By Suyi Ayodele

Have you ever broken a duck’s eggs intentionally? The duck does not come after you for doing that. Its siblings, known in the esoteric language as àpapò eleye (the combined forces of birds) do that on its behalf. I learnt the lesson that it takes the intervention of the Almighty to survive the war of àpapò eleye so young in life. They are a very unrelenting lot, who wage a war of attrition, and equally fatal. May my enemies not incur their wrath!

The duck is a dull bird, so we think. It is slow in virtually everything it does; never in a hurry. But beyond its ‘dullness’, the duck possesses some powers that make the human race avoid it. For those who are knowledgeable enough in the belief of our forebears, the duck is not just a bird. It is the bird of the elders. We are in the festive season when millions of chickens are sent to their early graves all in the name of celebration. Check up on your neighbours this season and tell me how many homes are using ducks as delicacies in celebration of Christmas. If you find any, I will advise you to respect such a home in all your dealings. Or, if you have a friend who boils or fries duck’s eggs for breakfast, know that your friend is deeper than you know. In poultry keeping, avian farmers hardly rear ducks in commercial quantities, at least in my part of the world. Yet, ducks lay more eggs in multiples than the chickens. Is there something about this gentle bird that is beyond the ordinary?

Growing up in the village, we discovered that if a driver mistakenly ran over a duck or its ducklings, the driver would not just run off. He would stop, look for a currency note or a coin and stick it in the mouth of the dead bird. Why? I will tell you the reason in a while. But let us talk more about the peculiarities of the strange bird, the duck. In terms of the heaviness of feathers, duck feathers are longer and heavier than those of chickens. But in terms of flight, the two are not the same. Chickens merely flop around. Whatever swiftness the duck lacks in walking, it makes up for in flying. The duck flies without flapping its wings like most birds. Once it takes to flight, it releases its wings for the winds to take over. And it goes a long distance before it stops. But on the ground, the duck and its ducklings are majestic; never in a hurry, and never paying attention to human activities around them. Another thing about this strange bird is that it makes no effort in protecting its eggs or ducklings from harm. It allows you to do whatever you want to do with them while it looks on with an expressionless stance. Even the ravenous hawks avoid ducklings while looking for supper. What is it about the duck? What is the mystery surrounding this being? I learnt about that while I was just crawling out of my cradle.

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We were three young cousins in our innocence. We got new catapults from an older cousin whose baskets we assisted in hawking. He was the honest type, who delivered on his promises. The gifts of catapults from him were priceless, and pronto, we went a-hunting. Our targets were the lizards on the rough walls of the houses in the neighbourhood. We were at this lizards-hunting venture when we suddenly stumbled on a duck in hibernation. We disturbed its peace and it left the eggs and moved a distance away. Waoh! There were many eggs. Whatever came over us. We tried our marksmanship on the eggs, aiming at them, and breaking them in relish as the stones hit them with a sound that excited us. It became a competition. Then an old woman showed up. We took off in different directions like the naughty boys we were. She raised an alarm and the neighbours, including our mothers, gathered to see what we had done. We needed nobody to tell us that we were in trouble. So, we stayed off our homes for as long as we could.

Something, however, soon brought us back home. We crawled back when hunger set in, waiting for the worst to happen. I was expecting the worst from my unsparing mother. But nothing happened to us. No beating, no scolding, no reprimand of any kind. Strange! We were fed our normal rations and we went to sleep. The following morning, the three of us were summoned, and given different types of left-over foods and asked to go and feed the duck. Again, strangely enough; we met the duck on the same spot, where we broke its eggs, as if it was in hibernation. We fed it for days until the duck left the spot to continue its normal lifestyle. Soon, we saw it with several ducklings and we never troubled it again. Another strange occurrence was that the owner of the duck, an old irascible woman, never asked us why we did what we did. She carried on as if we never offended her!

Days later, I asked my mother why nobody scolded us and we were merely asked to feed the duck. She only warned me never to break the duck’s eggs again. “Only a bad child does that”, she retorted. I was not satisfied. I knew there was more to it than she said. Years later, while watching my late father, Baba Falade, on his divination mat, I got to know why one should not intentionally break the eggs of the duck. I will only recall the way he ended the Odu Ifa that day. It was a warning in the esoteric that rings bell in my ears till date. This is what Baba Falade said to his clients that day: “Honi bá fo eyin pepeye, li hi wa uja apapo eleye” – he who intentionally breaks the eggs of the duck is the one who looks for the trouble of the combined forces of the birds. You should know by now what the “birds” in the warning represent. If you don’t, how do I help your ignorance of the operations of our mothers; the real owners of the night! It is not for fun that they are not called: Òlamo níjà, gbemo níjà, sin omo de lé – he who settles her child’s fight, fights her child’s fight, and escorts her child back home!

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Governor Siminalayi Fubara of Rivers State is in a long battle with his benefactor, godfather, predecessor and Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Mr. Nyesom Wike. The masses will never get to know the root of the big men’s quarrel. What we all know is that this is a battle that will not end soon. In the coming days and weeks, a lot of interests will come to play, and the battle will be prolonged. While the battle lasts, the peace of Rivers State will suffer. The people of the state will suffer too. And finally, if care is not taken, the economy of the nation will suffer. Should that happen, Nigerians in their millions, will suffer untold economic hardship. This is because the raging battle is capable of crippling our economic mainstay, oil. Can Nigeria afford such? It is left for our new husband in Aso Rock, President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, and his inner court members to decide. I am very much interested in the Fubara-Wike tango. I can predict the end. I can also do a character identikit of the dramatis personae. In this ongoing crisis, Fubara is the duck, while Wike is like the adolescents, who intentionally broke the eggs of a duck years back. Unless Wike sheats his swords and feeds Fubara’s duck for days, he may suffer the warning seconded in Baba Falade’s divination. Should this crisis degenerate to the level that the duck’s siblings would have to weigh in, Wike would have the real apapo eleye to contend with.

