Transacting Obasinjom: The Dissemination of a Cult Agency in the Cross River Area

Abstract

During the twentieth century, Obasinjom became one of the best known and most effective cult agencies in the Cross River area of Cameroon and Nigeria. This paper aims at reconstructing the history of Obasinjom and some of its variants. Unlike many other witch-hunting cults, Obasinjom usually did not disappear after accomplishing the immediate job for which it was acquired. The owners additionally desired to possess the institution because it created wealth, influence and prestige for them as well as their village as a whole. Obasinjom and other cult agencies (as well as women's and men's societies and dance associations) spread from village to village across ethnic or language boundaries. Along with their dissemination, something of their identities and agency diffused and was incorporated into their histories over time and space. As intellectual property they were owned by the buying village and at the same time remained the property of the selling village. Obasinjom, as well as more important institutions, created decentralised networks of owners who had no definite knowledge of all the other participants. The recently formed pan-Obasinjom association, however, has changed this situation and, at least among some owners, created a feeling of identity and a greater sense of unity.

Primary patriotism, shifting identity: hometown associations in Manyu Division, south-west Cameroon

“…In reality, the trajectories of Manyu associations are more complex. Lower levels of association may currently be in the ascendant but these have existed for a long time in various forms (Röschenthaler 2004;Ruel 1964). Historically they have tended to provide building blocks for larger units without necessarily being subsumed.…”

“…There is sometimes more than one ngbe lodge even in small villages and, in chieftaincy disputes, these lodges may be led by or allied to one side or the other, as in Besongabang. 35 There are also dissenters from ngbe, particularly among evangelical Christians, who in Manyu are also in Ejagham, including those of the obasinjom society, again reflecting its dissemination history (Manyu elite, Yaoundé, 21 April 2005;Röschenthaler 2004;Ruel 1969). 33 The extent and role of ngbe in the international diaspora was not researched here.…”

“…One example is etokobi, encountered in Bachuo Ntai and Kembong 48 and which, like ngbe, dates from the Atlantic slave trade. Etokobi was concerned with the strict separation of freeborn from slaves (Röschenthaler 2004) and, in Bachuo Ntai, interviewees still linked it with the claim that 'strangers', including immigrant Nigerians, form a substantial minority of the village population. The perceived 'strangers', who cannot take part in etokobi dances, may not be immigrants in any meaningful sense but people whose families have lived there for generations and who are then redefined, sometimes in relation to the perceived genealogical structures of the colonially created village (Geschiere 2004).…”

“…Fieldwork was conducted mostly in Mamfe Central and the neighbouring 'Central Ejagham' area of Eyumojock, so the article focuses on the Banyang and Ejagham. Like most other ethnic groups in South-West Province, those in Manyu have a relatively flat political structure, described as acephalous, decentralized, diffuse, segmentary or stateless (Konings and Nyamnjoh 2003;Nyamnjoh and Rowlands 1998;Röschenthaler 2004;Ruel 1969). Chieftaincy is often a wholly colonial construct and relatively weak in authority, although the village is the basic and most important unit of neotraditional government.…”

“…Most Manyu groups acted as middlemen in the Atlantic slave trade (Röschenthaler 2004). Large influxes of outsiders from the more densely populated Grassfields and from south-east Nigeria continued during the colonial and postindependence periods, driven partly by development of plantation agriculture on the fertile volcanic soils of South-West Province (Geschiere and Gugler 1998;Konings 1993) and augmented by refugees from the Biafran war of 1967-70.…”