Nwankwo T. Nwaezeigwe, PhD September 20, 2025
I read the gibberish titled, “ANIOMA: HISTORY, IDENTITY, EQUITY AND THE QUEST FOR STATEHOOD”, being circulated on social media and, purportedly authored by Senator Ned Nwoko and; from all indications it reminds me of the story of a drowning man who gripped every floating object in the river, including leaves, just to save his life.
Let me begin by stating that Senator Ned Nwoko lacks both the intellectual and political competence to educate Anioma people on the subjects of their history, identity, equity and the agitation for Anioma State, his redundant legal profession notwithstanding. What the people of Anioma land expect from him is unqualified apology for ever mentioning the idea of lumping them with the Southeast geo-political zone without due consultations.
Anioma people have a proud past and need nobody like Senator Ned Nwoko to distort it for them. Anioma people have a proud identity and need nobody to redefine their identity for them. Anioma people have not complained of margiinalization of any kind in the present Delta State by any individual or group of persons. So, what marginalization id Ned Nwoko talking about? An Anioma son has held the position of the Governor of the State for full eight years.
Finally, the agitation for the creation of Anioma State which subsequently led to the creation of the present Delta State far predated Senator Ned Nwoko’s participation in politics. The collective identity of Anioma people on which the agitation for Anioma State is hinged, is defined by a multiculturalism founded on diversity of ethnic origins that allows the use of Igbo language as the lingua franca.
This is the fundamental point at which Senator Ned Nwoko’s intelligence failed him. Could we therefre say that Senator Ned Nwoko is only engaging in political hallucination in his fake contraption of Anioma Igbo identity? Your guess is as good as mine.
If Senator Ned Nwoko is worth his integrity as a true son of Idumuje-Ugboko, lawyer and Senator of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, let him come out openly to deny the fact that his town—Idumuje-Ugboko was founded in the 19th century by a Benin man named “Ogbeide.” Let him also tell us if “Ogbeide” is an Igbo name of Southeast Igbo origin. Otherwise those close to him should advise him to shut up his mouth over his deluded contraption of Anioma Igbo identity.
If Senator Ned Nwoko is not yet aware, let me inform him that the suffix “Ugboko” attached to the name of his town “Idumuje-Ugboko, which stands for the Southeast term “Agu”, is derived from Yoruba term for farmland in the forest—Igbo-Oko; “Igbo” meaning forest and “Oko” meaning farmland. It also underscores the trajectory of West Niger Igbo origins from the Ile-Ife autochthonous Igbo axis.
Part of the attached photo is a testament to my role in the now discredited and notorious Indigenous Peoples of Biafra (IPOB), formerly led by his Lordship Justice Eze Ozobu—former Chief Justice of Enugu State and, Dr. Dozie Ikedife—Ikenga Nnewi, former President General of Ohaneze Ndigbo.
Can Ned Nwoko or any of his political hirelings from the Southeast compare himself to the two men mentioned above? Ned Nwoko should therefore be deluding himself by assuming that he is doing what no Anioma son has done before him by claiming to be Igbo when indeed he is not.
Does Senator Ned Nwoko think that he’s my mate in matters of competing sacrificial Igbo interests? Igbo patriotism is defeated when its fundamental objective is centered on the pursuit of illicit money and fraudulent political image laundering. My objective as an unsung Igbo patriot is thousands of kilometers away from that of Ned Nwoko, and I don’t care what people say about me in this regard.
Senator Ned Nwoko is a Muslim financially empowered by Sokoto Caliphate to prepare the grounds for the conquest and Islamization of Anioma people. So, sowing the seed of discord among Anioma people on the one hand and, between Anioma people and the Igbo of Southeast on the other, is a major Islamic strategy of stealth Islamization. Where else would the marriage of multiple wives be celebrated with imperious bravado except in Islam?
