Ukpebor Ogizien (JP) is the Ada of Ewohimi Kingdom, Esan, Edo
State. He is also the president of Edo State Herbal Medicine
Practitioners in Lagos. He spoke with OMIKO AWA on traditional
medicine.
What is traditional medicine?
IT is the original medicine designed by God, Almighty, for us to heal our diseases and make life worth living. It has both good and bad effects, so the user needs to follow the prescription of those who prepared and prescribed it to achieve maximum result.
Are traditional and herbal medicines the same?
They are not exactly the same. Though, they are both made from roots, leaves, tree bark and others, we aim at the same thing — healing the user and saving life. However, I must let you know that there is a very thin line that differentiates them; for while herbal medicine is purely based on concoctions made from plants, the real traditional medicine has an aspect of spirituality associated to it. For traditional medicine to be effective, it must be backed with incantations that will draw powers from the metaphysical realm.
So, aside from the herbs, do these medicines depend on other powers for their potency?
Yes, and this is the reason the practice is not open to everybody. Practitioners of traditional medicine are either called, initiated into it or they inherited the powers from their forbearers. This is to empower the person, make him or her have authority and power generally referred to as ase or awase from God. Without the ase no traditional medicine will have the potency to heal. So, having it would enable the traditional medicine practitioner to prepare concoctions that heal people.
Is paraga or agbo part of traditional medicine?
Yes, but there are a lot of charlatans doing it in the name of money. They lie to people that paraga cures so many sicknesses. I have even seen people hawk it. Traditional medicine practitioners have been complaining about this set of people, even to point of getting to the National Agency for Food, Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC), because some of the concoctions they sell are dangerous. Instead of these mixtures relieving the problems they are meant to cure, they aggravate them. They are dangerous and could damage internal organs such as the kidney, liver and even the lungs. In fact, no one medicine can cure all sicknesses, for there are different preparations for different illness. Another thing about these street paraga is that they do not have dosage and as such they make buyers take them as much as they could, which dangerous.
But some of the pagara sellers in the street claim they have their own registered body and are certificated to prepare and sell their concoction?
They may be right because there are different organisations out there claiming to be for traditional medicine practitioners. I know we all have different bodies, but there are some fraudsters that are masquerading under one or two organisations to sell their mixtures.
How effective are these medicines when they are put inside gin?
They still perform the same thing; they still have the same potency. There are some roots you cannot cook, traditional healers use gin to make them ferment for those that take alcohol. Gin makes the root to ferment on time. It makes the herbs to steep faster and good for those that love alcohol. Moreso, gin takes less than eight hours while water takes 10 to 24 hours to steep and they are good for people that do not like alcohol. One thing herbs do to alcohol is to make it lose its flavour; the herbs usually take over the power of alcohol. However, we advise anybody mixing herbs with alcohol to use the local brew, the original gin and not ethanol. Ethanol has long time effect on human internal organs; it is dangerous to health and should not be consumed.
Some say roots should be better consumed cooked than taken raw, so, raw and cooked, which is more effective?
You cannot cook all roots; there are some leaves we cook while there are some we just squeeze to get the fluid. There are some leaves for headache that you do not even need to squeeze or cook, all you need to do is put it on the person’s head and make some incantation and the headache will go. You cook some and use some raw.
Are roots products good for consumption?
If they are from genuine practitioners, I would say yes, but if not, my answer is obvious. Some of these street herbal medicine hawkers use original roots, but the exception there, is that they combine different roots into one to make their preparation a cure-all mixture. A traditional medicine practitioner must have an area of specialisation; he is usually certified by the State Traditional Medicine Board after proving that he is capable of healing the sicknesses he claims he could heal. A practitioner is usually made to undergo some scrutiny to authenticate his claims and failure to prove ones ability means there will be no certificate, and anything you do will then be tagged fake.
For instance, if you claim you can heal someone who suffer from stroke, a stroke patient will be brought to you to heal and you would be allowed to use your said prescriptions on the patient. This is done under the supervision of seasoned practitioners and if under the specified time, usually three months and the patient is certified healed, you will be instructed to go ahead and produce your prescriptions for sale. These are the bottled herbal medicines you find in such places like Ewu Monastery, Yaba Traditional Herbal centre and others.
Do traditional or herbal medicines have dosages?
