Rites of Passage of the Waja People of Gombe, North-East Nigeria

THE RITES OF PASSAGE OF THE WAJA PEOPLE

African Traditional Religion is part of the African lifestyle in such a way that separating it from its lifestyle is as good as annihilating the African continent and its inhabitants. This, we shall see in the way the Waja people gave themselves to be molded, nurtured and cultured by their religion and traditions.

HISTORICAL BACKGROUND OF THE WAJA PEOPLE

Waja is a name of a tribe as well as the people; they are situated in the south eastern part of Gombe state, Nigeria. It was said that the waja people came from a far place “wah”, Sikkam, a former JETS student, in his thesis says that they “came from Yemen in the East” ( 1995:13).

The Waja people are warriors and this is reflected in this saying “ka mo wwini kwayo mo jibu nerre ne bweshanga  gwala. Means that any young man who does not kill an enemy in his life time, a lady is better (brave) than such a person” (Sikkam, 1995:14).

Their socio-economic life shows that they are predominantly farmers, keeping livestock and farm crops like guinea corn, maize, millet, cassava, ground nut and cotton.

FESTIVALS

BAKURAU

 Is the festival that marks the beginning of the harvest and the end of the rainy season. Nobody enjoys the new harvest without this festival had been carried out first.

YIKKO

 This is a thanks giving to their God. This festival comes up immediately after the first harvest, and is characterized by great celebration. Wine, goats, chickens and cows are usually slaughtered for this festival.

SWATKA

This is a peace offering that unites the Wajas for three reasons: first, to appease the gods, spirits and ancestors; second, to thank them for the protection and provision; and thirdly, to have a fellowship with both the living dead and the whole Waja people in their community.

THE CONCEPT OF GOD

The Wajas belief in a supreme God called “Yamba”. he is the creator of mankind and he sits in heaven. He is all knowing and all seeing and cannot be approached directly. To get to him, he placed the spirits, ancestors and idols through which they can reach him.

THE CONCEPT OF SPIRIT WORLD

As in many African societies, the Wajas beliefs say that the spirits (Bawai) do exist. The good spirits and the evil spirits both dominate the spirit world. The good spirits are associated with good and the evil spirits with evil. The ancestors also relates to the community in the spiritual way.

WORSHIP OF HIGH GOD

The Wajas worship God through their ancestors, idols like stones, trees, pots also serve as intermediaries.

THE RITES OF PASSAGE OF THE WAJA PEOPLE

PREGNANCY AND CHILDBIRTH

In Waja, when a woman gives birth to twins, they will not touch the first child until the second is delivered before all of them will be attended to. When the first twin is a girl, and the second is boy, they usually say that there is delay in the delivery because the boy was angry that the girl came out before him. The belief is that the boy will be a great man. When a woman delivers twins in Waja, she is usually celebrated because she has given birth to a king and a queen. Gifts and different kinds of things will be giving to her, and she will be decorated in the traditional attires as a sign of respect for her.

The name for the twins if both are males is Sayi and Ndomi, while that of the females is Kwattam and Nafe.

 It is only when it is twins that much attention will be giving; when a woman gives birth to just a child, there will be no celebration.

CIRCUMCISION

In the traditional religion of Waja people, men are not usually circumcised, but when they attained a particular age, they will be initiated into the religion and formal education into the real life of the people.

Women are not circumcised as well, but once she attains puberty and the breast are shooting out, the mother tells her what is expected of a girl to do and not to do.

 MARRIAGE

Once a girl attains puberty in Waja, many suitors will come and befriend her. It is a tradition that no girl will tell a man that she is not interested. She will always say yes to the young man that wants to befriend her, even though she might not really love him.

After some time, the girl goes to the friend’s house (suitor) and sleeps there. At this time, she will stay with his mother because she is not yet his confirmed wife to be, but just a friend. The following day, the lady goes home and he parents get to know about the development. The girl can do this to any man that has interest in her, and no one frowns at it because that is the tradition.

After this stage, the friends of the young man organize how to get the lady again to his house. This time around, the girl stays longer with his mother than the initial, and her parents will be informed that their daughter is in their care to avoid panic.

When she is going back home, she will be escorted with two fowls and grounded corn flour to her parents.  If her parents accept this fowls, the lady becomes engaged to the young man and as such pledging to give their daughter in marriage to this family. If they refuse the two fowls however, the girl will be free to start a new process with another person. This process usually starts around August, and if everything goes well as plan, the man intending to marry will build houses, usually round in shape, and also harvest very good and tall grasses for roofing the houses.

The lady in turn will invite all her friends to come and help her weave the grasses while the man fixes the house at the end. During this period, the lady’s face will not be seen by any one because her face is usually covered. She will return home to her parents again and wait for the time when celebration for her official wedding (Buja) takes place.

