It is nearly an everyday affair but each one still comes with its own unique features, more especially these days when both the traditional and Church weddings are overflown with a surplus of innovations. As such, each one of such event leaves those who went to bear witness with memorable encounters.
Bride circulating among guests
The traditional formalities to the marriage of Veronica Onah (aka Ekpe) to Gabriel Godwin Agada October 1st, 2026 was no less. All the traditional and non-traditional innovations with which the younger generation have responded to the pressures of time and space were there.
The eyes were, of course, on the young lady and her man. Were they were an eyeful? Intervention can testify to that. Not only were they, they both share a capacity and energy to dance. The way the young man danced into the arena spoke more than anything else that he is satisfied with his beau. Here, Ekpe or ‘MD’ (Intervention’s own name for the bride in recognition of her business mindedness) was no pushover. In fact, she danced so well that she could have got the late Joe Akatu’s nod to wear the masquerade’s costume. That was the late chanter’s deployment of the privilege of the artist in recognition of exceptional footwork on the dancing floor by a woman. Otherwise, women do not perform as masquerades in Idomaland as in many others. What can’t an artistic philosopher disobey? Although the couple were the dancing champions, the members of the cultural troupe on stage were a wonder set in terms of how long they can continue singing and dancing. But the point is that should this couple ever have cause to quarrel in future, they would not need anybody’s intervention. All they need do is remember they are all good dancers, click a few steps in a way that dialogues with the wedding day dig and recoil into each other again.
Bridegroom in green dancing it out
Attending these events is coming into a more meaningful encounter with community organising. Community organising and the resulting solidarity in religious, cultural sharing at death, births, burials, weddings and sundry activities is alive across Nigeria. It cannot be for nothing that, in spite of all the control from outside, Africans still live well past World Bank statistics of average life expectancy. It must have to do with the and diversity of people who came to bear witness. In spite of the hardness of the times, it was a full house: from the villages involved in Benue State, the different layers of actors in the Church (the tireless members of the cultural performers – drummers, choir leaders and lead vocalists and so on), the cultural elite, the women groups and several others that defy easy categorisation. From the cultural elite circle alone, for instance, the Thursday event had retired ambassadors, professors, business men, retired military officers, technocrats and the traditional authority in attendance.
Technocrats all at the traditional wedding!
Bride’s solidarity team
Closely associated with everything said so far is clinical organisation and delivery of comprehensive food component. No variety is left out. It is not only done with home touch but also so arranged it gets to everyone. Food and the eating accompany every stage of the entire process. In the informal sector still lies the continent’s saving grace, considering the dynamics upon which the social thrives.
The music, the intensity of the dancing, the food, the dressings, the diversity of the crowd and the very entertaining clowning have their own compelling force. Each had its own colors to the traditional wedding of Ekpe Veronica Onah, a Mass Communications graduate of Benue State University and daughter of Abuja based publisher, Idu Onah to Mister Godwin Gabriel Agada, the son of a retired Senior Police Officer.
