₦airaland Forum

Eastlink:
Academic exercise without political backing is simply noise making. I support your idea wholeheartedly, but you also need political will power to achieve this. The same way Ijaws are using funds from Ministry of Niger-Delta, Amnesty and the likes to finance INC and sponsor willing persons in Bonny/Opobo is advance the Ijaw agenda, is the same way Ndigbo must rise up to assert itself in Bonny.

Look at what Yoruba’s did in Warri to destroy the Bini-edict that was done in old Bendek state that only a Prince with Benin mother can become King in Itshekiri. Awolowo during the first republic forsaw the Ijaw/Itshekiri crisis and made move to forstal that ownership battle by changing Olu of Itshekiri to Olu of Warri. I have no reason to bring Yoruba’s into this discuss but as a major ethnic group just like Igbos we need to assert ourselves and understand the advantage we wield.

Ndigbo keep running in circles which have allowed the Ijaw to use those loophole to land grab Igbo territories.

True.
I have mentioned about the lack of strong and informed Political leadership that reasons beyond eating, drinking, sleeping with akwuna, and stockpiling funds in tax havens and buying properties in Europe and North America with public funds, in Igboland.

We need a strong Political leadership fully invested in strategic issues affecting Ndiigbo as a people in all five SE states and beyond as governors of five SE states!

Any push for Igbo independence that doesn't start with first and foremost hijacking through the ballots the Political leadership of Igboland from councillors to Senate and Governors, is a waste of time and scam.

I have told IPOB people this severally.

I had once had the privilege of being with a state house of assembly member in one of Igbo states, and I raised some of these issues.
To my surprise, not only was these man totally unaware of these issues, he had zero interest in them.
All he wants is money, women, drink! That's all that tickles his fantasy.
You can't have such people representing your Political interests, and you are talking about Buhari and NIGERIA, when you haven't done your home work and cleanup your home mess.

JANK23H:
I've downloaded Captain Crow's memoir and will study it within this period.The little I've read so far make me think the Igbos here are either lacking in comprehension,or just being mischievous.

Post the snippets that talked about Jos men in Bonny by Captain Crow.
Quit making yeye statements.
We all have the document as well.

JANK23H:
What wrong with you guys?
Do you have selective amnesia?

I posted works of Captain Pereira confirming the Jos as inhabitants of the Rio Real,which is situated in Bonny and New Calabar.You always pretend no to know about it

You are not good at this.
No where in that your snippet was Bonny mentioned.
The snippet only mentioned the Ijaw(Jos people) pirated lurking those Rivers .
Which I noted and even showed you a U tube video of Ijaw pirates still lurking in coasts and Rivers of Bonny today, causing mayhem to the Indigenes.

Post those snippets again and Mark out where Bonny was mentioned there if dem born you well.

Eastlink:
I’m aware this event took place during the tenure of GEJ and not recent. Secondly, the Chairman of Opobo/Nkoro LGA and the Perm Sec for information and culture are no longer in seat. Moreover, they acted in their capacity as politicians. This is the angle the INC are harping on to gain a sort of emotional foothold on the riverine communities. Using such events to merge land grabbing tendencies. And we know that politics in Rivers state has been turned into a upland vs riverine affair all thanks to Ikwerre vs Kalabari political battles.

So I’m not surprised seeing the underground handwriting of INC sponsored cultural move in Bonny/Opobo.

The INC have cemented their status in the Niger-Delta after the emergence of GEJ and other monopolistic ownership of the Ministry of Niger-Delta, amnesty and the NDDC, as more financial inflow is pushed forward towards the Ijawnization efforts to corner communities in Warri/Bonny/Gelegele/Obolo etc.

If Ndigbo can get their politics right, then they will be an halt to that Ijaw shenanigans that INC keep exporting to Rivers state. First of them will be to fix her gaze in communities outside the SE. Get involved in the political battles in Nigeria and get her people to quit the emotional attachment to Biafra. Buhari has already done a good job by removing Ijaw hands from the cookie jar of oil derivative which is being planned to enforce the cash flow to Ijawnize and landgrab communities in the Niger Delta. Ohaneze-Ndigbo and the SE political leaders needs to sit down and start asking themselves open-ended questions and stop being lap dogs to Edwin Clark led INC, IPOB and PDP.

