THE IGBOS ARE GODS

Some say the Igbos are paranoid, meaning  the Igbos imagine things that are not really there. Others say the Igbos are arrogant, suspicious, fearful, mistrustful, obsessed with money, or have unreasonable business practices. Our observation is overwhelmingly significant. The Igbos  have to be gods. Though no Igbo has been elected President of Nigeria, one day someone will. The prospect that an Igbo would eventally be Nigerian President some day is as inevitable as the appearance of daylight after the darkest night!

The Igbos are gods. Igbos are a breed by itself, a seriously misunderstood variety.  Being the gods they are, the Igbos are survivors.  it is impossible for Igbos to be primitive or paranoid as some people make us to be without understanding who the Igbos are.

Watch the Igbos walk down the world ramp with grace and recherché nonchalance. They are the indestructible, they are the   indefatigable, and they are God’s people chosen and ordained to carry the mantle.  The mantle is the badge of honor, the layer, blanket, covering, shroud, veil, cloak, responsibility, or functionality that is entirely Igbo. 

The purpose of this essay is a response to portrayals of Igbos as paranoid. This Igbo writer seeks to defend his people long maligned in the course of Nigerian history during which the Igbos have been the butt of slander, criticism, smear, libel, hurt, harm, damage, or mkpogide no obe (mailing  on the cross). Read to the bottom of this essay to discover how and why the Igbos are considered as gods.

It is time the Igbos were left alone. First, people ought to learn to circumvent the habits of insulting people to get them to do what they want done. Secondly, people ought to provide positive reinforcements (encouragement and praise) to help others want to do what people want done. We would add the efficacy of social observational learning that requires the modeling of behavior you want others to acquire through emulation, process of imitation . Albert Bandura is our favorite psychologist, though other theorists are quite useful. Note that Western-style counseling approaches do not work well with in general with Africans who prefer the more direct approach.  Why? Our personality demands a more structured approach.

We Igbos are not primitive; it is just that we are a high-strung, aggressive and indefatigable group on the outside, but underneath, are fearful, intimidated, and stressed out. Remember  Igbos are barely crawling out of  a terrible war of attrition where they were made to wear the cloak reserved for a defeated, vanquished people What do you see happening to the Igbo boys carrying placard and agitating for Biafra nationhood? Igbos are experiencing an abrasion, a slow destruction or erosion of selfhood. Can anyone see the process of wear and tear, eating away and emasculation of Igbo manhood?

 Nigerians aren’t  some irredeemable, incorrigible, unalterable sadists who draw joy from human suffering, are they? Don’t they see the gnawing away, the wearing away, and the grinding down of Igbos? Are Nigerians truly humane?  It is normal to expect Igbos to experience intense symptoms of the post traumatic stress syndrome as manifested in Igbo behavior. Though all these things are so, yet we Igbos are a people who keep hope alive.  With time, “ogadiri Ndiigbo mma” (it shall be well with Igbos).  Sometimes, Some  Igbos believe “odigoro Ndiigbo nma” (it is already well with Igbos). The Igbos are gods.  An aspect of being a god is ability to be an overcomer. The igbos have overcome seemingly insurmountable obstacles, including pogroms, near total annihilation, and refugee camps. 

 This writer was at Enugu at the end of the War as the Ministry of Health and Social Welfare of the Eastern Nigerian Government was spearheading the repatriation of Biafran children out of London and other African countries to which they were sent to escape starvation and kwashiorkor. This writer’s late wife Maxine Myers Agazie, PhD, MSSW,  was the first trained and certified professional social worker employed with the government  of Sole Admininstrator Ukpabi Asika to organize children’s adoptions at the end of  the Biafran War.

You could not avoid shedding tears  (if the milk of human feeling  was  left in you)at the plight of Igbo children. These Biafran  babies and surviving toddlers  were not provided with any type of advocacy, adjustment, or rehabilitation counseling  as they were being processed for adoption. They were just passed off like animals and reintegrated anyhow into society they did not understand  them, and placed with families who did not understand  the trauma these kids had been through and who proved to be exploiters and abusers.

The children’s parents were either dead or unwilling to accept the responsibility to care for vulnerable, at-risk persons. There was no food in the homes into which the babies were deposited. The preferred option the Ministry of Health and Social Welfare (MHSW) adopted was haphazard adoptions by men who were unrelated to the adoptees, and who seized the opportunity to marry underage babies. How these kids survived to this day is a prayer only God could answer.

