Bekederemo Foundation and Museum: In Kiagbodo, Bekederemo Lives

By 

Nduka Nwosu

Tucked away from the seat of power somewhere in the northern belt of the Burutu Local Government headquarters, bordered by the creeks of Bomadi river and a long stretch of land east of Ughelli in Delta State, is the ancient city of Kiagbodo whose sons and daughters gathered recently to enact for posterity’s sake, a befitting status for a great man of history, the legendary Ambakederemo Ogein, ninth generation descendant of Ngbile, the founder of Kiagbodo kingdom.

Going to Kiagbodo itself was adventurous and full of curious expectations. Not after so much talk and reading about Bekederemo, famed to be a great businessman who lived in the days of the equally legendary King Jaja of Opobo and imperialist colonial agent Dore Numa of Itsekiriland.

Bekederemo was also famed for his fortune staking skills with the whitemen while he used his steamer to carry palm produce from the waterside markets to Lagos where he made handsome deals for his homeward journey.

“Bekederemo”, asked Sunday Bright, the Okada rider who was determined to lead the visitors down to Kiagbodo: “I know his place, Chief E.K. Clark’s village. The road no dey very good but we can make it in 30 minutes.”

Bright sped down the stretch that would lead to the Ughelli-Kiagbodo road with its bumps and bends. According to Chief Edwin Kiagbodo Clark-Bekederemo, a former Federal minister of Information and chief custodian of the Bekederemo Foundation, 27 years have passed since the construction of the road began first with the Mid West government under Governor Ogbemudia in 1974. It passed on to Ambrose Alli’s government which was determined to complete it until the army coup of 1983 terminated that ambition. It was left as an abandoned property for OMPADEC which again did little to improve on its construction. It witnessed considerable progress under Governor Yeri in 1991 until the split of Bendel to Delta and Edo States and was moved to the defunct PTF with minimum change.

Thanks to James Ibori whose government has finally restarted in earnest the new face-lift of the road which leads to the city of Kiagbodo. Beyond this minor distraction, Kiagbodo is a big village of 5,000 citizens of mostly farmers and traders and a sprinkle of fishermen. She boasts of electricity and potable water and one of her prominent sons — Kiagbodo Clark Bekederemo —enjoys a telephone facility.

The average Kiagbodo man is proud of Mein Grammar School which since inception in 1969 has turned out many important people of the town while federal presence is only beginning to be felt from a police post that is under construction to a medical clinic yet to take off. Overall, the people are happy endorsing the need for a Kiagbodo Federal Polytechnic and a local government headquarters and one or two industries. With one of her sons Prof. Peretomode recently appointed to the board of the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC), and many prominent sons, Kiagbodo’s dreams are not far fetched.

The visitors had hardly stepped into the home of Chief E.K. Clark-Bekederemo when they were greeted by showers of rain. Chief E.K. Clark-Bekedermo one of the leading lights of the Bekederemo Foundation, quickly led his guests to the site of the proposed museum and pointed to the Bekederemo compound: “he built some of these houses you are seeing here and imported some prefabs which were used as guest houses for the Royal Niger Company traders.”

E.K. Clark-Bekederemo, a great grandson of Bekederemo, is happy today and it shows on his face. He is asked the reason behind his joy and the proposed setting of the museum. The need to preserve Bekederemo’s physical heritage is a dream that unfolds by the day and Clark Bekederemo said this calls for joy.

“I can count 12 generations to me,” E.K. Clark-Bekederemo added, “there are many people who cannot count three or four of their generations and they celebrate things which are artificial.” But here is a physical evidence of a civilisation that flourished in the latter part of the 19th century and the first quarter of the twentieth century.

While the elder Clark-Bekederemo leads the crusade for the preservation of the Bekederemo lineage, Uncle Pepper as the younger generation of the Bekederemo ancestry calls poet and playwright John Pepper Clark, has been another leading light of the family who earlier adopted the full name J.P. Clark-Bekederemo.

