likely to fight back than is a lion. And it does not target one out of a group. It will attack one person after another. Reason the Igbo say “ofu agụ na-achụ mba” (a single leopard can sack a town).
For thousands of years the Maasai people of Kenya have practiced the art of emerging from hiding to scare lions away from their kill and take it home for meet. But a leopard will drag its kill in its mouth and climb a tree. It climbs a tree carrying in its mouth a carcass far heavier than its own size. Animals like bull, giraffe, antelope. In those days, it would attack someone’s goat or sheep and drag it in its mouth deep into the forest and up on a tree.
Leopard climbing a tree with an impala in its mouth
The lion lacks these amazing abilities. In terms of general efficiency and productivity as jungle hunters, the leopard beats the lion, by many miles! Indeed, scientists have determined that, pound for pound (ie adjusted for differences in size and weight) the leopard is the strongest of all the big cat species.
It was for these reasons that the ancient Igbo revered the leopard as their totemic animal for strength, agility, boldness, and courage. And that is also why Igbo language is littered with similes, metaphors, adages and proverbs that use agụ to illustrate positive energy and abilities. Like “omekagụ”, “agụ nwa”, etcetera. And it is why many Igbo families and communities proudly took their names and sobriquets after agụ. Like “Umuagụ, Amagụ Dimagụ, Eziagụ, Duruagụ etc.
Today, as urban dwellers we can look down on the leopard. But to the Igbos of those jungle days, a snarling leopard on the loose was literally nature’s force unleashed. Every hamlet had a chant or cry that was used to alarm the community when a leopard was sighted. In my own area the chant was “ ọ wụ agụo!”. ( it is a leopard o!). Social codes dictated that a person who heard the cry also repeated it, till the entire community was alerted. And until the leopard was killed or confirmed to have returned to the deep forests, usual daily activities were suspended. Children and women would not go the streams to fetch water. No one went to the farms nor led their sheep out to graze. Able bodied men were then organised, in groups, to track down the leopard. And think of it. Those men did not have guns. They went with spears, bows and sticks. Combating the leopard in these situations was an act of extraordinary bravery and patriotism – risking one’s life for the safety of the community. That explains why the person who eventually killed the leopard instantly became a hero and given the honorific “Ogbu Agụ”.
And eating a leopard meat was a once-in-a-generation-experience. Till today Igbos use the metaphor “ọbụ anụ agụ?” (is it a leopard meat?) to question the value of a highly priced or scarce commodity. Of course, the leopard skin was dried and kept by the leopard killer. He and his descendant would display it with pride for hundreds of years afterwards. And legend has it that reputable native doctors harvested the leopard’s bile/gall and used it to prepare the most potent charms or medicines, that warriors drank to boost their bravery and ferocity during intertribal wars.
Very perplexing was this elusive and powerful animal to ancient Igbos, that they even considered it a mysterious creature. A reason many Igbo dialects added the suffix “mystery” or “invisible” (“owo”, “owu”, “owuru” or “awolo”) to its name. Many areas call it agụ owuru – ie, leopard of mystery, mysterious leopard, or leopard that suddenly appears and disappears. Igbo metaphysics believed that some men acquired powers to transform to leopard. To assume the nature and characteristics of a leopard, even for a short period, was considered an attainment of a transcendental and superior state of being.
Indeed, ancient Igbo cosmology explained the entire universe as being some mystical leopard persona.The weather system and visible changes in the skies were said to be a leopard, the sky leopard. The thick clouds that formed in the sky before rainfall were its shimmering eyes just waking from sleep. The movement of tick clouds was the movement of the leopard in its marauding character. The sparks of lightening that came before a thunder were the leopard’s flashing eyes. The thunder was its voice snarling in anger and ready to pounce. The heavy rains were its urine gushing with a force typical of its strength. And bright day was the sky leopard fully awake, with eyes wide open.
The Lion symbol is not originally Igbo
This portrayal of the lion as symbolic cultural icon of the Igbos is only recent. It is driven by the influence of modern media and foreign popular culture. We watch a lot of animal documentaries these days and read a lot of books that continue to inform us the lion is the king of the beasts. True! But they don’t tell us about the king of our forests.
Today in global popular culture (eg children cartoons, films, etc) we are taught to be like the lion. Because throughout histories and in many parts of the world the lion image has been used in stories, artworks, coats of arms, logos and advertisements to depict strength, ferocity, power, confidence and success. The bible and other major religious texts also contain the lion symbolism. And so, the Igbos yielded – completely! We abandoned our equivalent animal totem, and even had to distort our language as a result.