Very good submission.

Alagoa sat down and blatantly corrupted Igbo history in Bonny and Opobo, reducing our Aboriginal presence on those Islands to Slave status.
We have how many Universities in SE, each with history departments and tens of professors of history.
And between 1970 till today, a whopping 50years, non of them have beamed a searchlight on Alagoa blatant manipulation of facts and provided a counter rebuttal.

We are really failing as a people. I swear. It's embarrassing.

Now there is something we must recognize.

This fight is not to claim Bonny or Opobo as Igbo. Ndiigbo are too big a people to be recruiting people into our fold.

This battle is to establish the fact that Ndiigbo existed in Bonny as Aboriginals and not just as Slaves.

Key to Ijaw de-Igbonization of Bonny and Opobo is their deliberate demonization of the Igbo tag in Opobo and Bonny as that of Slave-descendants. The Cunning Ijaws understand psychology very well, humans naturally will not like to be attached to a dehumanizing history. No one would happily embrace a history that says that his ancestors were slaves.
So Ijaws at every given chance have promoted the falsehood that Igbo presence in Bonny and Opobo is a result of slavery.

The implication of this, is that the average Opobo or Bonny Igbo speaking person cannot embrace his Igbo identity without accepting the dehumanizing Slave descendants tag. For this reason, many of them remain neutral,and consciously stay away from Igbo tag, which gives the Ijaws enough cover to work slowly on their cultural genocide agenda.

To break this, we need to unequivocally with well researched proof show to the world, including OPOBO and Bonny people, that their Igbo speaking ancestors were not present in those Islands as just slaves, but that they were there as Aboriginals and as kings, long before the slaves from Igboland joined.
They have to know that they can embrace their Igbo language and culture without being decendants of slaves as not all of them were slaves.

Once we do this and repeatedly so, we would have effectively put to stop the Ijaws psychological blackmail on Bonny and Opobo people. Allowing them to voluntarily embrace their Igbo selves and come back to us on their own terms.

Putindbutt:
In his lecture, Amasenibo Eric G. Jumbo listed out the current threat to Ibani Language which include Commerce and Christian Religion.

Also speaking, Warisenibo Abinye Morgan Ogolo, challenged the people of Bonny and Opobo Kingdoms to make concerted efforts to stop speaking Ibo language.

This will help to rediscover Ibani Language so that it will take its rightful place despite the damage it has suffered over the years.

The Chairman of Opobo/Nkoro L G A, represented by the Council Secretary, Mr. Sunny J. Pepple, called on volunteer experts of the Ibani language to partner with the Council to revive the language.

The event featured dances, lectures and Ibani language competition among selected Secondary Schools with CSS Opobo emerging as winner while GGSS Finima and Bonny National Grammar School, emerged as runners up.

Dignitaries at the event include, Professor Emeritus E.J. Alagoa, Dr. Mrs Iyalla Amadi and the Permanent Secretary, Rivers State Ministry of Information and Communications, represented by Mr. Francis Alli among others.

http://www.riversstate.gov.ng/item/1117-chairmen-set-to-develop-ibani-language-curriculum.html

I think we shouldn't bother about this.
They have been doing this since 1990s, Shell use to finance it.
I think it has become a cash cow for Bonny and Opobo Politicians, they get huge allocation for the Ibani circus jamboree. They gather and eat , they go home to start speaking their sweet Igbo language.

Poison to the hearts of " Ibos want Awa Oyel" people, and sad news to the "Ibos want to take SS" crew from SW.

Anyi ejebe go!

9Pluto:
Someone may have to put up a write-up as this will make a good project topic. Any current history student in Uniport, Rsust, Elechi polythenic etc

Ongoing ijawnization of the Niger-delta, a lesson in contemporary history.

That will make for a very good research topic.
The person can use Biseni and Bonny/Opobo in comparative analysis.

Vintagepipes:
.....I actually know two ladies (sisters) from there.
.......The people are called "Biseni Ama Ogu"
.........All their surnames are Igbo
..........The contacts I know could speak Igbo or at least understand but I think they might have another language.

However all the members of the family understood Igbo (This could be because they lived in Rivers state though).

I asked if they were Igbo and how they got their Igbo names. They said they are not, but almost everyone in their village have Igbo surnames up to their great grand-fathers and their main occupation is fishing.

