OPINION: Kalanama Smiles In Akugbene-Mein
By Ekanpou Enewaridide
Radiant,unbeatably radiant,smiles sit on the face of Kalanama the son of Kor who is the son of Mein the eponymous father of Mein Clan.Besides the radiance of smiles on the face of Kalanama,it is known everywhere that smile is the carrier of an irrepressible magnetism that takes a master position in every space because it is a massive, positively charged element. Its magnetism parallels the occasional dance of waves in the river in their span of entertainment whenever a speed boat takes over the stage with its talented orchestra.
Kalanama I is the founding father of Akugbene-Mein kingdom. Whenever the founding father of the clan smiles, the kingdom becomes the recipient of the smiles because the visible fragrance occupies every space. The smile of Kalanama I can only be the smile of Akugbene-Mein Kingdom in Bomadi Council of Delta State – a kingdom that is held together beyond the Achebic ‘things-fall-apart’ by Kalanama’s directional principle of pragmatic biologism ingeniously built around the prevention of meiosis in an ancient kingdom.
Always – for a traveler who negotiates a consuming bend either at sea or on the road – smiles become the undeniable inheritance, the natural accompaniment, though not without the aching moments manufactured by merchants of violence, confusion, chaos and misrepresentation. It seems Akugbene-Mein Kingdom has just witnessed the bumper harvest of smiles in her kingdom today through the smiles of Kalanama I.
My apologies, my readers! That Akugbene-Mein Kingdom has witnessed bumper harvest of smiles did not start today. The smiles walked to the kingdom yesterday – a yesterday that enjoys historical measurement or calibration captured unchangeably as the years 1969/1970 when that Commission of Inquiry gave a categorical pronouncement on the wind of confusion and destabilization that once walked frighteningly on the surface of the earth carrying a protruding stomach stocked with dynamites programmed to be released upon marked faces of different ideological persuasion bordering on the affairs of Akugbene-Mein Kingdom.
However, to strike a chord historically, the exact dating of Kalanama’s smiles should be in the 14 Century, not in the 16th century, because the 16th century dating is historically wrong and questionable as regards the history of Akugbene-Mein Kingdom though the contextual smiles could enjoy virtual documentation as 1969 and 1970 as the initiatory journey of the smiles – smiles tempted to scamper like the monkeys of Odugburugbu Canal in Opuapale town whenever the biologism principle of Kalanama I is threatened on earth. Did Kalanama I actually smile?
That famous Kalanama I must be a great historian yet to be dissected and captured appropriately in historiography. That he was not sufficiently talked about by historians could be a historiographical felony – a questionable historiographical recklessness, a targeted historical antagonism. Beyond being a possible historian, Kalanama I must equally be a biologist vast in the deployment of biologism in the governance of the entire Mein Kingdom in Western Ijaw Division when he left Ogobiri in Bayelsa State and settled in Akugbene in the 14th Century followed by five of his brothers – Ngbile, Ogbolu, Akan, Eze and Ogide. He must have studied Biology long to know the dangers of meiosis (cell division) applied to the human environment as it could cause dislodgement of ancient roots of brotherly bondage and linkage.
Meiosis, as a biological
process, is purely for cells within the living organism, not for the human society. Kalanama’s knowledge of Literature also appears legendary; he must have read Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart or its equivalent in the 14th Century long enough to know the dangers of disintegration in any society. His vast knowledge of Literature and his pragmatic biologism principle of governance made him rule the Mein Kingdom from Akugbene without any destabilising cell division and disintegration while his famed sole Pereship lasted. Are Donubebe, Onurun, Obirigbo(Obirikpo), Amounpere and Akpanaka aware that their father kalanama I ruled the Mein kingdom peacefully, animated by his vast knowledge of Literature and pragmatic deployment of biologism, resulting in a kingdom happily inhabited by great men and women who are both autotrophic and heterotropic in nutritional orientations?
Kalanama’s legendary literary knowledge built from vast readership of novels and his pragmatic biologism penetrated the Akugbene-Mein Kingdom through the processes of osmosis and diffusion even after his death. It was for this reason Akugbene-Mein Kingdom had no molten lava or magma of disintegration from the kingdom until the departure of F.B.O. Kalanama VI in 1965. That Akugbene-Mein kingdom was no longer immune to volcanic eruption weighted with disintegrating conflagration reared its bald-headed ugly head after the death of Kalanama VI. This was the first time that Kalanama’s legendary vastness in Literature and his pragmatic application of biologism in the administration of his kingdom had been muddied by his descendants who had no knowledge of the water-side of Kalanama because they did not accompany him in all his fishing and hunting expeditions.
