Ogbaru

Ogbaru is the riverine Igbo clan of the lower Niger in Anambra State, whose head town is Atani and whose people hold the river and its creeks as their own.

Ogbaru is a clan of the riverine Igbo on the lower Niger, in Ogbaru local government area of Anambra State, where its head town is Atani and where it is part of the greater Onitsha country. It has its own dialect of Igbo, its people are Igbo, and it is also a subgroup in its own right among the riverine Igbo.

Its towns run along the water and back into the creeks: Obeagwe, Oluta, Ochuche, Umunankwo, Okpoko, Odekpe, Atani and Umuzu, with Ogwu-Ikpele, Ogbakuba, Ossomala, Ohita, Amiyi, Iyiowa, Ogbeukwu, Okoti, Akili-Ogidi, Akili-Ozizor and Ochuche Umuodu among the others.

It shares clan lineage and boundaries with the Onitsha Igbo, with Oguta in Imo State, with the Anioma Igbo of Delta State and with the Ndoni of Rivers State. The Niger runs along its western side from Okpoko to the Ogwu-Ikpele boundary, the Orashi along its eastern side past Ogwu-Aniocha and the Osomari forest reserve, and its northern and north-eastern neighbours are Ozubulu, Oraifite, Oba, Ihiala and Okija.

The people hold the Niger and the waters running through the region as their territorial land, and they are remembered as farmers and as warriors. The Ogbaru Boat Regatta is their festival, and Omu Okwei, the merchant queen of Osomari, was born in the region in 1872.

The shallow river makes the area flood in the rains, and the floods of 2018, 2020 and 2022 took lives and covered farms, markets and houses.