If you ask Ned Nwoko to give one economic or political benefit Anioma people will get for joining Southeast, he has nothing in his brain to say; except the bullshit claim of common Igbo language. That’s the kind man representing Anioma people in the Senate.
The British Colonial Government anthropologist, Northcote W. Thomas, writing in 1914 on the distinctive cultural identity of Anioma people in contrast to the Igbo of Southeast, stated on page 5 of his Anthropological Report on Ibo-Speaking Peoples of Nigeria: Part IV Law and Custom of the Ibo of the Asaba District, S. Nigeria:
“As regards customs, it is clear that the Niger is a far more important boundary than the frontier between languages. The marriage customs on the Asaba side are completely different from those on the east of the Niger.”
The problem between Anioma people and their southeast Igbo kinsmen is not about common language. As has always been stated and proven beyond the intellectual walls of universities, language alone does not define ethnic identity or origin. What separates a native English man from and Igbo British citizen is his distinctive ancestral historical linkages, which cannot be obliterated by the common English language that unites them.
So, those who think because Anioma people speak Igbo language they should all be defined as Igbo without either exception or reservation, are not only deluding themselves, but are infested with incurable cankerworm of abhorrent conquest mentality. This is the fundamental basis of Middle Belt nationalism today—half-educated morons from Southern Nigeria referring to them as Hausa because they speak Hausa language as their indigenous lingua franca.
Initially, it was not my intention to respond to Ned Nwoko’s cacophonic musings on Anioma history and identity, including the now vexatious quest for Anioma State, safe for the inundation of the said intellectual garbage on my social media accounts by some of my Southeast Igbo fans, possibly hazarding the conquest of Odogwu of Ibusa by Ned Nwoko.
I refer to the current state of agitation for Anioma State as vexatious because from the stage when Ned Nwoko unilaterally introduced the extraneous subject of lumping Anioma people in the Southeast geo-political zone, those Anioma people who questioned his audacity to do so without due consultations have been vilified, abused, insulted and threatened with all manners of retributions by his Southeast Igbo political hirelings.
We saw His Royal Majesty the Obi of Issele-Uku Kingdom, Agbogidi Nduka Ezeagwuna II and, His Royal Majesty Obi (Prof) Epiphany Azinge, SAN, being vilified on social media by southeast social media mercenaries contracted by Ned Nwoko, for respectively reasserting Anioma’s ethnic and cultural distinctiveness from the Igbo of Southeast. It has never happened in any part of Nigeria that foreigners would be insulting people and their kings for redefining their own ethnic identity which is their inalienable right.
The fundamental question that always crops up in my mind is did Senator Ned Nwoko tell these Southeast Igbo mercenaries that Anioma people are nobodies and political nonentities who cannot stand up for their rights or make their own independent choice? Does Ned Nwoko think that with his fraudulently elected position of Senator he now possesses the unquestionable right to decide the political destiny of Anioma people?
We saw Ikwerre people of the present Rivers State openly and officially deny their Igbo identity even after being bribed with the position of President General of Ohaneze Ndigbo; yet we did not see any member of the deluded Igbo Bu Igbo organization openly vilifying them. Ikwerre people clearly belong ethno-historically to Southern Igbo sub-group together with Oratta/Owerri, Ohuhu/Ngwa and Bende. Again, this revolves round ethno-linguistic classification rather than ethno-historical origins.
I asserted and I still stand by it, that nobody in the present Southeast geo-political zone, not even the noisemakers and their fathers has sacrificed for collective Igbo interest more than I did and still doing selflessly till date. Let me even add as a professional historian of Igbo history and culture that more than half of the present population of the present Southeast geo-political zone who loquaciously claim Igbo identity are not of historical Igbo origins but those whose ancestors migrated or were imported from outside the present core-Igboland.