Now the entire lineage has resolved that Ambakederemo or Bekederemo should remain the surname of male descendants or middle name for those whose mothers were children, grand children or great grand children of Bekederemo.

John Pepper Clark-Bekederemo who had earlier crossed the river to a forest of one thousand demons, or spirits as he chose to call them, to open a small lonely island he calls Funama Settlement or Book Town, has written a play All For Oil, a dedication to his great grand father Chief Bekederemo.

All For Oil, J.P. Clark Bekederemo postulated, is the story of the creation of Nigeria by the British after the Berlin Conference of 1884 where the Europeans shared Africa amongst themselves. At that meeting, noted Professor Clark-Bekederemo, Britain declared Southern Nigeria an oil rivers protectorate and later with her conquest of the north, joined what is today known as the Nigerian Federation in 1914 under Lord Lugard.

Tubman Goldie had in 1884 formed the Royal Niger Company basically to exploit the palm oil trade and Lugard was his soldier, the military arm of that enterprise. Added J. P. Clark-Bekederemo in this dialogue: “Lugard was his territorial officer opening the trade. So it was a market. Nigeria is a market that the British opened on palm oil after slave trade was declared illegal.”

This foray into history was necessary to create the right insight on the place in history of Bekederemo and Uncle Clark could not but be the right choice in putting together a befitting epitaph to a great occasion.

He asked: “Who were the palm oil traders?” “Men like Bekederemo”, he replied, “from Warri to Pattani into Bayelsa. He was the big middleman in charge.”

According to the professor of English, Bekederemo bought palm oil and palm kernel from the local producers, “Isoko people, Urhobo people, Ijaw people and he sold to the Royal Niger Company which became UAC. That’s how Nigeria was put together.”

J.P. Clark-Bekederemo quarrelled with the notion which says the founding fathers of Nigeria were political leaders and statesmen like Nnamdi Azikiwe, Obafemi Awolowo and Ahmadu Bello who had not been born when the issue of resource control had started raging. “The principal players with the white people I mentioned to you now were people like Ambakederemo and Nana of Itsekiri, they were the great traders.

“The British then penetrated and all they wanted was trade and what they did was trade with the big traders using some Nigerians as their political agents to establish their government turning from trade to governance to have access to the people and their trade and resources and that was how Nigeria came about.”

J.P. Clark Bekederemo’s reflection left a sad irony that revealed that 100 years after, the story is still the same, the fight over oil which is what is keeping the country together is still raging.

This time it is crude oil, the same market and players, the traders and the same white people. As far as he is concerned, it is the same story and a fight for oil now though it is not the Royal Niger Company but Shell, the Dutch company — the Royal Dutch company.

“The story of Nigeria is the same, the government, the foreign traders in the middle and then the people at the bottom,” he remarked.

He noted still that resource control was a big issue in the days of Ambakederemo. At that time the British determined the grades as they are being determined now. “The grades of oil ranged from Grade One, to Grade Two and Grade Three. Now you have Sweet Bonny, Light Bonny, and Crude Bonny oil and the prices were set by the white man.”

And in those days, J.P.’s great grand father Ambakederemo was always complaining loudly asking: “what kind of trade is this that does not allow the owner of the product to fix the price but the buyer?” And that the white man has come not only to trade but is asking for land to build his barracks and offices. So he asked Lugard: “what kind of market are you creating that you call Nigeria?”

Bekederemo later petitioned Lugard through the assistance of a leading advocate of the time Egerton Shyngle, in the following harsh sentences: “you are creating a market by bringing so many people together from the North, South, East and West, upcountry to the coast, and you call them Nigerians, a new market under your control. You dictate and use some of us to rule us. What kind of thing is this?” Dore Numa a colonial chief from Itsekiri was one of those political agents.