Precisely, Pere F.B.O. Kalanama VI died in September 1965 though the formal traditional pronouncement of his death was in December 1965. Immediately after his death two schools of thought became radiant and dominant in Akugbene-Mein Kingdom. All the two schools of thought were dominated by the descendants of Kalanama I. The two schools of thought held different ideas on ascension to the Pereship of Akugbene-Mein Kingdom. One school of thought led by Okporiopo (Oporopo)Agidee and others representing the Donubebe Family held the position that ascension to the kingship of Akugbene-Mein Kingdom is by right of primogeniture based on Ekieretubor birth. It was also the stand of this school of thought that Donubebe was the only ruling house in the kingdom based on the 18 January 1958 declaration on Chieftaincy matters made in Akugbene-Mein Local Council at a meeting attended by Pere Kalanama VI,Chief J.O.Bozimo,Chief M.F.Agidee,Chief Alli Opudu(for Ogodobiri town),Chief T.E.Carter(for Akugbene town),Chief J.D.Ujobolo(Esanma town),Messers Ashaka Biogors(for Ezebiri town),Solo Okumaphayi(for Ezebiri town),P.S.Atonlogbo(for Ogodobiri town),N.E.Odubolu(for Ogodobiri town),Yangar Ekpodor(for Ogodobiri town),R.S.Akekah(for Akugbene town),F.T.Narebor(Ensanma town)S.O.Embelegha(for Kpakiama town),Yelele Gbenewei(for Kpakiama town),J.L.Egoro(for Kpakiama town),B.Olodiama(for Kpakiama town) and Rose Nugba(for Okoloba town). By these positions the deduction was that, among the five children of Kalanama – Donubebe, Onurun, Obirigbo(Obirikpo), Amounpere and Akpanaka – only the Donubebe Family had the traditional right to produce the next king of Akugbene-Mein Kingdom anytime the Pereship became vacant by death,and that the other four families should be content with their debarment from the Pereship of Akugbene-Mein kingdom. Could this be the second biblical Babel in Bomadi Local Government Area of Delta State?Specifically, was Asolo the son of Onurun who founded Ogriagbene aware of this exclusion?What about Okoro,Ekpedenyan,Enainemughan and Anduwo the great siblings of Asolo who is a respected grandson of Kalanama?Should Asolo the great founder of Ogriagbene be deprived of the right to kingship when he is a grandson of Kalanama?
The second school of thought in Akugbene-Mein Kingdom led by Chief T.E Carter and others on behalf of Akugbene-Mein Kingdom held the position that the right to the Pereship of Akugbene-Mein Kingdom was by Braeretubor birth exampled by sound health and non-conviction in any court of law and that there were five ruling houses in Akugbene-Mein Kingdom designated as Donubebe, Onurun, Obirigbo(Obirikpo), Amounpere and Akpanaka. This school of thought also challenged the January 1958 declaration and dismissed the quoted section as a deliberate infusion unknown to the minutes of the meeting held at Akugbene on that day when Pere F.B.O.Kalanama VI,Chief Jonah Oyadongha Bozimo, R.A.Bayoko and F.T.Narebor were still there as the President,Chairman,Secretary and Councilor of Akugbene-Mein Local Council – at a time when Akugbene was still the Headquarters of the Akugbene-Mein Local Council prior to its relocation to Bomadi as the Headquarters.
Confronted with the spectacle of a great kingdom about to be torn apart by two vociferous schools of thought unwillingly to shift their activist positions for brotherly accommodation, a Commission of Inquiry was set up in 1969 chaired by Mr. Amadi-Emina as the Sole Commissioner unlike the Ngbilebiri-Mein kingdom’s Commission of Inquiry of 1965 which was led by R.C Nwabolu. Memoranda were accepted from the two schools of thought which had people testified from Ogriagbene, Ogbeinama, Ogodobiri, Ekameta and Akugbene. The outcome of the Commission of Inquiry was awaited with baited breath after the memoranda-submission and the testification by people was over.
It was precisely in May 1970 that the Amadi-Emina led Commission of Inquiry categorically recommended that Akugbene-Mein Kingdom had five ruling houses designated as Donubebe, Onurun, Obirigbo(Obirikpo), Amounpere and Akpanaka, and that the right to Pereship was rotationally (among the five ruling houses) only by Braeretubor birth. These recommendations put a final end to the brotherly conflagration that once threatened the ancient unity of the ancient Akugbene-Mein kingdom.