Indeed, some of these noisemakers masquerading as Ndigbo have Igala, Ebira, Hausa, Jukun, Idoma, Ekoi, Ibibio and Nupe blood in their veins and arteries. Yet, these are the same people making noise about Anioma identity. Who actually has identity crisis? Is it the person clinging to his original ethnic identity in the face of an obvious conquering foreign identity or, the person who bears an ethnic identity he cannot prove his historical connection with it?
Northcote W. Thomas stated clearly on page 2 of his book mentioned above that one major difference between Anioma people and their Southeast Igbo counterparts is that not only could every town in Anioma trace its founder, but nearly, if not all the towns, are heterogeneous in origin; which was not the case with the Igbo of Southeast. To quote him direct:
“A curious feature of the traditions, and, in all probability, of the actual history, of the towns of the Asaba district is that not only can they, unlike the towns on the east of the Niger, say who the founder of the town was, but very few towns are homogeneous in respect of origin.”
The above statement not only underscores the ethnic diversity of Anioma people, but equally defines the high state of their historical consciousness. In other words, Anioma people do not need people like Ned Nwoko to redefine the trajectory of their history.
I can trace the origins of the various villages and kindred in my town Ibusa (Igbuzo) to specific towns in the Southeast and other places in the present Edo and Delta States without difficulties. Senator Ned Nwoko cannot do so in respect to his town of Idumuje-Ugboko. My town metamorphosed from “Isu-Mbaogu” to “Igbo bi n’Uzo”, then “Igbouzo”, from which point it got contracted to “Igbuzo”, before being Anglicized to the present form “Ibusa.”
Thus it is difficult for somebody like me to deny my Igbo identity as an individual and as a native of Ibusa. But as a group, it is historically insane as a professional historian with a doctorate degree in history to describe my Local Government Area of origin— Oshimili North Local Government Area of Delta State, as totally Igbo.
This is because we have two major indigenous languages—Igbo and Igala. Ebu town is an Igala-speaking community today and only speaks Igbo as a second language. Is it not laughable that our untutored kinsmen from the Southeast would want us to force Igbo identity on them just because they speak Igbo?
On the other hand, unlike the case of Ibusa, Senator Ned Nwoko’s town and clan name, “Idumuje”, lacks any form of historical Igbo link. “Idumuje” is the contraction of the Edo word, “Idumu Onojie” (Royal Quarters), which clearly expresses their core Edo origin. “Onojie” is the Esan version of Benin “Onogie.” The terms “Idumu” and “Ogbe” are two maximal lineage structures which are indisputably of Edo origins and only common among Anioma people. They are not Southeast Igbo terms.
Senator Ned Nwoko stated in his figment of imagination that Anioma is 99 percent Igbo and his deluded political hirelings both in Anioma and Southeast applauded him sheepishly. There was no question of how he arrived at the figure both historically and statistically. We were not also informed of those that constituted the other 1 percent.
As a professional historian of University of Nigeria, Nsukka School, I expect those challenging me on this subject matter to do so in tandem with the points I raise. This is very pertinent in the light of the on-going attempts by political neophytes of no defined intellectual locus to muddle up the history of Anioma people in their mad rage to create an invidious magnetic field of false ethnic identity for their selfish political ends.
Senator Ned Nwoko being the primus inter pares among these political neophytes, even as a lawyer without court experience, lacks the locus classicus to determine the historical pendulum of Anioma identity. Let him ask himself if being fraudulently elected as a Senator now qualifies him to dictate and re-define Anioma history and identity?
Let us first look at the ethno-historical character of Senator Ned Nwoko’s Aniocha North Local Government Area of Delta State, in order to see how deeply deluded he has come to be as a Senator of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. The Aniocha North Local Government Area of Delta State we have today is made up of three distinct clans of distinct origins. These are the Umuezechime Clan, Odiani Clan and Idumuje Clan.
None of these clans claims direct Igbo origin from east of the River Niger. Umuezechime claims Benin origin, Odiani is Yoruba origin both ethnically and linguistically; while Idumuje is of Benin origin. Although, the only exception in this case is Ogboli Quarters in Issele-Uku Kingdom, which traces its origin to Nri town in the present Anaocha Local Government Area of Anambra State.
