By Enyeribe Ejiogu, Lagos and Okey Sampson, Umuahia
Just like the biblical Prophet Elijah, whose servant told that he had seen a small cloud, the size of a man’s fist, and the man of God promptly declared that he could hear the sound of the abundance of rain (and it came to pass), there is now hope that the indigenous Igbo fabric, Akwete, is about to witness a revival and economic resurgence.
Akwete cloth derives its name from Akwete, a community in the southern fringes of Abia State. The craft of making Akwete cloth had from inception been restricted to the womenfolk in the community where it originated. The cloth is woven from cotton yarn on a special wooden loom called “Nkwe” in Abia vernacular.
The art of weaving Akwete cloth began in the late 19th century by a woman called Daada Nwankata Nnadede.
As Sunday Sun learnt from Mama Nwanyidiya Sunday, who said she is about 100 years old, God showed Nnadede the art of making the Akwete cloth in a dream.
“The woman that first wove the Akwete cloth was known as Daada (Igbo word that means elder sister) Nwakata Nnadede, who said God showed her in a vision or dream how to do it.
Neither did she marry nor had children, but she made sure that any girl child born in Akwete or any woman who was not an indigene but married to an Akwete man also learnt the art of making Akwete cloth.
“Daada Nnadede was from Umumai in Akwete,” Mama Sunday said.
As a generous woman, she further said, Nnadede never kept the idea to herself, as she made sure that every woman in the community who was willing was taught how to weave the Akwete cloth, free of charge.
In essence, she executed a women-focused empowerment and skill acquisition programme all by herself, a feat that clearly deserved special recognition. It is no wonder that her statue was erected in a very conspicuous space in Akwete.
This made the trade an all-women affair, and they were all engaged in weaving the Akwete cloth, irrespective of their status in society or how such women earned their living.
However, non-native women living in Akwete and not married to men from the community were excluded from the compulsory acquisition of the craft.
Regrettably, over the years, the treasured craft which put the area on the global indigenous textile production map began to wane as the focus of economic activities shifted to other sources of income.
Like a bolt of lightning, Prof Chukwuma Soludo won the Anambra State governorship election on November 6, 2021.
During his campaign for the office he had declared that if elected, he would apply the biblical injunction specified by Jesus Christ in Acts 1:8, where He enjoined the disciples to be His witnesses “in Jerusalem, Judaea, Samaria, and the uttermost part of the earth.”
Guided by this injunction, Soludo promised that his administration would pursue an official policy of promoting products made in Anambra in the first instance, the Southeast in general, Nigeria and Africa at large.
In fulfilment of that promise and starting from Anambra State, specially customised SUVs built by Innoson Motor Vehicles Limited in Nnewi, were procured by the government for his motorcade.
And on March 19, he gave a global nod and endorsement of Akwete fabric by wearing a simple but elegant outfit made from the indigenous fabric for his inauguration. Igbo people around the world and other Nigerians hailed the gesture as a clear manifestation of “talk and do” – a parlance popularised among Nigerians by Banky W in his hit song. Nigerians in all walks of life are earnestly hopeful that this disposition would pervade his governance style.
Again, on March 23, when Abia State Governor Okezie Ikpeazu hosted the People’s Democratic Party (PDP), at his Umuobiakwa country home, all of the guests adorned apparels that seemed to have been made from Akwete fabric.
With these two high profile endorsements, it goes without saying that Akwete is now positioned for resurgence as an indigenous textile of note, and which can strongly compete with the Ghanaian Kente, which is so popular among African Americans.
For sure, Akwete was once very popular among the Igbo people in Southeast Nigeria before patronage of the fabric went down.
But now there is genuine reason to believe that Akwete is on the threshold of revival, resurgence and explosive growth – if the Abia State government in collaboration with local and Diaspora investors would see the enormous potentials and move intentionally to modernise and expand the production process and package it for export under the United States Africa Growth Opportunity Act (AGOA), which has been operating for over 21 years, since it was passed into law in 2000.
A post on the website of the Office of the United States Trade Representative, which is a specialised unit of the Executive Office of the US President, states: “AGOA law has been at the core of U.S. economic policy and commercial engagement with Africa. AGOA provides eligible sub-Saharan African countries with duty-free access to the U.S. market for over 1,800 products, in addition to the more than 5,000 products that are eligible for duty-free access under the Generalized System of Preferences programme.
“By providing new market opportunities, AGOA has helped bolster economic growth, promoted economic and political reform, and improved U.S. economic relations in the region.”
Today, Akwete cloth is produced in the sleepy community of Akwete in Ukwa East Local Government Area of Abia State, and is coordinated by the Akwete Weaving Cooperative Society (AWCOS), which once operated from the AWCOS Complex built by the administration of the first civilian governor of old Imo State, Dr. Sam Onunaka Mbakwe, who presided over the affairs of the state between October 1979 and December 1983. It was designed to accommodate over 100 women, all fully engaged in weaving the fabric.
When Sunday Sun visited, the complex which used to be a beehive of activities, was seen to be a shadow of itself. No single person was found within the large compound. But on inquiry our reporter was told the woman, Nneoma Azubuike, who currently looks after the complex, went home.