This is usually done in August, where great celebration will be arranged and food (tuwo and miyan dargaza), beer prepared from grains, and all sort of items for celebration are brought for the occasion.

The lady will grand all the grains for the villagers in the traditional mill, so that they will know if she is hard working or not.

After this celebration (Buja), she still goes back to her parents before coming back later as a wife. Once she cooks in the man’s house, she is now his wife and he can now have sexual relationship with her since all this while he had no sexual affairs with her. It is imperative to note that nobody, no matter how privilege you are, will engage in sexual relationship with a lady if you are not married to her.

Paying of dowry is as follows: Two fowls and grounded grains, ten fowls, pounded fish, “potungeru” two goats (for the mother, one will be giving to her alive while the other will be strangle and giving to her), four to five goats, a cow, cowries and other items that are used in the traditional attire. The young man and his friends will farm for the in-laws to be as part of his contribution.

Before the bride comes to her husband’s house, she will engage in serious pottery. She will mold plates, dishes and different kinds of containers that will be used in her home. Every member of her husband’s family will be giving a special treatment when he comes to visit her and her husband. During this period, she will serve him food in the dish she had prepared and set apart for him. She will do for every member of his family, meaning that she had accepted them and they in turn have accepted her.

 DEATH AND BURIAL

In the Waja traditional religion, when a person dies younger than his age, it is generally believed that somebody kills him or her. They have a concept of out of body experience and to some extent, they would say that somebody came and attacked the deceased.

Generally, when a person dies, serious mourning (kolabore) will take place for seven days, and all the children of the deceased will be taking to a different house (if the children are infants). If the person that dies is young, they will bury him or her immediately. If the person that dies is old, a lot of rituals and sacrifices will be made to the gods. If the person was a hunter, the tradition demands that they go hunting; if the person is a fisher, they have to go fishing before thinking of burying the person. This is usually done to both males and females, and the reason for this is to identify the activities the deceased was engaged in before his or her death.

Burial is done in the Waja religious way; the grave will be dogged in a round way, about six feet deep. The base of the grave is dogged horizontally to enable them put the decease in a lying position. After that, a round stone is placed at the top of the grave to cover the deceased.

On the final day of the mourning, called “kikhisirwari”, the people will mourn as if the person just died. The reason for this is because they are saying goodbye to the deceased. If the deceased was a hunter, his entire instrument will be gathered, and an effigy (symbol) of him will be made from sticks and grasses. They will move all these things  to a junction, where the road divides, and there, they will break and destroy these things. They are telling him to go with his things; they do not need them since he is dead. If it is a woman however, all her pots, plates, calabash and different tools she has been using or were in her possession will be destroyed in the same manner, this time by women.

The final ritual for the death person comes around April and May, in the dry season. This is called kolabore; lots of activities will take place and celebration as well. If the deceased had daughters that are married, they will all come back home, and start preparation with their brothers and the whole family. Every member of the clan will come around to celebrate him or her (this is done only to the elderly). They will dance the kind of dance he or she used to dance when he or she was alive. Beer will be available for people to drink and enough meat and different kinds of meals are prepared for this purpose. After this ritual, the person can now join the ancestors.

Burial can also be done in an old tomb depending on the wish of the deceased, because some people would want to be buried in the tomb of their ancestors.

When a woman gives birth to twins and one of them dies, the dead infant will be buried in her courtyard, where she uses to cook and does her house work. After burying the child, a special kind of stone is used to seal the tomb and a platform (Timou) made from wood is placed beside it. This becomes the place where the mother of the dead child sits; the stone becomes her seat and the wooden platform is where she rests her back. Even after the mourning period is over, this act does not seize and in doing this, she will always remember how she lost her precious child. Nobody will ever sit on that stone apart from the mother.

CONCLUSION

            This paper is meant to bring to light one of the ways that Africans seek fulfillment in their worship of God even though he was a far off from them. This is not an exhaustive paper but one that came out as a result of an assignment during my seminary days in JETS. Instead of keeping the paper to myself, I thought I should share it with you like the one I share about the Ngas people.

            The only true and wise God is the one that is revealed to us through the Bible and he has never failed his own. It is my utmost desire that this paper will not just be a forum for criticism or pride but that you can help contribute to adding more to this work. I enjoin all Waja people or those close to their traditions to add or reduce in areas where I have gone too far or less by commenting or sending exerts to me so I can make necessary corrections as the need may be. However this work is purely a research that I personally engaged in so all facts presented here are true reflection of the results found.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Sikkam, Japheth.         An Evaluation of the Hindrances to Church Growth in Waja DCC. Jos: JETS Thesis, 1995.

Misal, Halimatu.          Oral interview. Jos: 31^st October, 2009.

Rev. Misal, Bello.       Oral interview. Jos: 31^st October, 2009.