Fubara has already set the stage for what is to come. When a trap setter uses an elephant as bait, every discerning mind should know the size of the game that will go down. Last week, before our very eyes, the Rivers State governor did the most unthinkable. As early as 5.00am, on Wednesday, December 13, 2023, the governor moved in with about six bulldozers, a sizeable number of security agents, and demolished the entire state House of Assembly structures. That is the bait for Wike. A governor who could wake up and render an entire arm of government useless is capable of anything. He did not stop there. Fubara moved just four members of the 31-member assembly to the Government House, where he presented the N800 billion state budget to them. The “Assembly” ‘passed’ the budget the same day. By the following day, December 14, Governor Fubara signed the 2024 Appropriation Bill into law. Recall the speed of the duck mentioned above. Is Wike getting the message? I wish he continues in this battle of no victory. I ask this with every sense of sincerity: who would have believed that a Fubara with his ‘innocent’ look would have the nerves to pull off the happenings in that state in the last one week? That, again, is the way of the duck. You can only take its ‘dullness’ for granted at your own risk!

Now, the duck’s siblings are already coming into the fray. The battle ground is getting frenzied. The war music I listened to in Gbelebu town penultimate week is playing in my head. I don’t know the lyrics of the war song. The interpretation of the song as given by my Ijaw friend of over three decades, Fidelis Soriwei, keeps ringing in my head. I pictured the frenzy of the atmosphere as the musician hit the cord. I visualised the excitement of the crowd, especially the womenfolk. Then Fidelis’ voice came hitting me. “What he is saying is that the children are crying as they are being prevented from joining the war boats and canoes. The elders are saying the children should go back because this war is not for them.” I asked why women, I mean mothers, should be happy that a war is about to break out. My interlocutor’s response was daring. “When it comes to war, there is no man or woman in the Ijaw nation.” Without sounding unnecessarily sanguine, I think I love that! If war exterminates without gender discrimination, the one to keep the people alive should also not be gender-sensitive. Ijaw women are already on the battlefield on the side of Fubara. They are being led by the 53-year-old Boma Goodhead, who represents the Asari-Toru Federal Constituency in the House of Representatives. The video of the grave allegation she levelled against Wike is all over the Internet. She is not alone.

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The Ijaw National Congress (INC) has also come into the fray. It is a case of one for all, all for one. Led by its President, Professor Benjamin Okaba, INC sees the Fubara-Wike tango beyond the ordinary. The Ijaw ethnic group is taking the battle to President Tinubu, who it accused of backing Wike against the governor. The group warned that having suffered marginalisation for too long despite being the golden goose that lays the golden eggs for the nation to live on, it would not fold its arms this time around. Should the crisis continue, INC said it could no longer guarantee the safety of the nation’s oil installations and facilities in the Niger Delta! “We are already angered that the government of President Bola Tinubu has marginalised the Ijaw people. In Delta State, where three persons were picked for a federal appointment, none are from the Ijaw nation….Meanwhile the Ijaw are the most economically viable in that state. We are noting all of this. But for him to keep quiet and allow Wike to misbehave shows that there is some tacit support. And we shall not take that. As we speak, our people are so angered; our people are so frustrated to the extent that we can no longer guarantee if things continue in this way, the safety of the oil installations in Ijaw land and our region….40 million Ijaw people are angered and aggrieved. And they are saying that a slap on Governor Fubara is a slap on the entire Ijaw nation. Any attempt to further close up our political space to remove Siminalayi Fubara from office is a call for fire.”

The simple interpretation of the INC warning is that a war will soon break out in Rivers State. Should that happen, the nation will suffer greatly. The Ijaw, in this impending war, will not fight conventionally. They will go for the soul of the nation. Unfortunately, Nigeria cannot afford any sabotage of its economy with the level of economic crisis the nation is passing through at the moment. Something must give. I don’t fully understand Wike’s worth in the President Tinubu government. I don’t know the level of damage Wike did to his own political party, the People’s Democratic Party (PDP), during the last election such that he occupies a prime position in the political calculation of President Tinubu. But I know one thing. When the chips are down, and the president is to make a choice between the economic prosperity of his government and Wike, he will go for the former. That will not make Tinubu an ingrate. The president will only be archetypal. After all, they say in politics and international relations, there are no permanent friends and enemies, but permanent interests. The coming days and weeks will be interesting. Wike has the window now to allow peace in Rivers State. He has fought many battles and won. How he intends to win the current war, I don’t know. He has everything to lose if President Tinubu decides to sacrifice him for the peace of the Niger Delta. No nation should take the INC’s warning lightly. In any case, they have done it before. And nothing can stop them from repeating the feat if that is their last card on the table. I can’t imagine Nigeria adding another avoidable Niger Delta crisis to the litany of woes confronting the nation because of an overbearing godfather. The matter is easier for President Tinubu to handle. He is the godfather of godfathers himself. So, it should not be difficult for him to take the call and avoid the looming battle of an àpapò eleye!!