Not quite long later, she returned, and in the course of the interaction, she said: “What we do here is to weave Akwete cloth, using our bare hands.”
Mrs. Azubuike added: “I was born in Akwete and met it the way it is today. I was six years when I learnt how to weave Akwete cloth and I’m now 37 years. Before, we were many that used to weave the cloth, when the business was booming; even white men used to come here to buy the cloth, but now, business is no longer moving. Back in the day, when weaving activity was at peak, up to 100 women were accommodated in the AWCOS building, but today, only paltry four women work there, thereby making the complex a ghost arena.”
Asked what was responsible for the decline in the trade, Mrs Azubuike said sadly: “From what I have said, you will find out that the Akwete cloth weaving business is on the decline. Apart from the economic downturn in the country, the major reason the trade is declining is because of the people’s love for foreign fabrics at the expense of the local ones despite the fact the Akwete cloth is more superior in quality.”
When the business was booming, Nigerians and foreigners used to troop to Akwete to buy the beautifully made and colourful fabrics.
One of the weavers, Mrs. Nne Ugbor told Sunday Sun: “Although we have customers from Anambra, Lagos and other places, but most of our customers come from Rivers State because they even wear the Akwete cloth more than people from Abia State.
“I have three major customers from Andoni and Port Harcourt in Rivers State and Lagos. The one you saw me weave when you came in was an order placed by my customer from Lagos. He asked me to do just plain weaving, later he will put the design of his choice on them,” Mrs Ugbor said.
Ada, who is in her early 40s, made an interesting revelation.
Hear her: “It was the money I made through weaving Akwete cloth that I used in training myself in secondary school because my parents were poor. I schooled at Federal Government Technical College, Ohanso; nobody paid my school fees for me for one day.”
How did she and others do this, the reporter probed? Her response demonstrated that any committed and determined individual can beat the odds and overcome any adversity.
Ada said that during holidays, she and the other children in the area engaged themselves in the weaving yards of Akwete cloth all through the vacation, and by the time schools would reopen, they would have made money that was more than enough to cover their school and other fees.
“By then, by the time we had midterm break, our parents would already have collected money from customers and kept for us. All you need do when you come back from school was to go to the market, buy materials and churn out yardage of the cloth.”
However, things have drastically changed. Today, Ada told Sunday Sun that it is difficult for girls to make money from weaving that will be enough to pay their school fees as a result of the dwindling fortunes of the trade.
The big question is: can the traditional craft be expanded and modernised? Azubuike affirmed that there had been a previous attempt to do this, revealing that some people had in the past expressed that desire to bring in industrial machines and modernize production activities of the cooperative.
However, the good intention was turned down. She gave this explanation: “Apart from taking away the techno-cultural aspect of the production which is synonymous with Akwete, other bureaucratic encumbrances may make the project dead on arrival, and that will lead to the end of the age long trade.”
Again, the natives fear that the ones that would be done by machines might not be as solid as the ones they use bare hands to weave.
Without a doubt, Akwete commands good prices; it is not cheap. The sleek fabrics cost as much as N25,000, having risen from the old price of N5,000. Some plain ones also cost N25,000. But the ones that have designs on them are sold for N45,000.
The soaring price of the Akwete cloth is principally due to the high cost of the materials used in weaving the fabric. A roll of the material costs N900 and about seven of those materials are needed to be able to produce two yards of Akwete cloth.
“By the time you buy the materials and make the cloth, there will be little or no gain when you sell them and that’s why many people appear not to have much interest in the business again,” Azubuike said.
Given this scenario of dwindling sales, it would appear that the aim of the Mbakwe administration in building the AWCOS has been defeated. The complex was purpose built with amenities that were intended to enable the women work under less stressful condition.
Ugbor painted a picture of the state of disrepair of the complex: “At a point, roofs of buildings in the complex were leaking water, but the member representing Ukwa East/West in the House of Representatives, Nkem Abonta, re-roofed some of the buildings. All the amenities put in place when the complex was built, have all gone bad. This made the women who used to weave there to leave the place and return to their homes, where they now stay to weave.”
In the remaining period of his tenure, Joseph Ibezim, co-convener of The Solomon Roundtable, a think tank that draws membership from Nigerians in the Diaspora strongly believes that “Governor Ikpeazu can mobilise support for the revival, resurgence and growth of Akwete in the same way he gave energetic attention to popularising Made-in-Aba shoes.”
He added: “The endorsement of Akwete by Governor Soludo must not be a flash in the pan, it must not go to waste. Yes, the apostle of banking consolidation, who faced down opposition to the policy with bull-headed determination, can go a step further by pushing for interstate investments across the Southeast. He has the personal credibility to attract Diaspora investment in critical areas that would boost micro, small and medium scale enterprises across the Southeast.”
Although efforts to reach the Abia State Commissioner for SMEs was not successful, however, a senior official of the Ministry of Commerce, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the press, said that the state government was making efforts to bring back the lost glory of the Akwete cloth and make it more competitive in the international market.