For my none Ibibio readers, Mbiam is something every Ibibio man is afraid of
From birth, you are regaled with the wickedness of members of your family and village members, and Mbiam is what symbolises this wickedness as it is said to be used to give you – Akpa ubeng, which I later came to realise was a stroke.
My people interpreted stroke as an affliction your enemies threw at you.
So you are told – Akpan Aniefiok agh to mi Mbiam anye di no mien akpa ubeng
Meaning Anefioks first son threw Mbiam at me and it gave me stroke.
I was invited to one of the many churches my people run to for shelter and salvation
If you grew up an ibibio or should I say in an Akwa Ibom house hold, either of these names will be part of your youth-
Qua Ibo, Episcopal, Mount Zion, Lutheran, Presbyterian, Olumba Obu and many more.
Almost every family has a Pastor, Elder, deacon and deaconness.
Even our Governor is a Pastor and his predecessor is an elder
My father was a pastor, my brother is a pastor, my bro inlaw is a pastor, my mother was a deaconness my only sister Mayen is following in her footsteps
This penchant for christianity and powerful churches is all pervasive – the major convo is usually – church ado ekit nkukut?
Meaning do they see miracles and visions in the church?
Under these are the witches, wizards, strong juju people that every family contributes to the cacapony.
In Akwa Ibom, you cannot have common erectile dysfunction or headache – it is akpan ekanem that has sent ifot to you.
So today, I was invited to one of those churches at Ojuelegba.
They were doing annual thanksgiving for our Village Anyiam Nsit in Nsit Ibom local Government of Akwa Ibom
Ive been to our village like 10 times in my life. The main tourist attraction, the stream has dried up and the place is boring and dry.
But its still my village and I feel that as i progress in age with children doing Gen Z for me and my daughter telling me straight that – I identify as Yoruba and with wives immortaly upset at my escapades, I am staring at a lonely old age.
So I have decided to go close to my village people. So I carried myself to the church
Mbok, the visiting pastor was the perfect picture of the Ibibio pastor of my father’s time
Short, financially challenged, educationally challenged with a world view that didnt go beyond his probable primary six upbringing
The congregation were picturesque Akwa Ibomites – humble, disenfranchised, barely literate lacking enthusiasm.
The message was the same message my father preached and the same message every Akwa Ibomite would have heard this Sunday in all of the aforementioned churches that litter my state
Ifot – witches, ancestral curses eternal damnation, ekpo, ndem, satan littered his thirty minute talk
It was classic. Thats all my people know no matter how highly educated.
As he spoke, i looked into the congrgation and i saw these afang eating people sit in perpetual fear.
You must break the curses, the preacher screamed into the mic.
He ended by telling us he was just coming back from My village after one month where he had warned an Ekpo who was crying by his window to stop or else he would kill it with the Blood of jesus and till he left after two weeks, the ekpo didn’t dare cry again
At least his colleagues are buying private jets and building massive mansions cos they have been able to refine there stories, my own pastors in Akwa Ibom are still fighting ekpo and its mbiam and still living in pernury.
He closed his sermon by anmoucing gleefully that he had just been delivered of a baby after 30years of marriage cos he was able to finally
Break the ancestral curse.
After his message, they made the mistake of giving me the mic and i told them my mind
I told them how my dad was down with diabetes but the pastors around him, told him that someone had hit him with akpa ubeng
Instead of taking his drugs. He died still doing dry fasting and cursing his step brother who was said to have been the culprit since my grandfather refused to marry his mother after his brothers passing as tradition demanded.
I told them to wake up and stop listening to these kind of messages as they were limiting and an entrapment.
As I spoke, I could see the pastor who just finished preaching looking at me with disdain, I didn’t care.
When I finished, I announced N20k for his new born baby, gave the widows N50k and donated N200k to the church and dropped their microphone and walked away daring them to come and beat me.
Akwa Ibom isongo
Duke of Shomolu
Last modified: January 25, 2025
