Are Aros really pompous people?

5
Ogbonnaya Akoma

In August, 2016, I had travelled to Arochukwu from Port Harcourt. As usual, I travelled to Aba (Osisioma Junction), and then took another bus to Umuahia.  At Umuahia, I had gone to Aro Park and bought a N1, 200-bus ticket to board another bus to Arochukwu after I had gone round the town (particularly Uwalaka Street where I had resided in the town of Umuahia before relocating my family to Port Harcourt that year).

Shortly after I had come back and boarded our bus that was waiting to be completed by two passengers, a cherubic-faced, dark-complexioned, tall and beautiful lady arrived and joined the bus to Aro. In the next ten minutes, the bus moved off and veered towards Bende Road, and headed for Bende for onward movement to Arochukwu.

As the bus was moving and galloping up and down the road, some passengers started discussing the bad state of the road that led to Arochukwu.  While some discussants talked ill of the government at the federal, Abia state and local government levels, others blamed the local and representative politicians whom they said were compromising with those who awarded road contracts. They accused the local politicians of colluding with the contractors to abandon the road contracts after they (the local politicians) must have collected their percentage payments. The result is that, according to them, road projects were abandoned, including those that led to Arochukwu .

But the tune of the discussion changed close to the Goodluck Ebele Jonathan Barracks at Ohafia the moment the dark-complexioned lady started talking. So, she spoke and said that we were then entering into the ‘forgotten town’ in Nigeria – Arochukwu. She continued to say that despite the big names she had been hearing about the town of Arochukwu since she was a kid till the journey, Arochukwu had remained a despised town in Igbo land. She was not done yet.

As we galloped and veered through one bad spot or the other, the lady went ahead to talk ill of the people of Arochukwu, condemning those who represented the town in political and general leadership of the town, mentioning names. She went ahead to talk ill of Arochukwu in many more ways. She said that it was because of her participation in slavery and slave trade that ‘Arochukwu is punished now’ in atonement. The lady went ahead to say that the three towns in Abia state that participated actively in slavery and slave trade (Arochukwu, Bende and Uzuakoli) ‘will never experience development and peace because of the inhuman treatment they had subjected people to in those days….’

At all those vituperations, I had kept quiet and listened. So, she continued. But when a lecturer at ASCETA (who was travelling with us) reminded her it was not only the three towns she had mentioned had participated in slave trade activities in Nigeria, she dismissed his explanation and quickly added another dimension to the whole thing. She had said it openly that another thing she hated about the Aros in particular was that ‘the people of Arochukwu are always pompous in their nature. They always brag about their nativity and town. They always bloat themselves as the toro toro does …. They always feel they are superior to other people. But when you want to go to their town, no road! Look at the type of roads that lead to Arochukwu. Next time any Aro person talks to me and brags about their town, I will shout him down…. No wonder they live everywhere and refuse to go home.’

It was at that point that I came in. I asked her if she actually thought every Aro person was pompous and bloated himself as a turkey. She answered in the affirmative, and went ahead to swear that she was right to conclude that ‘Aro people are pompous. Everybody knows this.’

Since that encounter, I have continued to ruminate over that lady’s aspersions that she had cast on the people of Arochukwu. I later discovered she was a police woman posted to Arochukwu, where she vowed never to serve in. In fact, when she alighted at the Magistrate’s Court-Market Road Junction, she had quipped ‘this is where the Nigeria police want me to live and work – I will never do so. Instead, I leave the force.’ As she said that, she left us.

Come to think of it: let me ask the question here: Are Aros really pompous people, braggarts? I posed this question to seven people (of Arochukwu origin) and another six people (non-Arochukwu indigenes). Four Aro persons (out of six) admitted many of us were really pompous while three outsiders admitted Aro people were really pompous (and boastfully braggarts).

If this opinion-sampling is anything to go by, it is not good that we continue to brag about, engage in unnecessary boasting sprees, and feel we are superior to other people (because of our native town that is now one of the worst places to live on earth in all ramifications). We should be less-bragging, less pompous, less boastful, and stop feeling we are superior to other people. To me, we are not! I feel that those who engage in the above negative engagements should stop it, those mba ovia people in our midst.

It is because of the way many of us behave that make people of other places tend to hate us.

Or, don’t you think so?

