Mgbo

Mgbo is an Igbo clan of Ohaukwu local government area in Ebonyi State, with ten traditional communities. Its people speak Mgbolizhia, and the name is written Mgbo — the n the old records printed in front of it is not part of it.

Ekwashi is where the clan begins: the ancestral settlement, the place the traditions of Mgbo root in. From it the communities branched, and the ten that stand now are Ekwashi, Umuogudu Akpu, Umuogudu Oshia, Ukwuagba, Amoffia, Umuezeaka, Okposhi Eshi, Okposhi Eheku, Umuakpu and Amaeku.

The clan was organised around farming and around a society that ran without a single ruler. Authority sat with the elders of each community, disputes went to them, and what held the ten together was descent and the obligation to answer when one of them was attacked. Mgbo's reputation for answering is the thing its neighbours remember.

The people speak Mgbolizhia, and the name of the speech is the name of the people. The land is farm country — yam, cassava and rice — on the northern side of Ebonyi.