 We mention this to show that the Igbos have survived so many atrocities for too long and with so little help it is believed Igbos  can survive anything anytime anywhere and  anyhow. The current thinking is this: the Igbos are mini gods that descended directly from heaven. Of all the Nigerian tribes, the Igbos appear to be the only group that hasn’t been given the opportunity to benefit from real rehabilitation programs. Igbos have not had opportunities to experience love from neighbors and to acquire altruism.

 To be altruistic is to be unselfish, selfless, humane, and philanthropic.  Therefore,  Igbos do not take help-your-brother stance seriously. The Jews and the Italians do help each other. The Igbos at the Nigerian Federal Ministries would prefer Hausa or Yoruba heads to one of their kind. This writer asked: "Why not prefer fellow Igbo managers?" Allegations given were that Igbos are taskmasters, Igbo bosses would underpay their employees, and Igbos are heartless.

The real reason why Igbos do not provide for each other is this: Igboland is so overcrowded the people need to move out elsewhere. Wherever they go, the Igbos suffer some form of persecution at hands of spiteful neighbors.  Recall the experiment done with mice in an overcrowded environment where some electrical shocks were delivered at random. Like Igbos just out of a war with nowhere else to go, the mice experienced PTSS (post traumatic stress syndrome), resulting in maladaptive behavior that included homosexuality, cannibalism, with male mice attacking females and infants.

We admire the Igbos for surviving the atrocities of war and carrying on without extensive psychotherapy as if nothing has happened.  Th e Jews wouldn’t have been able to survive the Holocaust without massive reparations and UN-sponsored rehabilitation efforts. With time, we Igbos shall acquire such survival skills as resistance, politeness, altruism, loyalty, and all other good attitudes. 

The Igbos need the world’s understanding, kindness,  and encouragement. We do not need the world’s  condemnation, criticisms or to be over-psychoanalyzed. Igbos do not need others’ pity, sympathy or condescension because Igbos are gods, and gods do not need the forgiveness or benevolence of mortals. There are creative and fictional, survivalist explanations as to why Igbos see themselves as gods,

One of the characteristics of gods is their indefatigability, the quality of being untiring. Indefatigability is inexhaustibility or the ability to work and continue to work for a very long time without becoming tired. To the extent that gods are infinite and inexhaustible, Igbo are gods. Infinity is endlessness of energy.  Inexhaustibility is boundlessness or get-up-and-go. The spirit of Ndiigbo is as inestimable as it is illimitable.

The Igbos are so indefatigable, aren’t they? An indefatigable person is one who is unrelenting, remorseless, unstoppable, unflagging, and inexorable. After pondering over the Igbo paradox, one may  asks some perplexing questions.  What gives the Igbos their distinguishing personality?. Why are these people strong, fearless, adventuresome go-getters? Why do they go up Northern Nigeria and spend “billions of Naira, in fact, trillions of okpoyo ha (their money)  to develop the North, to build schools, churches, 5-star hotels, and banks, dingy beer parlors? Some people add ulo ashawo  (brothels) to the list of Igbo accomplishments in Northern Nigeria. 

Now, let us define further the Igbo indefatigability by describing the mythical and culture-based  paradox of Igbo personality. A paradox is the inconsistency, absurdity, irony, contradiction, impossibility, or illogicality of Igboism/Igbotism. Therefore, Ndiigbo are gods. There is a mythical explanation of why and how Igbos have become gods.

One market day somewhere before the advent of Bible-carrying white men, while natives were trading their wares by barter and with cowries, a fiery star fell off the sky and landed in the center of the village. As illiterate and terrified as the villagers were, all adults and children scampered  into their huts, thinking an angry god had arrived to exact penalties for their undisclosed trespasses. No one ventured out for several days until a day after a heavy rainstorm fell. Pandemonium broke loose as a muscular stranger was hatched out of the fallen fiery star.

Without uttering “Ndewo” (thank you) or “Kedukwanu?”(how are you?)  in the way of greetings, the muscular stranger started to construct his own abode. He didn’t ask for help or food. He simply walked into your hut and helped himself to your food, knives, hoes, machete, and sticks. He dug behind your hut to gather his mud and climbed your palm trees to cut the fronds and harvest a calabash of palm wine.

 Villagers watched in amazement as the stranger worked and toiled and finally completed a big three-mansion-sized building much like the Aso Rock where President Buhari of Nigeria resides. It had a huge toilet dug in the middle of the bedchamber into which no stool was dropped. The latrine or shit hole was stuffed with bales of money.