Yet Igbo folklore is filled with stories that reference “agụ” as the king of animals. First generation Igbo intellectuals had no misunderstanding that agụ was leopard. And they were acutely aware of its significance in the Igbo culture and worldview.
In Onuora Nzekwu’s classic novel Eze Goes to School (published 1963), the ravaging beast which held the people of Ohia hostage, which Eze’s father killed but later died from the wound it inflicted on him, was a leopard, not a lion. Anezi Okoro’s 1966 novel ‘The Village School’ featured an intriguing student. Ismael was popular amongst his mates because his father was a reputed hunter who killed a leopard and took the title “The Leopard Killer”.
In 1950 Cyprian Ekwensi published a novel entitled ‘The Leopard’s Claw’. Chinua Achebe later published a short story with the title “How the Leopard Got Its Claws”. He narrated an Igbo folktale featuring leopard as the king of the animals. Achebe’s other book ‘Anthills of The Savanah’ narrates the incident when the leopard, the king of the forest, was to kill the tortoise and how the tortoise scattered sand and grass. And in of ‘Arrow of God’ he masterfully devised an English translation of a popular Igbo proverb ‘Agụ aghaghị ịmu ihe yiri agụ” as “what the leopard sires cannot be different from the leopard”.
These men did not talk about the lion.
Chukwumeka Ike’s novel “The Bottled Leopard” explores Igbo metaphysics in the context of interpersonal strife during primal times. It tells the story of how men acquired metaphysical powers and transformed to leopards to terrify their neighbours or attack their animals.
Wago the protagonist of ‘The Great Ponds’ (the second novel of Elechi Amadi’s trilogy) was revered in the community because he killed a leopard. He was even hailed by the honorific “The Leopard Killer”. What surprised the members of the community was that the brave Leopard Killer later committed suicide, something they deemed an act of cowardice.
Gabriel Okara, an Ijaw man, was educated at Government Collage Umuahia and worked in Enugu for many years. He wrote the famous poem ‘The Drum and the Piano’. Romanticising primal African life, he used the imagery of a “leopard snarling about to leap and the hunters crouch with spears poised”.
If you’ve read the works of late great poet Christopher Okigbo, you will see repeated references to the leopard. In a manuscript drafting the poem ‘Land of Our Birth’ which he intended to be Biafra’s anthem, Okigbo wrote of Eastern Region’s (mostly Igbos) resolve to found its own republic: “This leopard is now unchained”.
Defunct Biafran Armed Forces published and circulated a periodic newsletter/bulletin to engage the masses. It was not for nothing that the brand name of that bulletin/newsletter was “The Leopard”. Indeed, the coat of arms of that republic, which was the same used by Eastern Region, proudly featured a charging leopard.
Stay true to who you are
Leopard skin (“akpụkpọ agụ”) was the totemic body-covering material in Igbo cultural foundations. In this modern era, if any fabric should be an emblem of Igbo culture, it is leopard skin fabrics. This lion symbol expresses nothing unique about the Igbo.
Leopard skin: akpụkpọ agụ
Totemic symbols embody and express the spirit, history, character and worldview of a people: what they have been through on their road to civilisation. How they see themselves in the world. The standards and qualities they aspire to, collectively and as individuals.
It is not difficult to see parallels between the leopard’s characteristics and core Igbo character: There is the leopard’s individualism – that Igbo man’s tendency to take his own destiny in his hands. The leopard is vigilant and opportunistic. The Igbo are wired to identify and take advantage of changing dynamics. Think of the spirit of enterprise and consider the leopard’s ability to perform feats that are out of proportion to its size. What about the leopard’s versatility? The Igbo excel in any enterprise they truly apply their energy to. And then adaptability. The Igbo have not only survived different challenging conditions and thrived in different regions and environments. They have tuned adversities to opportunities and made huge successes out of nothing.
No imperial influence has forced the Scots to abandon the tartan. Nor has centuries of persecution swayed Jews to discard the yarmulke. The leopard was also the animal totem of the Zulu. That proud people of South Africa remain proud of it. Why then did the Igbo falter?
TO MY TOWNSMEN, ADULTERY WAS A CREATION OF THE WHITEMAN'S RELIGION 😂🤣🤣
By Anayo M. Nwosu
It was about the second week of November 1907 when the town crier announced that the attention of the adult men and women of the entire Ọkpụnọ Otolo Nnewi community was required at Obi Ezechukwu; that some whitemen needed to address them and to also distribute some gifts to the members of the community.
It was an Orie market day hence many people were in attendance. The meeting conveners must have been advised not to fix the meeting on Nkwo or Eke market days. Nobody would have attended as Ọkpụnọ people didn't play with those two market days.