Since Akugbene-Mein kingdom virtually strayed from their ancient historical path of unity nourished by Kalanama’s bequeathed vast literary knowledge and famed pragmatic biologism when the two schools of thought emerged with opposing views on Pereship, the kingdom has resumed her ancient peaceful co-existence and unity. From Kalanama VII to the present S.P. Luke Kalanama VIII, the kingdom has not made any attempt to stray from the ideals of Kalanama – directional ideals that have no loopholes even in this digital world where ancient ideas and ideals hardly survive retirement, expurgation, expulsion, dismissal and condemnation to the dustbin of forgetfulness.
The deployment of pragmatic biologism in the rulership of Akugbene-Mein Kingdom has become an integral component of the governance style of every traditional ruler in the kingdom because it is the most dependable mechanism of peaceful co-existence and unity as it is geared towards building institutions and structures bound to prevent cell division (meiosis). It is a proactive governance mechanism derived from a knowledge of biological processes witnessed in the wake of cell division in living organisms.
I know that cell division may have a metabolising anchor in scientific studies but when applied to human institutions and structures in administration, it destabilises, destroys, dismantles and disorganises hierarchically arranged components or system of administration because a divided cell leaves a dangerous chasm, schism, abyss, crater, etc. in human relationship.
Armed with the famed Kalanamaic pragmatic biologism coupled with a passion to walk on the approved historical path, it was Applied Biology the present king of Akugbene-Mein Kingdom, Pere S.P. Luke Kalanama VIII, studied at the university. Indeed the Kalanamaic pragmatic biologism flows in the blood of every king in Akugbene-Mein Kingdom as they have all been historically initiated into the famed Kalanamaic mechanism of peace-building and unity in a kingdom.
I think it would be historically meaningful for me to add quickly that for communities like Ezebiri,Ogriagbene,Adekagbene/Kalafiogbene,Okoloba,Esanma,Ogbeinama,Bomadi,Kpakiama,Ekameta,Ogodobiri,Akugbene and others,they are so attuned to the hypnotising workability of the pragmatic biologism principle of Kalanama 1 and now extended to Kalanama VIII that they are daily imprisoned by thoughts of indivisibility in Akugbene-Mein Kingdom as that hated virus of kingdom-divisibility walks 800 nautical miles away from them,and so they sleep so well at night – even soothingly deeper and better than that Shakespearean Lucius in JULIUS CAESAR who had no thorny thoughts of disorientation and destabilization at night – unlike that troubled Brutus of dangerous stratagems.
Having geograhically claimed some reasonable nautical miles in my voyage today,some of my readers may be bothered to ask to know how many novels Kalanama 1 read or wrote,how many journal articles he wrote to justify his vastness in Literature.Please note that Kalanama’s vastness in Literature is not measured by how many books and journal articles he had written or read,but by the applicability of his lessons gathered from his reading to his kingdom’s administration,particularly his knowledge on preventive disintegration in Akugbene-Mein Kingdom he must have derived from Chinua Achebe’s THINGS FALL APART – possibly from the ‘collective unconscious’ because there was no Achebe’s THINGS FALL APART then,but there were only Achebes and their equivalents in the ‘collective unconscious’ of Carl Jung’s creation.
It is therefore my beloved meditative dance that may Akugbene-Mein Kingdom never stray from the ancient pragmatic biologism of Kalanama I as an administrative mechanism that systematically builds and embodies structures positioned as the antidote against cell division in any kingdom, as cell division kills the smiles of a kingdom. If the pragmatic biologism of Kalanama I is the medication for the Covid -19 of cell division in a kingdom, S.P. Luke Kalanama VIII may become the administrative epidemiologist since he intentionally studied Applied Biology at the University to improve and update his knowledge on the Kalanamaic biologism and historically become the king who aligns ideologically with Kalanama I and be armed historically to consolidate and continue the biologism principle in governance bequeathed by the Kalanamas.
Taking a look at my historical voyage again and again it is no longer subject to infantile argument that the pragmatic biologism of Kalanama I which has been institutionalised as a historical continuum in Akugbene-Mein Kingdom as the antidote against disintegration, should be treasured and continued by Pere S.P. Luke Kalanama VIII since it has historically become the carrier of the smiles and unity of the kingdom – the carrier that could be deployed to negotiate any man-made bend in the kingdom.
Personally, I believe that for somebody biologically initiated into the importance of ecology, ecosystem and biodiversity, Pere S.P. Luke Kalanama VIII would be a dependable institution for the preservation, perpetuation and continuation of the pragmatic biologism of Pere Kalanama I long bequeathed by Kalanama I for the historical documentation of Kalanama’s smiles because the smiles of Kalanama are progressive smiles meant for every neighbourhood in Akugbene-Mein Kingdom and beyond.
BY :EKANPOU ENEWARIDIDEKE
Writes from Akparemogbene
