An Ancient And Modern King - At the Obong’s Palace
Elizabeth Ohene
Elizabeth Ohene meets the Obong in CalabarWhen I was ushered into his office in the palace in Calabar, Obong was on the phone to his bank manager.
A few seconds into the conversation that I had to listen to, it was obvious that this was somebody quite used to speaking to bank managers and who had, indeed, before becoming the Obong, been a very successful businessman.
Right now of course, I was in the presence of His Royal Highness Edidem Bassey Eyo Ephraim Adam III the Obong of Calabar. A most sprightly 79 year old gentleman full of humour, very articulate, full of fight who had either never mellowed with age or was one of those rare breeds who get angrier the older they grow.
He was in his private life, until he became the Obong of Calabar two years ago, an electrical engineer who had a very successful business. As can be expected therefore, he had very definite ideas on everything ranging from what he felt the role of traditional rulers ought to be in present day Nigeria to the slowness of the girls in his office.
He is persuaded that the role of the traditional ruler should be more than purely ceremonial or cosmetic, he believes he should play a more decisive role because there is a lot that the political rulers can and should learn from the chief, simply because it is a longer lasting institution and they have made all their mistakes already and have centuries behind them, "the politicians are still trying to find their way and their power is more transient........
He therefore wants to be kept informed and involved in the decision making process, so that he can give his opinions and advice at a point where it will be most effective.
If all that sounds suspiciously like he wants chiefs to assume political power in Nigeria, it is not exactly right, but it might help to hear him on what an Obong of Calabar was like and meant at the turn of the century when he was born.
Oh, totally different, he was easily the most powerful man in these parts of the world, and do not forget that before then, the Efiks used to believe that their Obong was the head of all black men, his political power was absolute and around the time I was born, Calabar was the capital of British West Africa.
This was the point from which civilisation spread into the interior, people sent their children to school here, our people went as teachers to all other parts of what is now Nigeria. Our world revolved around Calabar and the people were convinced that anything that could be learnt could only come from Calabar.........
It is worth mentioning at this stage that during my stay in Calabar, there was a Scottish television team also in town doing the preparatory work for a documentary on the life of Mary Slessor the famous Scottish missionary who worked and died in Calabar spreading christianity.
As most people who went to old mission schools in West Africa will tell you and if the number of Slessor Houses in many English speaking West African countries will testify to, a course on Mary Slessor used to be an absolute must!
These days of course, missionaries and colonialists are branded and damned together and no self-respecting nation alist will want to be seen as admitting that there could possibly be anything good to have come out of the adventures in Africa. All the same, Mary Slessor still holds an honoured place in Calabar. Her grave is lovingly kept and her portrait has pride of place in the Great Hall in the Palace with all the other departed Obongs and their ancestors.
Mary Slessor, it was, it might be recalled, who persuaded the people in and around Calabar that twins were not dreadful creatures to be abandoned in the forest and left to die. All those things sound rather foolish today in modern Calabar but they were not so long ago, and we might go back to the Obong and hear him explain a phenomenon of the Obong of Calabar - he is crowned as Obong twice?
Yes, every Obong, since King Archibong III has been crowned twice, the first coronation is the traditional one when all the customary rites of the Efiks are performed in the sanctity of the ancient shrine known as the EFE ASABO (shrine of the cobra) and he emerges to his people, a full fledged Obong. But in 1878, King Archibong signed what became known as the fifteen articles with the British consul David Hopkins.
After the first coronation, the Obong of Calabar in his traditional attire. He trades that in for a royal robe, sceptre and or after the second coronation. The broom in his hand signifies the unity of his people.
After the traditional ceremony and on the persuasion of the missionaries, King Archibong accepted to be publicly crowned in the Duke Town Church of Scotland Mission and there he gave a solemn undertaking to give effect to the 1878 treaty. The fifteen articles of the treaty crystallized in the 'Christian Oath' to which King Archibong swore on the occasion of his coronation.
To commemorate the event, the then ruling British monarch, Queen Victoria, through Her consul presented King Archibong with the accoutrement of a royal robe, vestments, sceptre, an orb, a crown, a gilded throne and a copy of the Holy Bible.
The Obong went to great lengths to explain that these paraphernalia were not mere trappings of colonialism since they were presented when the King was still being respected as an independent monarch in his own kingdom. It was therefore taken by the Efiks to signify that their King had been accepted into the community of christian Kings of the world who, like them, could be regarded as Defender of the Christian faith.
This current Obong's church coronation took place late last year and the photographs look almost the same as Prince Charles did at his investiture as the Prince of Wales. That, side by side with the photographs of the first coronation, the leopard skin, the broom in the Obong's hand instead of the sceptre and orb, all go to emphasise the contradictions that blend into the institution of chieftaincy in Nigeria today.
For all his wanting the role of traditional rulers to be respected and expanded, the Obong is very much aware that not many chiefs or past Obongs have had the advantage of high education that he has had nor the opportunity of knowing the ways of the world as he does, thus he would admit that the role of the traditional ruler is bound to diminish.
But diminish is not a word that comes easily to this very alert 79 year old, (some who know him claim he must be at least 86 if he is a day, if that is true, it rather adds more marks to this remarkable man) work was in progress at the palace making extensions to the buildings. Since he still lives in his private home, he is having the extensions done to the palace - a bigger kitchen (so that my wife will be comfortable while cooking) two rooms for a male and fe male servant at least, and a guest room - something small you know, to make this place habitable.
"The world has changed you know - I wonder if that young lady is back from the bank. Nobody has money in this state any more; the government is said to be broke, the civil servants have not been paid for a long time, everybody is complaining, even the Obong is broke" - then he broke into an impish smile and you could not tell any more if that last bit was a joke.
The young lady came back from the bank with the money.
What experience and history teach is that people and governments never have learnt anything from history, or acted on principles deduced from it.
— George Bernard Shaw's The Revolutionist's Handbook