Reverend Moonlight was very courteous in his gait and was too condescending for a whiteman as he tried to shake the hands of all the titled men in attendance. He could tell the titled men by their red caps adorned with one feather or more depending on their ranks.
The whiteman's interpreter, a fellow Igbo man from Opobo, thrilled the audience with his eloquent interpretation of Rev Moonlight's speech. The natives wondered how long it took him to learn, interpret and speak the whiteman's tongue.
Rev. Moonlight started by telling his audience that he and his organisation were not part of the colonial government; that he came to introduce them to a superior being who created the world and who all human beings must worship. He told them how God sent his only son into the world to save mankind.
After ten minutes, the whiteman paused and asked his assistants to start the distribution of clothes, combs, mirrors, shoes and wrappers. They started from the titled men then to the women and the youths. The visitors ensured that majority of the people in attendance got one item or the other.
The gifts enlivened his audience especially those that got mirrors. For the first time, they could see themselves more clearly, much more than they ever saw themselves as a reflection from Ụbụ stream or from a pool of rain water. Also, the elderly who got wrappers tied them there and then as it was the height of the harmattan season.
When Rev. Moonlight recommenced his message, he had before him a happy audience but he chose the wrong topic.
He decided to tell his audience about 10 Commandments of his God.
All went well until he got to the 6th Commandment "Thou shalt not commit adultery.”
"You should not have sexual intercourse with any other woman besides your wife", the whiteman explained to the disapproval of the adult males present.
"Dunu Ụmụagbala, ị na anụkwọ ife nwoke anyarị a na-ekwugheri?" meaning "did you hear the nonsense oozing out of the mouth of that albino", Nzeribe Ámáoké asked his friend.
The 6th Commandment didn't factor in the age long practice of Iko or Agịlị in Igbo land whereby a married woman was expected to have a married male friend known as her Ọyị, Iko or Agịlị.
The female Ọyị or Agịlị had the right to visit her friend at his home without the man's wife raising any eyebrows.
However, male Ọyị, Iko or Agịlị were not encouraged to visit theirs in their husbands' houses. But, no man killed his wife for having a sexual relationship with her Ọyị or Iko.
But the husband must approve of his wife's choice of Ọyị, Iko or Agịlị even as some women might decide not to have any Agịlị or Ọyị expecially the proud, frigid or contented type. But, it was very rare to see a man without an iko or agịlị except "ndị ume ngwụ" or men who ordinarily couldn't do long distance races.
Whenever a man went to market to buy clothes for his wife, he wouldn't fail to buy some for his Agịlị.
The Ọyị, Agịlị or Iko system ensured that no woman became barren because of the inability of her husband to impregnate her. This was in line with Nnewi adage that "onye egbe ya nyụrụ ọkụ e nyere ya aka" meaning "someone would have to help another man whose gun has failed to discharge bullets".
At that time, no greetings or pleasantries was complete without asking a man about his "ezi na ụlọ". Ezi represents the man's Agịlị while Ụlọ represents his immediate household.
Therefore, the elderly men could read the mischief on the face of the Opobo man, the whiteman's interpreter as he kept on shouting "akwana iko ma ọbụ agịlị", "ayịna ọyị"! All meaning, "don't commit adultery"
The interpreter knew quite well that the happiness brought about by material gifts distributed by Rev. Moonlight would soon disappear with the criminality the 6th Commandment would bring to the people's long-term sweet cultural practice of Iko or Agịlị.
During the question and answer session, Dunu Amaoke had the last word, "Rev. Moonlight, I'm glad to hear you say that your God answers prayers. Please ask him and his son to modify the 6th Commandment for us to cover only the unauthorised access to a woman's honeypot without paying bride price or without the husband's consent which in our land is also a taboo. We call it "ije ohi ọtụ" and it is not tolerated.", he paused as he adjusted the feather on his cap.
"I so request because ọkwa mba na-achị na olu na olu", meaning that "because we are different tribes or races, we are bound to have different cultures and shout in different tones",Dunu Amaoke ended to a high sounding applause from all adults present.
Il massaggio Shiatsu che si effettua tramite la pressione delle dita, dei palmi delle mani e dei piedi e dei gomiti su tutto il corpo, agisce sui punti energetici considerati dall'agopuntura. Stimola la circolazione sanguigna ed il flusso linfatico, agisce sul sistema nervoso allentando la tensione muscolare più profonda, rimuove le tossine dei tessuti, risveglia il sistema ormonale e sollecita la capacità di autoguarigione del corpo.
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