I think they are now IIjawnised.

They have been unfortunately Ijawnized.
The thing dey pain Ndoni people.
They were same people, before the Ijaws rushed Biseni and Ijawnized them.

Ijaws are aggressive expansionists. The Biseni Igbo ancestors were aloof to these schemes like most Igbos are. Look at the kind of cultural genocide Ijaws are attempting to pull off in Bonny and Opobo, and you understand that this is not a new thing for them, they have been in the business of cultural genocide in the past, and Biseni was a successful campaign of theirs.
We have lost Biseni forever. I can't have someone who doesn't speak Igbo as mother tongue in an Igbo gathering, ancestry or no ancestry, that's nonsense.

Biseni Ijoid language is corrupted by many Ndoni (Igboid) words and even intonation so much that other Ijaws don't understand them when they speak.
But the language is unmistakably Ijoid.

9Pluto:
Are you sure it is up to 60%? Let us stop making conjectures please. From what @Ekealterego posted, they are not upto 60%.

See for yourself:


This is BAYELSA

1. The ijoids (South Izon/southern Ijaw, Izon etc.)

2. The Edoids (e.g Epie, Attisa, Engenni [Known as the Oguan), Urhobo, Isoko).

3. The Cross-River people (Ogbia, Abureni etc. )

These are the people in Bayelsa and here is their classification and LGAs

Brass
Abureni; Cross-River language/people
Southeast Ijo; IJo
Ogbia; Cross-River language/people
kugbo; Cross-River language/people

Ekeremor
Izon; Ijo

Kolokuma/Opokuma

Izon; Ijo

Nembe
Abureni; Cross-River people/language
Southeast Ijo; Ijo
Izon (Ijaw)

Ogbia
Abureni; Cross-River language.
Southeast Ijo;
Odual; Cross-River language
Ogbia; Cross-River language
Oruma; Ijo

Sagbama
Biseni; Ijo
Isoko; Edoid/Edo
Izon; Ijo
Ogbah; Igbo/Igboid
Okodia; inland Ijo/Ijo
Urhobo; Urhobo/Edoid/Edo

Southern Ijaw

Southeast Ijo; Ijo
Izon; Ijo

Yenagoa
Engenni; Edo/Edoid
Epie; Edo/Edoid
Izon; Ijo
Ekpeye; Igboid



Notice that Ekpeye is in Yenegoa, the heartland of Bayelsa.

Ewoo!
My apologies.
Maybe 30% sounds much closer to the reality looking at this .

Putindbutt:
I doubt you can put an average ibo and intelligence in the same sentence. To begin with, are you a graduate?. Were you taught in school to read a paragraph in isolation?

You chose the first paragraph in isolation while dismissing the concluding paragraph, who does that?.. How can you selectively isolate the first sentence if your mind is not already shallow.

The writer focuses on the ibos inhabitant /descent of Bonny who had come from the interior to settle. "
Going further, he revealed how they had struggled to adapt to their new environment which was unnatural to them.

Aside the fact that Ibani is not dialectical to ibos.

I think you are playing dumb now, having lost the argument.
Next time, don't let your Igbophobia get the better of you, people have been noted to take rat poison as a result of Igbo hate.
Always verify your sources to make sure they support your argument and not your opponent argument before rushing to post them and then get stuck in a hole that you will always deep further the more you try to wriggle your way out like you are currently doing.

Having dropped your Alabo moniker after you were bursed, your lack of intelligence has made you drive this particular moniker into an intellectual cul-de-sac. You have reached a dead end, and I am sure you know it.

I expect you to now rest this moniker and log on into your other monikers an try again.

Let's hope that that time around you show intelligence. Because so far, you have been a disappointment. You only ended up complicating issues for JANK23H, who I thought despite having all evidence against him, have been putting up a fairly good fight.

OfoIgbo:
There are also Urhobos in Bayelsa, so that state is not exclusively Ijaw, before you start claiming Urhobo areas of Bayelsa

Bayelsa is like 60% (this is me being generous) Ijaw and 40% other distinct Edoid and Ibibiod ethnicities.
And most importantly, the Capital City Yenegoa, belongs to Epie-Attisa, an Edoid people.
So the capital of Bayelsa is not even Ijawland.