Bekederemo was noted as a very religious being who worshipped the Almighty God — Tamara for whom he constructed an altar or shrine — Tamarasain. He also had his house hold gods one of whom was the estuary god Edjo-ru-Unurhie (the god of wealth). Mary Ebiakho Fuludu Bekederemo, great grand child of Bekederemo remembers the days of old when Edjo-ru-Unurhie provided food physically to those in need until an ingrate took her plates home. Angered by this untoward behaviour, she held back such facilities from her subjects. Edjo-ru-Unurhie was also known to be the guardian angel and protector against shipwreck.

However, it was her beloved devotee and husband Bekederemo, she gave the best of her benevolence providing him with cowries at the time they formed the unit of exchange in this part of the world. That was part of the prosperity that followed Bekederemo in his lifetime down to his wives and children.

Chief Andy Akporugo, Executive Consultant, Guardian Newspapers, remembered that his late mother who was one of the children of Bekederemo during her time was a great businesswoman who flourished in her trading business. Added Chief Akporugo, “I saw my mother prosper very much, and part of this prosperity could be attributed to this same goddess,” Akporugo said. Later in life, Bekederemo was to have rejected these household gods preferring like Pharaoh Akhnaton, the worship of a sole God he identified as Tamara. According to Chief Kiagbodo Clark-Bekederemo, if the legend had lived a little longer, he most likely would have embraced Christianity following this trend.

Bekederemo owned a steamship that helped facilitate his trade and contact with the white man and in spite of his trading activities with these same whitemen, he refused to accept arbitrary fixing of prices of palm produce, especially from the smaller white mortals and their agents.

Chief Simon Ambakaderemo, ex-director of Bayelsa State Council for Arts and Culture and Barrister Godwin Gbishere-Bekederemo harped on the unity of brethren according to the psalmist King David, urging family members to adopt Bekederemo as the family name for its convenience while those who preferred Ambakaderemo were free to still hold on to it.

Marine Engineer Superior Ogedengbe Bekederemo, a Jehovah’s Witness who works with Shell Petroleum, believes his grand father though devoted to the worship of the river goddess was disciplined, honest and godly. Few of his descendants, he said, still serve his god and take time to maintain the old shrine across the sea and in Okwagbe where such shrines could still be found. Even at the route near the river close to the home of J.P. Clark-Bekederemo, an ant hill housing an aged cobra and sheltered by a small enclosure could still be found, the town god — Oghoro, neat and tended by the worshippers. Professor Clark-Bekederemo remembered how in 1985 Jerry Krone from Broadway under the auspices of Ford Foundation in the USA, visited him for a project and left Funama with a sad tale. He had been warned not to enter the shrine but defied good counsel from his host and stepped into the shrine. Later that night mysterious and dangerous ants bit him to stupor.

While the Bekederemos enjoy the myth left by their father’s conquests and the halo of a bethrotal to a water goddess, Rebecca Clark-Bekederemo Okorodudu is bothered that riverine routes and the need to develop riverine transportation which Bekederemo popularised with his steam boat trips in his palm produce trade, were receiving minimum attention from government. “Our riverine routes are all blocked”, Clark-Bekederemo Okorodudu lamented, “the Bomadi boys are not happy at the construction of new roads because their little avenues of livelihood through water transportation are being hindered with the growth of water hycinth in the creeks. In the days of my great grand father, foreign ships used to berth at Bomadi port but that is no longer the case as the riverine routes are no longer accessible. Such areas as Ayakoromo and Okwagbe are now stranded.” Clark-Bekederemo Okorodudu would want an even development of both the riverine transport system with the construction of new roads.

Young Dr. Valerie Bekederemo and Manny Edu are two other great grand children in the dynasty. While Valerie dropped her father’s surname for her great grand father’s name on her mother’s side, winning laurels for the dynasty with her distinguished prizes won at the medical school, Manny Edu also a great grandson of Bekederemo on her mother’s side and a publisher and chief executive of Persuaders Nigeria Limited, is writing a biography on Chief E.K. Clark Bekederemo, which “by extension”, Edu hinted, “will involve a write up on the Bekederemo lineage. A whole lot of chapters will be devoted to the Bekederemo lineage.”

