Siradom and the culture of ‘nwibiake’: An Ogoni Experience

Pemii Ben

 

To those who do not know about the Ogoni culture and traditional system, the best ever heard of the people is the Ken Tsaro-Wiwa renaissance that led to the ousting of Shell Petroleum Development Company. The activities of this multinational and those like it, are often referred to as the mainstay of the underdevelopment in Ogoniland as well as other health hazards. True as this is, there is another grave factor behind the plights of the Ogonis. This secret agent of plights and underdevelopment is the cultural practice known in Khana language as “nwibiake” and in Gokana it is called “gbeabe”.

 

 

This mundane practice allows one of the girl children, in most cases, the Sira (first daughter) to remain in her parents’ home unmarried so as to bear children for the family. She is allowed to procreate with any man of her choice or, in some cases, the man chosen for her by the family. This practice mostly obtains in situations where the family has no male child. The girl child so retained where there’s no male child is referred to as the first son and she automatically has inheritance rights. She presides over family issues same way her male counter parts (first sons) do.

 

 

If by dint of circumstance she is unable to conceive, she is expected to marry a wife (some form of same sex marriage) who will also be expected to raise children for that home. The woman that married another woman is referred to as the husband of the woman married into the family and that “female husband” is seen as the father of the children the wife she married gives birth to. In this situation, this “female husband” scrutinises the kind of family background of the man she intends to procreate with so as to ensure that children from questionable backgrounds are not fetched into the home.

 

 

There are usually official rites performed by the man who has been accepted to procreate with the woman married by another woman. The incoming man buys at least a goat, some tubers of yam and the accompanying drinks to formally inform the “female husband” the agreement between the woman married by the ” female husband” and himself. As the “father” of the house, the “female husband” presides over the ceremony and formally receives the accepted man in “his” (female husband’s) family.

 

 

This practice has survived for years and in some Ogoni localities, it is still in vogue. However, it has horrible repercussions that have ruined the fortunes of many. Some of the men who eventually accept to procreate with such women are sometimes impotent. This leads to the woman having multiple partners. In most cases, she contracts such sexually transmitted diseases like HIV/AIDS, to mention but a few.

This practice also accounts for the poverty in Ogoniland as some men are forced to cater for both their biological families and those of these their concubines from their worse than meagre income which most often comes from subsistence farming.

 

 

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The practices compromises the dignity of the woman and makes her a mere instrument of commerce.