It’s always a landmark tree like Achi. You here things like Ukwu Achi, Ukwu Akwu/Akpu. Even a village in Ututu town answers Ukwuakwu.
Well, whenever I reflect on this, it is not emotion first, it is loss – biological, pharmacological, and intellectual loss.
Did you know that, in many parts of Igboland today, especially in places like my own Isu, this tree has disappeared or gradually disappearing especially the big one? This is not because it lacked value, but because it was misunderstood.
The last ones I witnessed in my time in Isu are Akwu Amukabi and Akwu Amakram, those were not just trees, they were living systems. Some persons organised and engineered the cutting down of the tree, and a church was built on the spot of that of Amukabi as a symbol of victory over the devil .. Ndi isi ojiiiii for a reason… For them the tree is an abode for principalities and powers of the darkness….
No one smokes existential mishap weed like an extreme ignorant Christian! Take this to the bank.
In some places, once the tree was cut down, something else was quickly built there, as if removing the tree solved a problem.
I remember in senior seminary, late Fr. Dr. Nicholas Ibeawuchi Mbogu narrated how some groups went around cutting large trees, tagging them as evil. This was not isolated.
In the early 2000s, there was this pastor/bishop who became popular for “ancestoral deliverance”, he was even know for cutting down big trees and what he tagged evil forest . One of such cases happened in Ofia Izu, Ututu in Arochukwu LGA.
It did not stop there. In many communities today, even the big Achi trees are being cut down. The same Achi we use as a soup thickener, the same tree that carries nutritional and medicinal relevance. We are removing the source while still using the product, without thinking.
Now step away from sentiment and look at this from a scientific standpoint.
Ceiba pentandra is not an ordinary tree. It is a complex phytomedical system with multiple pharmacologically active components distributed across its bark, leaves, roots, and seeds.
Phytochemically, the plant contains:
These compounds act on defined biological pathways.
Now consider the structure of this plant as a medicinal system.
This is a full pharmacological system in one tree.