The implication if this is that Ijaw as an ethnic group does not have Indigenous claim to any modern city in Nigeria today.

Also note that the non Ikwerre part of PHLGA belongs to Obulom (Abuloma people), even though Obulom people are part of Okirika , they are not an Ijoid people, they are a proto Ibibiod people whose language is classified together with Ibibio as a Cross River language.

NIGERIA is a country built on so many falsehoods, which is why she is a dead country.

BornRicch:
You guys can lie for Africa. That's why you were sold as slave. Egusi and agbono Igbo soup! Which of the Igbo tribes are you referring to? Liars.... I hate to reply you people.

It is Ogbono and not Agbono.
Yes! It's Igbo soup which the entire NIGERIA seem to have now adopted and copied from us .
I know that that Ogbono fruit(seed) is traditionally called "Apon" by Yorubas! But we call it Ogbono in Igboland. That's how the soup came about.

9Pluto:
We all know both Abua and Epkeye people are dominantly found in Rivers State, however some of them are indigenous to Bayelsa State. Most of you seem to forget that all these state boundaries as presently constituted are man-made. They are not natural boundaries.

If you are still in doubt and want a detailed history and identity of Bayelsa, kindly open a thread on the topic and mention me. Better still reference the several list of Bayelsa people that @Ekealterego has posted on this thread.

Do you know that Biseni in Bayelsa was founded by Ndoni (Ndi onu iyi) people, but the town over town got overwhelmed by Ijaw people strolling into it from Gbaramatu and co, and soon the Ijaws outnumbered the Igbo Aboriginals and Biseni had a language switch from Igboid to Ijoid, with Igbo only surviving in surnames of some Biseni people and in some of their customs.

DubaiLandLord1:
Igbo land have always been landlock. If not for slave trade, Igbos would have no business with the sea or ocean.

Make una stop boring us with all this unnecessary argument on this forum.

Make una stop all this una mumu and unnecessary argument.

There is no igbo land within any coastal area in Nigeria.

The map although incomplete because of ignorance of the interior tribes by the Portuguese, shows what we always knew. The Igbo is an ancient group that predates everyother group in Southern Nigeria.
Notice there was no Yoruba but Oyo in the map.

Map also reinforces our argument that Ijaw are aliens in southern NIGERIA as you can't see Ijaw in the map.
The place below Igboland was unlabeled but they were not called Ijaw!
We are on this thread to unravel the identity of that area, and so far so good, we have shown they are Igbos!

Putindbutt:
I wonder where ibos put their thinking cap. Do we need oyinbo to come tell us the natural occupation of ibos?.


From the screenshot below, John Adams, referred to ibos as people from the interior (ibo interior) who came to settle in Bonny. In addition, he said, they were obliged by the force of circumstances to adapt to the water and trade instead of hunting and farming. Which means the only way ibos could have survived in Bonny was to force themselves to adapt to the water and trade instead of farming and hunting they were naturally inclined to from the interior they came from.

cc JANK23H

"The Ibani who came from Ibo interior and settled in Bonny over 300 years ago".

This man has scored an own goal. Even JANK23H must be dying in shame wherever he is .
JANK23H, it's like your Yoruba friend is out here to bury you in the guise of helping you, because of this remark you made years ago against Yorubas?

Yorubas can be very strategic and they never forget.

Ndo, my Asawana neighbor. Next time don't invite Yorubas to your war. They don't fight for no one but themselves.

Putindbutt:
You guys celebrate Crow's work the most for obvious reasons.
What you uploaded on Barbot is incomplete, a one-sided screenshot.

So which of the works called Bonny Indigenes Ijaw, Izon or Jos people?
Upload the snippets, it can't be that hard.

Putindbutt:
Emphasis on SLAVES.
Emphasis on those originally making salts from the sea, which was never an ibo occupation.
Moreso, interrogate the 'king of new calabar' being of ibo descent.. think.

are you okay? You didn't do comprehension in your primary and secondary School English class?

"The King of New Calabar, in the neighborhood, and king Pepple of Bonny, were both of Eboe descent,of which also are the mass of the NATIVES;"


The slaves are not natives and were spoken of in the next sentence.

"....and the number of slaves from the Eboe country,which throughout the British trade was taken from Bonny, amounted perhaps to 3/4 of the exports"

JANK23H:
Good job Sherlock Holmes!

