His Royal Majesty, Emmanuel Onyeike Efeizormor II and the Obi of Owa Kingdom in Ika North East Local Government Area, Delta state has recounted some of his past experiences in life.
The 77-yea-old monarch who is also the vice chairman of the Delta State Council of Traditional Rulers has had many near death tragedies in his sojourn on the planet earth. In a recent interview with Niger Delta Voice, spoke on the challenges of life, why people refer to Owa as the land of peace and prosperity, how he slept with a giant snake for 5 days and many more.
HRM Emmanuel Onyeike Efeizomor
Read excerpts below:
There is the story that you slept with a snake in the same room for several days without it harming you in your childhood, was it an ancestral guide, can you tell us what happened?
I have to thank my God because I have encountered this kind of circumstance repeatedly but at every stage, I overcome. It was a miracle to me, it was very surprising, it was very shocking, I thank God, each time I think about it, I cannot just imagine, it tells me I should be more humane, I should be more responsible, always give thanks to God and do justice to all manner of people. How God did that for me and why He did it, I do not know.
You have not told the story yet, when exactly did this happen, how did you finally come to see the snake, for how many days was the snake there with you and you said there were other circumstances, we are all ears?
(long laughter again) Well, it is not everything that happens to man that you want to expose. Perhaps, if you begin to do a lot of in-depth explanation, if there are forces working against your interest, you might be reminding them that they have not done enough homework to be able to get at you adversely, that force can be reinvigorated, but simply put it was the first experience.
I was then a houseboy living with a headmaster, late Mr. G.N.C Diai at Owa-Aliero community, I was in charge of animals like fowls, dogs, goats in the family and I was very friendly with these animals. Even till today, if I enter your premises and I find a dog, merely looking at the dog and whispering in a peculiar way, the dog will like it and start playing with me.
I can play with a dog and make it to go to sleep, the same thing I do with goats, the fowls were about three when they were handed over to me and in no time, it went to 100, the whole place was filled- up and they multiplied. We had a cage where he we put the hens and cocks and just by the boys quarters, we have places that we keep wood to prevent rain from falling on them.
At a point, the place was actually congested but I was not expecting any danger, I had a bed made up of palm fronds and bamboo, you cut it as if you are making a fence, put it on the floor with grass in between as foam and a mat on top of it. There was no electricity at the time and you rely on the stars to have light, one particular day, my master held a get together of teachers in the school compound, they had a gas lamp that you pump those days, music was on and they were dancing.
I didn’t know when I raised alarm
I was listening to music and watching them, suddenly but close by, the fowls would make some disturbing noise and I wondered why they were making noise incessantly, so I came very close to watch. I sat by the side of the house to find out what was happening. Unexpectedly, I saw a shadow moving by the side of the wall and the thing was crawling, a light flashed and I saw it moving like a snake, I watched closely but still do not know what I saw, I was confused and did not even know when I raised the alarm. I shouted: see snake seriously; they jumped out from where they were dancing.
Mr. Diai and others asked me where is it, where is it, I said I saw it there, they showed bravado, searched the place, the thing went underground, they did not see it. They went back to continue with their party, the man gave me a very serious knock on the head saying that I was a crook and that I was disturbing their enjoyment. I felt very sad and still went back to the place. Then, I saw the thing again, I could not bear it, I called another houseboy from another master and he raised alarm much more than I did.
They ran out again and felt that this time around, let them look for it. They were using a long stick to poke everywhere to see whether it would come out until one of the teachers saw it, it was by the edge of the wall, and it had put its head up. He threw his stick away and ran and as he was running, he was raising alarm. It was only then that they began to feel that there was sense in what I was saying. Finally, they brought a torch and started looking for it.
The whole school, community, came to see the snake.
Diai himself not too sure of what they were saying fired his dane gun in that direction, it was in the course of that the snake was hit and it moved out from that place, there was reflection as it crawled away and they saw it and shouted. They rushed back for cutlass, wood and he loaded the gun again. He fired again the bullet did not hit the snake properly, it was not even acting as something that was shot at, but it moved towards the pit.
It took considerable efforts before they were able to hit the snake on the head, so that was when the speed slowed down and in the course of that, they killed the snake. They pulled it out, it was very long and heaped the woods fetch by the pupils for teachers in their quarters on the snake and set it on fire with kerosene. It burned all night. In the morning, teachers not staying in the quarters came to see it, the pupils not campus came to see and then the community came to see it.
It was after that Diai said I should no longer be sleeping in that place. He gave me one room in the main house. You can see when the snake came, it did not attack me, and it went to eat fowl, egg and all that, so why should I not thank God.
What is the name of the snake?
It was a black snake, I did not ask anybody the name because of the fear, but it was very big black snake. In fact, the whole of the stomach down was already red and the back of it was red to almost the neck.
We learned the snake slept in the same room with you about three to five days, is this true?
You know before a snake can shed its skin, it takes not less than four days to do that and if the snake shed the skin that we found there, definitely, it had spent more than four days. Therefore, it was just a companion.
What lesson did this incident actually teach you about life?
What I will say is that if your hands are clean, God will always be by your side, which is my first reaction. That is why I try to be extremely tolerant so that whatever people do to you, give them a second chance, third chance, fourth chance, they may change.
You can read the full interview on Vanguard here.
No comments:
Post a Comment