Ekpeye People of Nigeria Essay

It became a serious problem that the elderly indigenes of the town had to cry out for help so that their innocent youths would not be taught this new way of life. It is true that there are many tribes in Nigeria that are still holding to the moral standard of their culture. But in a country where a lot of people migrate everyday away from their tribe and culture to other people’s culture for reasons like admission into higher institutions of learning, youth service, employment, etc; it becomes imperative to consider and treat cohabitation as a very serious anomaly. The Ekpeye tribe, one of the numerous tribes in Rivers state of Nigeria is a very good example of the tribes that are now involved in cohabitation. Working among the Ekpeye youths, one will discover a high rate of premarital sexual relationship among the youths. Many of these youths cohabiting with one another are not unbelievers; many couples in the local churches are not married, at least according to the customary law. Majority of these young people came together as a result of premarital sexual relationships which resulted in unwanted pregnancy. Sad enough, many of these people are church members serving in one capacity or another; in fact, there are pastors among them. It has become the order of the day, a common thing that goes on from one town to the other. Majority of these youths, including Christians go into it with the knowledge of their parents and community leaders. This is gradually becoming a serious temptation to many Christian youths who want to uphold the standard of God for marriage and stay faithful to marriage vows. It  Ã‚   is also standing as a barrier to evangelize those outside the church. This research paper is focused on this people group with the intention of knowing their marriage custom, how cohabitation gained access into the culture, the way cohabitation is practiced and the effects that cohabitation has on the cohabiting families and the church. Ekpeye Tribe and Its Marriage Custom Ekpeye tribe is one of the local tribes in Rivers state. Ekpeye tribe as seen in the map is in Ahoada East and Ahoada West local government areas in Rivers state. There are four traditional groups in Ekpeye kingdom. They are Akoh, Ubie, Upata and Igbuduya. 8 The main occupations of Ekpeye traditional society are farming, hunting and fishing.