Guy, I'm happy that we share similar opinion about Yorubas.
That your post I posted was very brunt, but I can't detect any lies there.

Kudos for passing the authenticity test.

9Pluto:
Bro, spare those people. I am sure most of them are in shock by now. Imagine, No one could provide one single counter evidence. I am interested in reading Alagoa's tales by moonlight because he seems to be the pioneer of all this.

In trying to grab other peoples territory, now the ideal definition of ijaw territory is being questioned. If this is not a classic definition of own goal,pray tell me what it is.

I have always had this notion that Bayelsa was a homogenous ijaw state until I came here..

I have always known that Bayelsa was not a homogeneous Ijaw state.
I knew this in 2007 when GEJ was picked ahead of Odili for PDP VP.
I had to do a background check on his Ogbia people.
That's when I realized that something was fishy with the Ijaw tag!

Igboid:
My grandmother Princess Okukuba W.D.Goodhead...immediate senior sister to His Majesty The King...was almost executed by firing squad by the invading Nigerian Military led by her Nephew Capt. Erasmus J.T.Princewill son of her elder brother King J.T.Princewill,Amachree X11....on her support for Biafra.

My grand Aunty who was nickname Madam Biafra....grand mother of a former Foreign Minister of Nigeria was taking through very painful torture before execution.
My maternal uncle one of the first lawyers in the Eastern Region never return home till his death because of his support for Biafra.
My father was a Biafran officer in the medical Corp.

My statement is recorded on tape....I never said we were taught....I said we were told many stories by our elders which we now discovered to be false.

On abandon property.....my Father or Mother did not benefit from properties left behind by Igbos....infact my family lost a lot of properties at Iguta.

All my great grand Mothers except one were Igbos.

The ancestral stool I occupy today...Edi Abali was founded by an Igboman from Abom in Abam in 1782.

I am an Igbo man because Allah gracious allowed Ijaw, Igbo and Bini blood to flow in mine veins......I am not begging to be Igbo.As I will not beg to be Gambari,Yoruba or Efik .

-Asari Uzodinma Dokubo

Asari Dokubo admission above tallies with captain Crow account on King of new Calabar (Kalabari) being of Igbo origin as well as Pepple the King of Bonny.
Ndiigbo had Aboriginal presence in both Bonny and Kalabari!
While we were assimilated in New Calabar (Kalabari), we managed to hold forte in Bonny.

My grandmother Princess Okukuba W.D.Goodhead...immediate senior sister to His Majesty The King...was almost executed by firing squad by the invading Nigerian Military led by her Nephew Capt. Erasmus J.T.Princewill son of her elder brother King J.T.Princewill,Amachree X11....on her support for Biafra.

My grand Aunty who was nickname Madam Biafra....grand mother of a former Foreign Minister of Nigeria was taking through very painful torture before execution.
My maternal uncle one of the first lawyers in the Eastern Region never return home till his death because of his support for Biafra.
My father was a Biafran officer in the medical Corp.

My statement is recorded on tape....I never said we were taught....I said we were told many stories by our elders which we now discovered to be false.

On abandon property.....my Father or Mother did not benefit from properties left behind by Igbos....infact my family lost a lot of properties at Iguta.

All my great grand Mothers except one were Igbos.

The ancestral stool I occupy today...Edi Abali was founded by an Igboman from Abom in Abam in 1782.

I am an Igbo man because Allah gracious allowed Ijaw, Igbo and Bini blood to flow in mine veins......I am not begging to be Igbo.As I will not beg to be Gambari,Yoruba or Efik .

-Asari Uzodinma Dokubo

Both Crow and Baike agree that king Pepple was of Igbo origin.
They both agree that the NATIVE Bonny people are predominantly of Igbo origin.

Emphasis on NATIVE!

Notice that the Aboriginal Igbos of Bonny United with the "people of Brass" to form Bonny. I am convinced the Brass spoken of here were not the Ijaws because at this point in time, the Ijaws were already known as the people of Jos! I believe these people of Brass were the the proto Ibibiod groups that were Aboriginals in the Niger Delta, the Abureni, the Ogbia, etc.
However, the Aboriginal Igbos in Bonny outnumbered the Brass and easily assimilated them into Igbo language.
The inflow of Igbo slaves into the Island only helped the Igbo Aboriginals of Bonny to consolidate an advantage they already held in terms of cultural domination.