We need not overburden ourselves with the well-known case of Umuezechime Clan. But it is laughable to note that Obior, the hometown of one of Ned Nwoko’s political handmaid, Omu Onyebuchi Okonkwo is the Clan Head of Umuezechime. Omu Onyebuchi Okonkwo would often expose the depth of her ignorance of her own ancestral origin by claiming that because her name is Onyebuchi Okonkwo, that automatically qualifies her to be of the same ethnic origin with the Igbo of Southeast.
But she forgot in the same vein to inform us why her Yoruba-speaking Olukwumi neighbors in the same Local Government Area bear Igbo names while they are Yoruba. Is Omu Onyebuchi Okonkwo telling us that the people of Odiani (Olukwumi) Clan are no longer Yoruba because they bear Igbo names? This is the kind of intellectual charlatans Ned Nwoko gathers around him as representatives of Anioma people in his bid to lump Anioma into the Southeast geo-political zone.
Odiani Clan as one of the three clans that make up Aniocha North Local Government Area, is both Yoruba-speaking and Yoruba origins. They are made up of the following six towns: Ukwunzu, Ugbodu, Ubulubu, Idumuogo, Ugboba and Ogodo. This was what Nortcote W. Thomas wrote about three of the communities on page 2 of his book mentioned earlier:
“In the north-west portion of the district two towns, Ukunzu and Ubodu, with an offshoot Ubulubu, are remarkable as b eing Yoruba islands, which appear to have settled in their present situation perhaps some 700 years ago, and yet, in spite of their isolation, preserve their Yoruba language, known as Unukumi, which resembles the Yoruba of Usehin and Akure, until the present day. In fact, the older people are even now unable to speak Ibo fluently, and it is said that until some 50 or 60 years ago the population was monoglot Yoruba. As far as the customs go, they appear to have entirely assimilated those of the surrounding Ibo, except, possibly, in burial customs.”
From the timing of their migration and settlement by Northcote W. Thomas, it is obvious that these Yoruba communities in Anioma are older than Ned Nwoko’s Idumuje-Ugboko. Is Ned Nwoko again telling us that these people have no right of their Yoruba identity as Anioma people just because he wants Anioma State to join the Southeast?
Do we now say that an Ugbodu man refusing to be identified as Igbo and claims Yoruba identity is suffering from identity crisis? Unfortunately none of these social media intellectual minions has given us the precise definition of identity crisis. One is beginning to understand why Ned Nwoko could not practice law in both Nigeria and United Kingdom but chose to engage in fraudulent business of money-making.
Idumuje Clan, Ned Nwoko’s supposed clan, is made up of Idumuje-Uno, Idumuje-Ugboko and, Aniofu. Idumuje-Uno gave birth to Idumuje-Ugboko; while Idumuje-Ugboko gave birth to Aniofu. Again, like the Umuezechime Clan, Idumuje Clan did not have the tradition of origin and migration from east of the Niger.
Both Idumuje-Uno and Idumuje-Ugbo claim Edo ancestry and the onus now lies on Ned Nwoko to specifically tell the world that the history of his Idumuje Clan relating to Edo origin is false; instead of pitiably hiding under the cloak of common Igbo language to impose Igbo identity on all Anioma people.
While it could be reasonable for Senator Ned Nwoko to claim undeniable Southeast Igbo identity since his biological father was from the present Ntezi town in Ishielu Local Government Area of Ebonyi State, it is not in the same token reasonable for a “Nwada” (One’s daughter’s child) to dictate the origin of his maternal kinsmen to them. But the irony of Ned Nwoko’s paternal origin from Southeast is that even Ntezi his father’s hometown is not Igbo-speaking or of Igbo origin. So could we say Ned Nwoko is an ethnic bat?
