Why Not All Stealing Or Criminal Activities Are Punished In Nnewi

By Anayo M. Nwosu

Before the Whiteman came to ruffle the cultural feathers and stirred our still clean water of criminal justice system, the Nnewi people had settled ways of punishing or treating criminal elements in the town.

As big as the town was, the leaders of the town maintained no jail or prisons.

The leaders of the town were more interested in studying the root causes of a crime than punishing the criminal.

For us, something must have ignited the fire of crime in a citizen.

In Nnewi Jurisprudence, stealing was classified into the following groups:

1. Ohi Agụụ (i.e the stealing caused by hunger)
2.Ohi Akantụtụ or Kleptomania
3. Ohi Ngbakụị or stealing caused by influence of juju in which case the thief is regarded as a victim of spiritual manipulation.
4. Ohi Anya Odo or stealing done wilfully.

In a bid to curtail the first type of stealing, all levels of authority in Nnewi ensured that no young man was allowed to loaf around.

Anybody was also free to harvest from any farm at the end of harvest season any missed out or unharvested yam, cocoyam and cassava without fear of harassment from the farm owners.

This is still practiced in Nnewi till date. It is called “ije mkpa”.

Most children of my age did a lot of “ije mkpa ji” or scavenging for unharvested yam, a month after the first rain before the next farming season.

A sprouting yam tendril in a harvested farm was indicative of an missed out yam tuber. A lucky hunter might dig out a big tuber or a small yam stump so small to warrant the harvester’s effort during the harvest.

It was no crime for kids to pluck any fruits like mangoes, pears, and guava to quench hunger. This is in ohi agụụ category. I could remember that I was guilty of this kind of offence and had long confessed same to the late Monsignor Joe Nwaibegbunam at St. Peter Clavers Catholic Church Otolo, Nnewi.

Also, stealing of cassava or cocoyam from anybody’s farm just for consumption was treated as a minor offense which attracted only a reprimand by the head of the extended family or ụmụnna, if the victim decided to escalate the matter.

The thief would be advised to learn how to be industrious and would be assisted with farm inputs and land to farm and become useful.

However, stealing of yam, which was regarded as the chief of all farm produce, was highly prohibited.

Any wilful stealing of yam from a farm before harvest season or from a yam barn either out of hunger or for sale attracted the punishment of being dragged around the market square and taunted as “onye ohi ji” or “yam thief” and a fine. The offender must also appease the god of the land or ị kpụ alụ.

The sheer stupidity and the style of stealing could make it so obvious that the thief was either a Kleptomaniac (Ohi Akantụtụ) or under the influence of juju (Ohi Ngbakọị).

Thieves in these two categories were considered sick and were referred to dibias or native doctors for cure or deliverance.

The fourth category known as Ohi Anya Odo or wilful or professional stealing was further classified as:

1. Isiakpụ: in this class were thieves whose occupation was known to everyone. They combined stealing with kidnapping and hired assassination. Even their robbery victims were so afraid to report them.

This group were sometimes patronized by the leaders or elders of the town to execute a king or a leader or enemy of the town or a renegade warrior.

2. Ekpelima: this class operated with stealth and with the aid of juju that could make their victims fall asleep during their operations.

This type of criminals usually lived in isolated huts in places known as “ịkpa or ọzara” which were distant from their relations’ clustered settlements.

3. Abanidiegwu: this group were well trained hefty looking men that operated only in the night.

This class of thieves could empty the pen or yam barn of a household before dawn and while the victims were as sleep.

There was a man in Nnewi history who had imbued in him, the combination of the four traits of
wilful criminality. He was named Ukpabia. He hailed from Uruagu village.

Ukpabia forced Nnewi to accept his own rules that if anybody caught him stealing anybody’s yam, he would “tolerate” the owner taking back his yam but wouldn’t stomach the seizure his “ụkpa” or carriage basket.

The impunity of this criminal who defied all traps and plans geared towards liquidating him forced Nnewi elders to commission “ịgba agụ” or “a spiritual inquiry to ascertain which ancestor reincarnated him” to enable them to figure out how to take him out.

When the result of the spiritual enquiries revealed that not only was Ukpabia reincarnated by a deity and that he was fulfilling his destiny by stealing but that no human weapon fashioned against him would prosper, Nnewi leaders adopted another option.

Nnewi people from time immemorial, are not known to be so stupid to stick to a plan that does not work.

“Ndi be anyi na ebu dike n’obi kwe ụjọ ekene” meaning that “it is never an act of cowdice to negotiate with an enemy with better or deadlier weapons”.

What Could Make A Wealthy Man’s Male Children Run Mad Without Cure

A delegation was sent to Ukpabia to broker a deal and an understanding was reached under oath.

Ukpabia wouldn’t be harassed or called Isiakpụ, Ekpelima or Abanidiegwu in Nnewi and in fact, anybody who openly referred to him as such would be fined provided that Ukpabia no longer would practise his stealing trade in Nnewi.

And he agreed.

Also, being that Nnewi people lived a communal life, it was very easy to identify the male species from a pool of day old chicks.

That is to say that, children with clear tendencies to criminality were easily identified and trained as warriors. There were many wars to fight with neighbouring towns for one cause or the other. And in war, there were so many things available to be looted including sex.

While the criminally minded warriors had to win the wars to enable them loot, Nnewi leaders and elders gained from their motivation and gallantry to win wars against the town’s enemies.

It was a win-win situation.

Also, the traditional chieftancy or Ọzọ titles were not available to criminals hence making those who wanted to take Ọzọ or Dim titles to lead honourable lives devoid of serious crime.

Broadly speaking, any serious society who relegates its psychologists, philosophers and thinkers who could help it study and understand the reasons why so many types of crimes flourish and who could analyse and proffer alternative solutions is doomed.

That’s why the most effective or efficient EFCC or police force cannot stop criminal activities in Nigeria until we understand and fix the root causes of crimes which include unemployment, poor engagement of youths, allowing those with criminal tendencies to lead and lack of social safety nets.

However, many of our politicians and civil servants must have been reincarnated by the same deity or similar deities that was responsible for the stealing in Ukpabia.

Nigeria should learn from the precolonial Nnewi by granting amnesty to the repentant looters of our commonwealth if the looters agree to repatriate their loot, return agreed percentage to government and to invest the remainder in Nigeria’s economy.

Was it not the variant of the deal Obasanjo’s regime cut with Abacha family?

Evil is evil but not all stolen items are returnable otherwise, let the christians or Israel return the blessings of Isaac to the children of Esau and Ishmael.

Isaac was clear on who he wanted to bless but Jacob and his mother, just like our politicians, INEC, senior civil servants and their families and friends, conspired to obtain by trick that which was clearly considered as stolen.