Edu was asked to comment on what data he had collated so far for these chapters he intended to devote to Chief Bekederemo. He responded: “There is no doubt that Bekederemo was a particularly great man who brought a lot of innovations to his own children, I went to look at a factory that my grand father built. Bekederemo was my great grand father but my grand father Meshu Bekederemo built an agricultural factory many years ago, where he used to make garri and the rest.

“From what you are seeing here, this is like the palace of the Oba of Benin if you’ve been into that part. You can imagine what this would be like in those days with these relics that are still slightly well maintained, you can imagine what they looked like in those days. This could have been a mighty palace.”

The initial plan, Edu said, was to have an E.k. Clark Foundation which has now been turned to a Bekederemo Foundation and “we are hoping to launch the Bekederemo Foundation before the end of the year.”

Bekederemo was also a model, a pacesetter in fashion, who beat his competitors at the great fashion parades that held in the city of Warri. At such competitions, he dwarfed other contestants like Dore Numa of Warri using coral beads and such lengthy and flowing cloth provided by his wife the river goddess and tended by seven men.

Dr. G.G. Darah, Editorial Board chairman of The Guardian and friend of the Bekederemos, brought sunshine to the re-union with the Udje dance troupe from Ughievwen Kingdom Otutuama town in Warri South-west.

No doubt, a Bekederemo Foundation and Museum will signal a positive sign post for the future, not only for the dynasty but the Niger Delta and this fast transmuting market he called Nigeria.

Distinguished poet and playwright Professor J.P. Clark - Bekederemo dreams of his ancestors, going back from his father to twelve generations, and he begins here with a befitting tribute to his great grandfather Chief Bekederemo who played a notable role in the creation of Nigeria.

In this interview held at Funama (Book Town), outside Kiagbodo, in Burutu LGA, Delta State, Professor Clark-Bekederemo, who crossed a river to build his house, Okemeji Place, in a forest of spirits, chronicles the life and times of Bekederemo who he says has influenced his works, especially The Boat, his latest book of poems, A Lot from Paradise and his new play about Nigeria, All for Oil, now about to tour the Niger Delta after a successful run in the South-West. Excerpts:

Your great grandfather Chief Bekederemo or to use the fuller form, Ambakederemo, must have been a source of inspiration in scripting the play All For Oil?

Yes, indeed he has. All For Oil is a story about the creation of Nigeria by the British at the end of the 19th century into the beginning of the 20th century. The British created Nigeria to exploit the palm oil trade at that time. After the Berlin Conference of 1884 where Europeans shared Africa among themselves, Britain declared for herself what she called the Oil Rivers Protectorate in the southern part of what became Nigeria, and later on with her conquest of the northern part of the territory, she amalgamated the two in 1914. That was the work of Lugard, as you know, but in 1884 it was Sir Tubman Goldie who formed the Royal Niger Company to gain monopoly of the palm oil trade for Britain. Lugard was really his soldier, the military arm of that commercial enterprise. So simply put, Nigeria was a market that the British established to trade in palm oil after they gave up the slave trade as unprofitable.

Now who were the palm oil traders?

Men like Bekederemo, the full name is Ambakederemo. He was the pre-eminent trader in palm produce in the western Niger Delta, from Warri to Patani into the present Bayelsa, he was the major middle man. He bought palm oil and kernel from the local producers - Isoko, Urhobo, Ijaw, Kwale, Aboh - and sold to the Royal Niger Company, precursor of the United Africa Company. When people talk of the founding fathers of Nigeria, these are not Zik, Awo and Sarduana as we are made to believe. The principal players were the merchant princes trading with the British. To maintain their monopoly, the British had to control the territory and for this they used local political agents to establish their government. Trade, as they say, follows the flag. That was how Nigeria was put together.

