Some people, mostly those who despise tradition and always call our tradition 'juju', have been trolling me since yesterday for allegedly breaching tradition and writing about the demise of our King before the official announcement from the palace.
Having been on the throne for about 64 years, dating back to his days as a member of the Eastern House of Chiefs during the First Republic, there are not many people in Obudu who have living memories of the reign of our previous Kings. For most Obudu people alive, just like most Brits knew only Queen Elizabeth, the only person we have known as our King all our lives is HRH Utsu Ukandi 1 of Obudu, Uti J.D. Agba.
At his demise, the traditional prime minister is expected to immediately send royal emissaries with kola nuts to the clan heads of all the clans under his Kingship. The royal messengers aren't supposed to tell them the King is dead. They will inform the clan heads that the King demands them to suspend whatever they are doing and rush to the palace immediately. It is on their arrival at the palace that they will be informed of the demise of the King while they return home with the news for their various clans.
A set of rituals is supposed to follow for one week (which is five market days in our traditional calendar). After which another set of closed-door activities will follow and culminate in the firing of the traditional canon by the end of the second week (ten market days.) That is supposed to be next tomorrow Thursday. Because today is 9 days since our King, our living deity, transited.
To the best of my knowledge of our tradition, the most crucial of this period is the first five market days when all the clan heads MUST be informed about the King's demise before the information can go out. I dutifully followed that process as a son of the soil. The other days were equally important but not to the restrain on the notice of his demise. Whoever assumes that a journalist was supposed to wait until the official announcement is made next Saturday before going to press is not in sync with the times. If the notice was on CNN or BBC, would they also feel the same way or is it because I am from Obudu?
Now seeing people who have always demonized me for openly declaring and promoting my adherence to traditional religion, those who always call our tradition juju, pretending to like religion and pouncing on me for not waiting for Saturday, as if they now love our tradition, is very ironical and hypocritical, to say the least. That is like preaching to the convert.
It is however a good development that this raging controversy has been generated and that is what will exactly up the long-awaited public conversation around the promotion and further elevation of our revered traditional throne.
Yours sincerely,
Citizen Agba Jalingo