The stranger then went to sleep. Villagers dared not enquire into his name or say PIM as to why he shouldn’t pay for “borrowing” their stuffs and eating their food. After series of discussions and a poll, male villagers decided to name the stranger Chi. Because Chi came from heaven, he is god and anthropomorphic, sharing some attributes with Chineke (the Almighty God).

Chi considers himself superior to other mortals, including the Hausas, Yorubas, Fulani, Munchi, and the Mmoghos. His antithesis is Ekwensi (the devil or evil spirit). He doesn’t need mortals’ permission to do as he pleases. Because Chi does anything he pleases, says whatever he chooses, goes anywhere he wants, eats all things he fancies, Ekwensu (Satan) becomes jealous and  tries to exert power over him. In fact, Chineke (the Almighty God) recognizes Chi as His own son, and has lots of regards for him. Chi shares Chukwu’s (Chineke’s) omnipotence (superpower), omniscience (unequalled knowledge), and omnipresence (being present everywhere at the same time).

The only difference between Chi and Chineke (Almighty God) is that Chi could not live beyond a certain age, though he sometimes wishes his money would buy him ndu ebighi ebi (everlasting life). One pernicious, dreadful, insidious, or bad aspect of Chi’s disposition is his uncanny or weird ability to come to your community, take over, and put you out while asking you: “Can I help you?”

Chi is to be greatly feared and respected by lesser gods and minor tribes. Chi deeply believes he is not on equal footing with the other gods, including the gods of rain and thunder, god of procreation, and god of harvest of new yams. In fact, Chi is higher, and he is known by other names, including Chukwuka, Chima, Chuma, Chukwuma, Chinedu, Chikwendu, Chigozie, Chijioke, Chibundu, or other names starting with the word Chi.

Chi never loses arguments with mortals because he is a god whose knowledge supersedes all others around except Chukwu or Chineke. Chi eventually became a big farmer, and married several wives to produce millions of children. His children are the Igbos of today. Chi is hated by the other tribes, including  the Hausa, Fulani, Mogho, Munchi, Shua-shua, Akputu, and others because Chi had never paid for the things he borrowed while building his house. Waiting for Chi to pay his debts is waiting forever.

 There is a culture-based explanation for the personality of the Igbos. The Igbos became who they are as a result of cultural influences. Many moons ago before the advent of the white man and thereafter, most Igbo men were cultivators of  such  staple foods as ji (yams), akpu (cassava), akidi (beans), ede (coco-yams), oka (corn), utaba (tobacco), and opupa (groundnuts), to name only a few.

Because times were hard, labor scarce and expensive, and money in short supply, most Igbo farmers married many wives for economic reasons, namely,  to produce enough children to work on family farms. Men planted yams and cassava, and women tended to vegetables , like okwuru, onugbu, egusi, uturukpa, and anara.  What the farmer and his wife or wives harvested were sold at open markets that fell on specific market days, such as  Eke, Oye, Afor, or Nkwo days.

Whatever money the farmer realized was spent on family needs, including clothes, food, medications, and children’s school expenses (books, fees, and uniforms). The family head, Nna Anyi (our Father) always played an important role as protector and disciplinarian. Children respected, honored and revered Papa who carried the family Ofor. 

The Ofor is the symbol of authority held by the oldest family member, and Papa is the originator of the family. As family heads, fathers provided direction for all family members to follow, including wives. Children were taught to become future fathers and mothers in their own homes. 

Boys were expected to watch their fathers labor, heave, and strain on stubborn soil that must be made to yield food and other family needs. Girls watch as  mothers cook, clean, wash, become impregnated, give birth, and take care of young children, All children were made aware of family expectations: boys to marry and become fathers and husbands; girls to marry men and become wives and mothers in their own homes. Both boys and girls are to produce children for their husbands and wives.

Igbo men grow up to be just as industrious as their fathers in hard work and wisdom. Igbo girls pattern after their mothers. Family honor is to be maintained at all times through being responsible, providing food and shelter for the family, obeying traditions and fulfilling customs related to elderly parents, traditional marriages, family inheritances, funerals, and  chieftaincy titles. This is how the Igbos have developed to be who they now are.

COPYRIGHTED  MATERIALS.

