For the Igbo people of southeastern Nigeria, Njoku Ji is the yam’s guardian deity. Annual rites in honour of the yam deity, Ifejioku are still held in some regions of Igboland.
Like adults, children were supposed to become wealthy yam farmers, thereby elevating them to nobility.
Aha Njoku, as a goddess of such a vital crop, provides a whole range of yam services, including yam growth, harvesting, and insurance for yam producers, to name a few.
When it comes to planting yams, the Ndi Igbo’s principal crop, it’s usually a guy (although with modernization, women should be free to become Yam farmers too).
‘Iwa-Ji Ohuu’ or ‘Iri-Ji Ohuu’ is another name for the New Yam Festival, which is a celebration of yam and its significance to our social culture.
On the occasion, the Igbos thank God for a bountiful crop of new yams and undertake traditional processes to declare the new yam safe to eat.
On a full moon before Iwa Ji (cutting Yam) and Iri Ji (eating Yam) on an Eke market day, the Igbo people celebrate the Ahanjoku or Ifejioku Festival.
The ceremony is celebrated as Afia Olu in some Igbo clans, and it commences from the Eke Market day. People with the surname Njoku should be aware that their forefathers were renowned Yam farmers.
In order to preserve and expand that history, we should promote and invest in agriculture in Igboland in order to revitalize yam growing.
When the new yam festival occurs, it is a traditional festival that usually occurs at the conclusion of the agricultural season with a harvest, and it is a time for people to express gratitude and thanksgiving to society, to the gods, to their friends, and to re-establish family bonds.
The history of our forefathers and mothers must be maintained in the same way that other people’s histories are. ka Omenala ndi diri ha.Ka Omenala anyi ga na aga n’iru!
To put it another way, everyone should practice their culture in their own unique way, and Igbo culture must survive.