About author

Ogbonnaya Akoma

Public Affairs Commentator Isimkpu, Arochukwu

5 comments

  1. ndubuisi 6 August, 2018 at 16:22 Reply

    Cultural egocentrism and ethnocentrism – every human is guilty of the “offence!” The idea in our head that our place is the best place to be, notwithstanding the allure other places may present, is inherent in man! “Nwa Aro iche, nkpola ya iche!” Most of the time, if you examine these views deeply you find ignorance, prejudice and complex at the root. If the dark dude sees Aro during the festivities, she will not remember her birthplace. An irrepressible disposition, a refusal to be put down, an indomitable spirit and enterprise are some of the traits which make the Aro appear to the uneducated mind as pompous! Being ware of this, we owe it to ourselves to relate and socialize more with other people, educating them in the process.

  2. Okoro C. Ukpabi 16 August, 2018 at 16:40 Reply

    You bet we are! At least most of us bask in hollow pomposity. Our “Aroness” mirrors our “Igboness” to some degree. We move into arid zones, toil and make vegetation grow, – buoyed by our success and resultant affluence, we see ourselves far better than the natives, create nomenclatures that ridicule etc. Among us and other Ibos there’s hardly any “Mr.”. We are Chiefs and High Chiefs, Sirs, Drs, Profs, Engineers, Architects, etc., and even combinations- never mind the basis or authenticity. Our social platforms are saturated with grandiloquent expressions. So! It’s part of who we are.
    Thank God as Aros those who really qualify can go with Mazi….
    I for one will comply with your concluding prescription.
    Ndewo
    Okoro C. Ukpabi

  3. Ogbonnaya Kanu Okoro 5 September, 2018 at 20:24 Reply

    We can not change who we are because others wants us to do so. That there is an unwritten conspiracy against Aros can not be disputed and we must strive to make sure we are not subjected to the extreme background in Igbo polity. I don’t see see what hardship we are facing aside from bad road. We have water, electricity and at least a descent road network inside Aro – what then does the lady want. I bet she came out of the hamlets of Igbo land and I must say it, we can boast of having the third largest city in Abia State. If she chose not to work in Aro – fine but she must realize that she denied herself the opportunity of working in one of the most harboring and peaceful kingdom in Igbo land. We are Aros and owes no one any apologies for being who we are. Like us or hate us, we must remain who we are and will continue to do so.
    Ogbonnaya Kanu Okoro is from Amaikpe Square, Arochukwu.

  4. GABRIEL HENRY 24 January, 2019 at 21:25 Reply

    I owe no one apologies for being an Aro man. Slave trade or no Slave trade, Aro man is a merchant who believes in any opportunity to survive. Aro man did not introduce slave trading in Nigeria rather he was introduced to it by the white men whose way of life has virtually become the practice of the day in Nigeria today. As at the time of slave trading just as oil and gas pays today slave trading was a viable opportunity for any serious business man. I am not in any way in support of the barbaric practice of slave trading but I have come to understand that the practice which was introduced to Arochukwu men was welcomed because of the believe which exists even today that the white know better than the blacks.
    As per the lady that claimed Aros are pompous people, it should be clear to her that a way of identity of a people is what makes them unique in their nature. I have come to notice that the same way Hause and Yoruba people hate the Igbos is the same measure, if not more, other Igbos hate Arochukwu people. But in all, Aro will remain Aro unapologetically. We owe nobody but God apologies for our Fathers sins. Our identity is our identity. People are identify based on their way of living, culture, language etc and Aro’s won’t an exception.

    My name is Orji Gabriel Henry from Obinkinta village.

  5. GABRIEL HENRY 24 January, 2019 at 21:25 Reply

    I owe no one apologies for being an Aro man. Slave trade or no Slave trade, Aro man is a merchant who believes in any opportunity to survive. Aro man did not introduce slave trading in Nigeria rather he was introduced to it by the white men whose way of life has virtually become the practice of the day in Nigeria today. As at the time of slave trading just as oil and gas pays today slave trading was a viable opportunity for any serious business man. I not in any way in support of the barbaric practice of slave trading but I have come to understand that the practice which introduced to Arochukwu men was welcomed because of the believe which exists that the white know better than the blacks.
    As per the lady that claimed Aros are pompous people, it should be clear to her that a way of identity of a people is what makes them unique in their nature. I have come to notice that the same way Hause and Yoruba people hate the Igbos is the same measure, if not more, other Igbos hate Arochukwu people. But in all, Aro will remain Aro unapologetically. We owe nobody but God apologies for our Fathers sins. Our identity is our identity. People are identify based on their way of living, culture, language etc and Aro’s won’t an exception.

    My name is Orji Gabriel Henry from Obinkinta village.

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Dr. Francis Ohuabunwa

Homeopathic medical practitioner and businessman turned 56 on the 12th of February. A native of Ndiakunwanta Onuimo, Arondizuogu, he received his education from the Institute ...