In Taraba State, Kuteb nation moans suspended Kuchecheb festival-Stephen Osu,
In Taraba State, Kuteb nation moans suspended Kuchecheb festival-Stephen Osu,
In Taraba state, efforts to bring back a fiesta with deep history, named Kuchecheb, in the city of Takum has failed. The festival which holds... every first quarter of the year and celebrates the people’s history of heroism, industry and marks the beginning of planting season could not hold this year.
Attempts by a set of people deemed not culturally apt to stage the yearly on Tuesday, March 25, 2008, sparked off violence. An attempt by some people to stage a politically-motivated Kuchecheb festival in Takum last year without the right cultural representative (Ukwe) in Takum led to violent crises that claimed five lives and destroyed property worth millions of naira.
In order to guarantee the security of life and property, Governor Danfulani Suntai of Taraba State there for banned all cultural activities in Takum town including Kuchechev. Even as another year has come for the fiesta, the much desired peace is not there as there is heavy military presence on the streets of Takum. Hence, this year, it did not hold, prompting experts on the culture of the land to wonder when it will return given its deep roles in the people’s unique way of life.
The background of the festival is deep and it touches sensitively on the culture of the land. When the first Ukwe Takum, late Ukwe Ahmadu Gankwe, ascended the throne as the first paramount ruler over the entire tribes in the then Takum chiefdom, he had a stiff resistance from other ethnic groups of Hausa Tiv, Chamba Kukuns and the Ichen who had lived as independent entities for centuries before the colonial arrangement that now brought them under the control of one person who happened not to speak the same language with them.
This forced the Ukwe Takum to leave Takum for Tampwa and later Lumpe in 1912. Hence various clans of the land began to celebrate their respective Kuchecheb every January through March. But this year the elders of Kuteb came together and directed that no clan should hold the Kuchecheb. Ukwe Ahmadu Gankwe must return to his traditional headquarters in Takum.
A harmonised version of the festival was for the first time put together with representatives of cultural groups from all the twelve clans, and in the colorful ceremony the Ukwe was returned to his palace on the March 25 that year. And a harmonized Kuchecheb cultural festival was born.
The day for the festival was fixed to hold on March 25 of every year; and the way it is celebrated no smoke or fire is accepted in the house of every Kuteb man on that day until the Ukwe bring the ancestral fire from mount Lumbu and every home in the land will collect its fire from him through all the twelve clans to mark the introduction of a new fire and new farm season from the gods.
Apart from the fire collection rite the Ukwe Takum leads a procession of able men from mountain Lumbu into Takum town amid a display of several cultural paraphernalia of the people including horses, camels, war gear, dances from the clans of the Kutebs. Some special skills like hunting, fishing, wrestling competitions and arts craft were also staged during the event.
The significance of the Kuchecheb to the Kuteb people is that it marks the beginning of a new planting season. The festival is essentially aimed at gathering the people to pray for good harvest, good health for the youths, rain from the gods and safe delivery for women as well as examine the past year and plan for the new one as exemplified by the sequence of the fire from the gods.
This was the practice for centuries and in an event of the death of an Ukwe Takum the Kuchecheb was suspended on the account that there was nobody to lead the procession and another one was quickly appointed to fill the gap.
In March 2008, when the Kuchecheb festival led to crises and Gov. Suntai banned all cultural activities people of Takum town were touched. Their hope was that it would return this year. That hope did not materialise last week. The oldest Kuteb man alive, Mr. Atenji, told Nigerian Compass that the absence of the festivity is affecting the psychology of the entire community socially and economically as the harvest is poor and there is hunger in the land.
According to him the Kuchecheb festival prepares the minds of all Kuteb, old and young, towards farm work. This he said is responsible for the bumper harvest witnessed in those good years. So he prayed the government to “do something fast to re instate the neglected Kuchecheb festival of Taraba state.”
In Taraba state, efforts to bring back a fiesta with deep history, named Kuchecheb, in the city of Takum has failed. The festival which holds... every first quarter of the year and celebrates the people’s history of heroism, industry and marks the beginning of planting season could not hold this year.
Attempts by a set of people deemed not culturally apt to stage the yearly on Tuesday, March 25, 2008, sparked off violence. An attempt by some people to stage a politically-motivated Kuchecheb festival in Takum last year without the right cultural representative (Ukwe) in Takum led to violent crises that claimed five lives and destroyed property worth millions of naira.
In order to guarantee the security of life and property, Governor Danfulani Suntai of Taraba State there for banned all cultural activities in Takum town including Kuchechev. Even as another year has come for the fiesta, the much desired peace is not there as there is heavy military presence on the streets of Takum. Hence, this year, it did not hold, prompting experts on the culture of the land to wonder when it will return given its deep roles in the people’s unique way of life.
The background of the festival is deep and it touches sensitively on the culture of the land. When the first Ukwe Takum, late Ukwe Ahmadu Gankwe, ascended the throne as the first paramount ruler over the entire tribes in the then Takum chiefdom, he had a stiff resistance from other ethnic groups of Hausa Tiv, Chamba Kukuns and the Ichen who had lived as independent entities for centuries before the colonial arrangement that now brought them under the control of one person who happened not to speak the same language with them.
This forced the Ukwe Takum to leave Takum for Tampwa and later Lumpe in 1912. Hence various clans of the land began to celebrate their respective Kuchecheb every January through March. But this year the elders of Kuteb came together and directed that no clan should hold the Kuchecheb. Ukwe Ahmadu Gankwe must return to his traditional headquarters in Takum.
A harmonised version of the festival was for the first time put together with representatives of cultural groups from all the twelve clans, and in the colorful ceremony the Ukwe was returned to his palace on the March 25 that year. And a harmonized Kuchecheb cultural festival was born.
The day for the festival was fixed to hold on March 25 of every year; and the way it is celebrated no smoke or fire is accepted in the house of every Kuteb man on that day until the Ukwe bring the ancestral fire from mount Lumbu and every home in the land will collect its fire from him through all the twelve clans to mark the introduction of a new fire and new farm season from the gods.
Apart from the fire collection rite the Ukwe Takum leads a procession of able men from mountain Lumbu into Takum town amid a display of several cultural paraphernalia of the people including horses, camels, war gear, dances from the clans of the Kutebs. Some special skills like hunting, fishing, wrestling competitions and arts craft were also staged during the event.
The significance of the Kuchecheb to the Kuteb people is that it marks the beginning of a new planting season. The festival is essentially aimed at gathering the people to pray for good harvest, good health for the youths, rain from the gods and safe delivery for women as well as examine the past year and plan for the new one as exemplified by the sequence of the fire from the gods.
This was the practice for centuries and in an event of the death of an Ukwe Takum the Kuchecheb was suspended on the account that there was nobody to lead the procession and another one was quickly appointed to fill the gap.
In March 2008, when the Kuchecheb festival led to crises and Gov. Suntai banned all cultural activities people of Takum town were touched. Their hope was that it would return this year. That hope did not materialise last week. The oldest Kuteb man alive, Mr. Atenji, told Nigerian Compass that the absence of the festivity is affecting the psychology of the entire community socially and economically as the harvest is poor and there is hunger in the land.
According to him the Kuchecheb festival prepares the minds of all Kuteb, old and young, towards farm work. This he said is responsible for the bumper harvest witnessed in those good years. So he prayed the government to “do something fast to re instate the neglected Kuchecheb festival of Taraba state.”
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