A hundred years after, what is keeping this country together? Oil again, this time crude oil. But it is the same market, the same players, namely, the imperial Nigerian state, the multi-nationals, now led by the Royal Anglo-Dutch Company, Shell for short, and at the bottom of the heap, the poor people of the Niger Delta, left divided and quarrelling among themselves by the old Lugardian policy of divide and rule. It is the same old story, it hasn’t changed a bit and the fight is over oil. That is the inspiration for my play All for Oil, using the past to mirror the present.

In the days of Ambakederemo oil price was determined by the British thus denying the Southern Protectorate the opportunity to determine the control of their resources through price fixing. Could this be true?

Everything was determined by the British as it is now, and it was in grades: grade one, grade two and grade three oil. Like you have Sweet or Light Bonny oil and the heavy kind. Palm oil was graded then as petroleum products are graded today. The prices too were set by the white man, the buyer and not the owner. Contrary to what Abuja is saying, both palm oil and petroleum are God-given commodities. It was only later on that UAC came to open up some palm plantations. The main crop flourishes naturally on the land. From the Eastern part of the country and stretching into the Niger Delta, even into the Yoruba part of the country, that is, wherever the palm tree grows, it has been a God-given resource and the people on whose land it grows own it.

If you read All For Oil or see it on the stage, you’ll hear my great grandfather protesting in words like these: “This is a strange trade, the owner of the product is not the one setting the price but it is the buyer, the white man who is setting the price.” There was also his complaint that the white man had come not just to trade but was asking for land to build offices, to build barracks for his soldiers. He asked Lugard: “What kind of market is this you have created and call Nigeria? The crops are many and the stalls numberless and you have as guards and agents our men over us. How long do you think it will hold?”

Definitely Ambakederemo was not in this league of the agents?

Definitely not. On the contrary, he was the antagonist of the principal political agent for Lugard in our part of the Niger Delta, the Itsekiri chief called Dore Numa who led the British to their wars with Nana Olomu in 1894 and Oba Ovonramwen in 1897. He and Dore were forever fighting. Lugard, wanting to penetrate the land, where he did not meet paramount chiefs, where he didn’t meet Obas, Emirs and Obis, created what he called warrant chiefs to help him carry out his policy of indirect rule.

What particular trait or character of your great grandfather has influenced you most?

His sense of justice and fair play, his spirit of enterprise, his open and forthright disposition towards all people he dealt with, promoting free trade and marriage across ethnic and racial barriers and, of course his love of the arts, especially poetry and dance, oh yes, he was a poet in his own right for whom song and dance could be employed for pleasure and peace as well as for debate and battle. And he was generous to a fault. He spent his wealth for both family and community, building halls for ancestors in all quarters of the town of Kiagbodo, clearing forests and streams for farm, fishing and transport and he was not afraid to deal with false prophets and witch-hunters trading in human misery.

I am particularly happy that after growing up with his history with his story all around me and after writing about other people and about other matters, I eventually wrote about him as a central character who took part in the creation of this country called Nigeria. Oil was the issue then, and it is the issue today.

So the new Dore Numa is here?

The new Dore Numa is to be found in the soldier and the politician and the civil servant, happy to serve as compradors for masters abroad. These are the new Dore Numas, the British are still here, and the Americans are here reinforcing them, the Europeans are here reinforcing them. It is the same old Berlin Conference arrangement that is still around, though the sphere of influence has changed here and there.

And what objectives do you intend to achieve in your bid to put together a Bekederemo Museum and Foundation?

We want to preserve the Bekederemo heritage as the children of his friend and elder, Chief Nana Olomu, have done for their great father at Koko. When the catalogue of his personal effects is released, you will find that, after the traditional sharing out of his estate among his numerous children and relatives, and after all the stealing and spoliation that followed over the years, the heirlooms that remain make an incomparable collection. It is only right that the nation and indeed the world should know about it and have access to it.