The opposite happened in New Calabar (Kalabari), the Igbo Aboriginals there, including the Igbo kings, were outnumbered by the migration of Ijoid people there and became assimilated as Ijoid speakers today.

Take a look.

Notice from this attachment, Crow talks about Igbo Aboriginals(natives of Bonny) and the then the Igbos brought in as slaves from the Igbo country.
Notice that the king of New Calabar (Kalabari) and Pepple the king of Bonny were noted to be both of Igbo Origin.
This account collaborates Asari Dokubo account where he stated that his ancestor, the Ediabali himself, who was king (Amayanabo of Buguma) was an Igbo from Abam!

Good news from our favorite Captain Crow.
I am thinking we should give this scouser an Igbo title already, he saved us alot of headache from these Jos people. from Urhobo/Isoko side country.

9Pluto:
Thank you Sir. Please, if you have it you can also post his list of igbo names highlighting where he mentioned Opobo as an igbo name for males.

https://archive.org/details/memoirsoflatecap00crow/page/228/mode/2up

Nnaa this is captain Crow book.
Ike nji agu di akwukwo agwugom.

Read and search whatever you want there yourself.

JANK23H:
They'd always discredit it so long as it isn't Crow's account.

I have some literature from the Dutch,French and Portuguese and would unleash at the appropriate time.

I've been trying to download "A Voyage to New Calabar River in the Year 1699" by James Barbot 1699.I only have access to snippets.That has some key information.

Haven't you already done that?
The record that showed that Ijaws lived close to the Sobous (Isoko and Urhobo) and from there terrorized Rivers in Western and Eastern coasts of Southern Nigeria?

No where there was Ijaw presence in Bonny was mentioned.

9Pluto:
Please, be specific with this your earliest document for future reference purposes.

It was actually Captain Hugh Crow of Liverpool(1765-1829)

Yes!
Ladies and gentlemen: Captain Crow record.

By the way, I'm convinced Alabo is same person as Puttinbutt.
Alabo got bursted and Puttinbutt reappeared.

Putindbutt:
The screenshot was just a snippet but a more interesting focus on the phonology and orthography of the Ibani dialect.
Rodger Blench enriches his work with older documentations, citations and a more careful examination of ibani dialect. I posted the pdf to rationalize Baikie's counting system in ibani.

Having established that the ancient kingdom is founded by ibani-ijos, the palace language is ibani and the titles is Amanayabo. The local politics is also controlled by the end ibani-ijos.
O knew ibos would be quick to dismiss it but neglecting the import of it. That's why their energies is more focused on winning an academic argument and downplaying earlier records and current realities of Bonny.

The funniest part is ibos denying being "settled" slaves in Bonny. Who supplied the highest number of human slaves than the ibos?

An Afonja doing what they are good at.

1.Earliest documents noted Bonny spoke Igbo

2. Baike noted that Bonny kings and people were of Igbo descent

3. Current realities is that Bonny speak Igbo language as Mother tongue

4. Historical data presented here clearly showed Bonny kings with Igbo names

5. We know that Slaves can't be King in Bonny


6. We also know that current Bonny Igbo is not an Isu dialect (this is the dialect of most Igbo slaves) but those of Ndoki, which proves that the Aboriginal Igbos of Bonny were of Ndoki stock, they were sufficient enough in the Island to make the Igbo slaves drop their Isu dialect for the Ndoki dialect of the Indigenes.

7. Conclusion: Igbo presence in Bonny are of two types. The Aboriginals who were of Ndoki/Ngwa stock and produced Early Bonny kings, and the Igbo slaves who were mainly of Isu stock.
The Ijaw usurpers would want the presence of Igbo Aboriginals in Bonny hidden, but Igbo nationalists have punctured all their weak arguments so far.

9Pluto:
You seem to have so much information about them. Has anyone being able to confirm that that video we saw the last time was actually Nembe youths? The one were they destroyed Alabo's house.

Seems from the information we are gathering Nembe may actually be different from izon.

I haven't verified that video.
But I know that Nembe language is classified as Ijoid.
The possibility is that there could be an Igbo speaking enclave within Nembe, like they have in Okujagu at Okirika.