Senator Ned Nwoko was hosted by his deluded “Igbo Bu Igbo” identity scavengers of Southeast at Okpanam and, no Delta State nah Anioma political leader of worth attended; not even the Councilor representing his Idumuje-Ugboko Ward in Aniocha North Local Government Area Council. Anioma has three Members of Federal House of Representatives. None of them attended. Anioma has nine members of Delta State House of Assembly. No Honorable member attended. No Traditional ruler; not even his own Obi of Idumuje-Ugboko attended. Yet his Southeast Igbo political hirelings don’t think something is wrong somewhere.
Senator Ned Nwoko’s Southeast Igbo compatriots will never see anything wrong with such abysmal show of disgrace by a Senator of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, because even in his defeat he serves their obnoxious objective of forcing Anioma people into their deluded mission of IPOB-led Biafra secession project.
It is instructive to note that the original idea of IPOB as advanced by Justice Eze Ezobu and Dr. Dozie Ikedife was not to secede from Nigeria, but as a platform for political agitation against Igbo marginalization. I joined on the invitation of some prominent Igbo leaders out of patriotism as an individual Igbo man and, not as a representative of Anioma people; just in the same manner I was a member of Oodua People’s Congress (OPC). I subsequently left when they abandoned the original mission and engaged in the vile act of secession.
The current mission of the Nnamdi Kanu-led IPOB rejected the original principle of IPOB and subsequently turned it into an internal Igbo terrorist machine designed for intimidation and extortion of the same people they claim to fight for their emancipation. Nnamdi Kanu went ahead to unilaterally re-draw the map of Biafra from the original Eastern Nigeria to include Edo and Delta States.
Well, that was unacceptable to people like us because historical Midwest Region was never part of the defunct Biafra and would not wish to belong in future. It was in the bid to justify this clandestine inclusion of Edo and Delta States in the new IPOB map of Biafra that some disgruntled IPOB elements embarked on the clandestine project of Igbo unity outside the Southeast geo-political zone. Beginning with Igbanke and, then subtly linking it to Anioma State agitation, they soon employed Senator Ned Nwoko as their agent provocateur.
Not only was Senator Ned Nwoko promised unflinching Southeast support for the position of first Governor of the proposed Anioma State by the late President General of Ohaneze Ndigbo Chief Emmanuel Iwuanyanwu, he continued to be bankrolled by some prominent Southeast businessmen both home and abroad for the proposed inclusion of Anioma State in Southeast.
Anioma people should therefore be informed that Senator Ned Nwoko’s intention of proposing Anioma State’s inclusion in the Southeast is to situate Anioma people ready for the future Biafra as being advanced by IPOB. Otherwise, if Ned Nwoko is asked to tell Anioma people what economic and political benefits they would gain if lumped in the Southeast, there is nothing he can say, outside the spineless claim of common language.
What has common language to do with the economic and political development of Anioma people? The Igbo are attracted to Lagos State today because of economic prospects. Anioma people also want to know the economic attraction in the Southeast geo-political zone beyond the stupid and insane claim of common Igbo language. “Na person wey carry palm fronds goat dey follow”, goes a popular adage among Anioma people.
Outside Onitsha Main Market, which is even situated on historical Anioma land, what other economic attraction in Southeast will encourage Anioma people to be part of it? Even as I write now, Onitsha and Ogbaru people are silently agitating for relocation to Delta State, because to them they are aliens in Southeast geo-political zone.
Dr. Nwankwo T. Nwaezeigwe is the Odogwu (Traditional Generalissimo) of Ibusa, Delta Sate & President, International Coalition against Christian Genocide in Nigeria (ICAC-GEN). He was formerly Director, Centre for Igbo Studies, University of Nigeria, Nsukka. He lives in exile in Manila, Republic of the Philippines.
Email: Nwaezeigwe.Genocideafrica@gmail.com
Visit our: https://icac-gen.org to understand the core reason of my struggles and exile in Republic of the Philippines.