Submitted by Dr. James C. Agazie, jamesagazie@gmail.com, jamesagazies.blogspot.com

AFRICA MAY BENEFIT FROM HOMOSEXUALITY

There is no evidence that the Obama administration homosexualized Africa. It appears that indeed homosexuality may benefit Africa. And before you throw your hands up in the air and dismiss this writer as a gay man or accuse former US President Obama of introducing gay virus into Africa, wait. Read on!  Africans have many lessons to learn before the close of the second half of the 21^st Century, The most important lesson is to fast forward knowledge of science and technology. The next is to try effective population control mechanisms. Overpopulation is a serious problem many African nations can no longer ignore or take lightly. 

The purpose of this essay is to share some thoughts on why the U S Supreme Court’s recent decision legalizing same-sex unions is a significant step in the right direction and why we Africans should not rush to judgment on controversial issues. The Supreme Court decision seems to be telling Africans: “if you don’t stop fucking and having too many babies you’ll run out of land and food. Please don’t look to us to bail you out We have our own problems.”  

What do Africans do when the die is cast? Will Africans choose to become homosexual or homophobic? Having said this bluntly does not ipso facto justify placing homosexual labels on foreheads of persons who disagree with the contention that only heterosexuals have the right to inhabit God’s earth.   

Our position is that, since we have not yet learned all that there is to know about the subject, we ought to exercise caution rather than gather all homosexuals together in one spot  and slaughter them. A word of caution means that mankind’s knowledge of human sexuality, including the homos and how the brain operates, is incomplete. We ought to tread cautiously, watchfully, vigilantly, guardedly, or carefully, rather than act recklessly since we aren’t even beginning to scratch the surface of the problem.

We are facing very serious challenges both from within and without. There is a threat from famine, hurricane, tornadoes, and flooding associated with pollution and global warming.  Muslim terrorism poses serious threats around the world and in Nigeria, Central African Republic, and at the Winter Olympic Games at Sochi, Russia. No nation is safe or immune from terrorist or chemical attacks. Remember the 911.

There is a potential threat from wars we fight to contain terrorism or to defeat persons or groups bent on destroying our earth. The problem of the world seems to be concentrated in one word – security.  HOMOSEXUALITY appears to offer the best deterrent, at least in the minds of Western thinkers.  

The world cannot handle the tremendous press and demand placed on our fragile planet. A press is defined as the act that has the tendency to punish, push, depress, force down on, compress, or squash.  It is predicted that the next 100 years would witness the transportation to and colonization of other planets (such as Mars) to ease earth’s  problems. That’s a tremendous solution, isn’t it? 

We are in a race to find ways to push back at our pressures or retaliate against the seemingly insurmountable problems we are facing on earth. What are these problems? They are :  (a) Threats of wars, famine, and overpopulation; (b) Control of scarce resources; (c) Establishment  of New World Order; (d) problems created by superstitious beliefs; and (e) Development of  new economic system that delineates the  upper class and the underclass or  slave minorities.

Homosexuality is thought to be the cheapest, less controversial solution to a big problem created by diminishing returns on investment, exploding population, and disintegrating environment. The only solution’s drawback is convincing a significant portion of people on planet earth to accept homosexuality as normal or alternative lifestyle.

Recent research is beginning to unearth the proposal that homosexuality is far from being  an aberration  An  aberration is defined as a deviation, an irregularity, or abnormality. Homosexuality seems to provide awesome solution to the questions of overpopulation, hunger, violence, and pollution . The thinking of supporters of U S Supreme Court same-sex decision  appears to be centered on certain basic principles.

Homosexual or same sex persons appear to be better educated and to have higher disposable incomes than heterosexuals.

Same sex unions do not produce children to help deplete our limited natural resources because there are no child-rearing expenses, such as food, education, and health bills.

Unmarried persons are jealous of the benefits married men and women enjoy and wish they had such advantages as homesteads, tax benefits, health insurance, death benefits, and social security, to mention just a few.

When childless homosexuals die, their money, property, and huge investments revert to the State and comes back to society.

       Homosexuality will help keep world population to a minimum because children will not be born to replace the dead or to repopulate and re-pollute the environment. Convincing people to become homosexuals is much cheaper and easier to achieve than waging wars to harvest resources because wars are very expensive and can cost about 10,000,000 dollars per bomber; and 10,000 dollars per gun and ammunition.

Convincing people to embrace homosexuality will be accomplished in a more cost-effective manner than colonizing Mars and other planets because in the event  earth becomes so polluted and uninhabitable we have to abandon our planet and seek refuge in heavenly places. It costs between 4 to7 billion dollars to send a rocket to Mars. The cost of sending people to Mars would be prohibitive. Therefore, let’s stay where we are with homosexuals.

Marriage is no longer in vogue as people are divorcing much faster than they are wedding  so people are opting for same-sex arrangements as a more satisfying arrangement than the man-woman marriages plagued with irreconcilable differences. 

Homosexuality may be a solution to threats caused by overpopulation. The world’s population is increasing astronomically beyond the 7 billion people the earth can comfortably handle.  China is relaxing its one-child law as a result of its newfound wealth.   Poor people in India and African nations are procreating children as rats do in a warm house of cheese.

There is a massive infiltration of Latinos into North America in search of available space to raise, feed and educate their children. It seems plausible the Western nations are likely  to sanction Africa and other Third World countries for being  baby-producing factories that swell numbers to a breaking point. 

Homosexuality may benefit Nigeria where “hunger deh” and each Nigerian household prides itself in having 5 or more children. Who will feed these hungry mouths when populations are bursting at the seam, and people are shifting to urban areas and away from farmlands?  Aren’t villages  being abandoned, and becoming baby manufacturing factories?

 These baby factories are an oxymoron, creating headaches on one hand and demanding handouts with the other hand. America, Britain and the have nations are tired of doling out foreign aid. The haves are sanctioning baby producers and saying:  “Stop all that fucking and sperming and stop criminalizing homosexuality.” 

Same sex agenda may be a way to exert control on population and distribution of scarce resources:  Our resources are getting thinner and inadequate to take care of our needs. Land, the most important natural resource, is fully occupied, or taken over by the strong from the weak. But land is very scarce and fought over fiercely in Zimbabwe, Jos, and Central African Republic.

 The West (America and Britain) sell weapons of mass destruction to one African tribe to be used to kill the other, And the winning tribe is to hand the land along with resources over to the Western nations (Britain, Russia or America) to pay for costs of the guns bombs, airplanes, and technical advisers.

Same sex is thought to be a means to an end in the control of exploding populations. Land is not enough to contain an unlimited number of people. Where there are overpopulation and inadequate supply of food, strange things do happen. There is starvation and disease. There are wars. In Congo, pigmies are being hunted down as bush animals and eaten. It is alleged the Malawians are slaughtering and eating persons with albinism because it is believed doing so confers magical powers. Cannibalism means “I am hungry and I need to eat something.”  

 

 Experimental psychologists have demonstrated that in overpopulated environments, rats become violent, engage in homosexual activities, attack the young, rape the females, and develop aggressive behavior. Rats behave as cannibals. These aberrant behaviors are  happening nowadays in the Hutu-Tutsi massacres, boko vs. Christian violence in Nigeria, Islam-Christian bloodshed, South Sudan militarism, and so forth.  Could embracing homosexuality  provide solution to some of the problems Africans are facing in the Continent?

Can same sex unions help in the development of New World order?  Politicians are running around scared, devising ways to maintain a new economic underclass and slave minorities.  Americans are considering a return to the antebellum slave plantation of Georgia. There is a rush to keep wealth in as few hands as possible.

This is the puzzle that Western leaders and Third World corrupt  heads are putting  heads together to solve: how to survive without  building underground tunnels leading to massive mansions that would store food to last for decades in case the earth becomes  too badly uninhabitable. Selfish leaders  are asking:  “How do we keep the taxes coming in, the oil flowing from Nigeria, and our bills paid on time?” To do so would entail keeping permanent upper and under classes (1% vs. 99%), separated.

Homosexuality is expected to have a profound effect  in Africa and on Africans: The Continent of Africa is in for a big surprise. While Africans continue to weigh homosexuality as a moral issue, the West sees same-sex as a solution to a greater problem related to pollution, overpopulation, poverty, and violence.  The Western powers will exploit the 54 nations in Africa for raw materials and force Africans to become consumers of Western goods, especially the cheap stuffs from China. Africans will be used as experimental guinea pigs for the testing of new products, epidemics, weapons, and prophylactics/cures.

Economic sanctions  will be slapped against any African country that criminalizes homosexuality (Kenya and Uganda and Nigeria) until-the whole world becomes non-homophobic.  It is only then, in the Western thinking, can overpopulation be controlled. Africans pride themselves on being “ fruitful, multipliers’ and replenishers” of the earth with house full of children The Supreme Court decision seems to be telling Africans: “if you don’t stop fucking and having too many babies you’ll run out of land and food. Please don’t look to us to bail you out. We have our own problems.”  These are just preliminary thoughts.

Posted by Dr. James C. Agazie, jamesagazie@gmail.com; jamesagazies.blogspot.com