Yes, they do. They have dosage depending on the seriousness of the illness. But many people believe you can just wake up and take agbo or any other traditional medicine for the cleansing (washing and setting) of the body for the day. In fact, agbo is of the two types: there are agbo iba for malaria and agbo typhoid for typhoid. A pregnant woman cannot take agbo typhoid and if she does, she will have a miscarriage. It is to be taken twice a day, full glass without blood tonic, but as time goes on with the sickness going away you reduce to a glass per day. The mixture has a special root that would make anybody taking it to eat well. There is another, you can just bath with. Anything outside these prescriptions becomes an overdose. All medicines have dosages.
It is a common belief that herbal medicine helps men’s libido, how true is this?
What causes weak erection is dysentery (jedi jedi) and all one needs to do is take Jedi jedi medicine. It is usually purgative, but it will clear the system and make you hard. Jedi jedi could be caused by too much intake of sweet things or sugar based products. Other things that could cause erectile problem are infection, which could be contacted from public toilet or poor hygiene, diabetes, stroke and nerves related illness. Any man suffering from weak erection should first find out if he has jedi jedi or other infections before thinking of using sex-enhancing drugs. This is to avoid the long-term negative effect of sex-enhancing drugs. It is always good for anybody with erectile problem to go for comprehensive medical check up to know the real cause and how to treat it, instead of going for aphrodisiac that will later endanger one’s life. The side effects of these drugs are dangerous.
What do you suggest for men using libido drugs?
It’s bad, they should rather go for check up to find out if their problem is associated to infections such as sexually transmitted disease that was not well treated in the past or jedi jedi, so that they would know what to eat or take.
Supposing it is associated to age
Age will never make any man lose interest in sex. My late father had a child when he was 120 years old. It is only women that lose the urge for sex with age, especially when menopause sets in. Men do not suffer menopause, so, they keep on kicking. Secondly, erection is a thing of the mind, when the mind is not settled no matter the woman’s beauty, you can never have erection.
Can a woman take herbs to enhance performance?
There are no special herbs for that, rather, most women are inflicted by spiritual husbands. After satisfying themselves in the spiritual realm, they wake up to deny their physical husbands sex, which is really the major cause of most broken home.
Some say traditional medicine is the same as voodoo practice or witchcraft?
We have two types of traditional medicine practitioners or native doctors. There are two types of witches or wizards. The white witches or wizards are those initiated with ordinary kolanut, while the black ones are initiated with fish or meat. The black witches are for destruction or evil and they are dangerous. But the white witches or wizards are like the military police to the soldiers: military police arrest soldiers who misbehave. So, the white witches destroy the bad ones. There are some bad native doctors, we cannot rule that out, they destroy and enjoy doing that, so, we call them witchcraft native doctors. But there are those that use their power for good. God gave us herbs to cure our sicknesses and to keep life going. If you go to Ezekiel 47:12 you see that.
Prophet Ezekiel was the first native doctor in the Bible. He told us how to use herbs: that is the reason he said ‘blessed are those that do His will,’ the will of God is always good, and never bad. The spiritual power that follows is that most sickness are not natural, there are a lot of hatred, jealousy and the urge to eliminate one and take over his or her position, so most of this will lead to those wanting to achieve their inordinate ambition to inflict harm on others. So, what most native doctors do, especially those called, are to set loose those inflicted by all manner of affliction by the wicked ones. You need to be called to do this; it is like the pastors too.
How long are you in practice?
I was initiated into it at the age of seven; in short, it runs in my family, my grandfather and father were both native doctors. But despite that, I attend Trado-medical School in Ghana and have been practicing since 1985. I have many titles and high profile men including commissioners, traditional rulers and ministers as clients.
Source:guardiannews
What is traditional medicine?
IT is the original medicine designed by God, Almighty, for us to heal our diseases and make life worth living. It has both good and bad effects, so the user needs to follow the prescription of those who prepared and prescribed it to achieve maximum result.
Are traditional and herbal medicines the same?
They are not exactly the same. Though, they are both made from roots, leaves, tree bark and others, we aim at the same thing — healing the user and saving life. However, I must let you know that there is a very thin line that differentiates them; for while herbal medicine is purely based on concoctions made from plants, the real traditional medicine has an aspect of spirituality associated to it. For traditional medicine to be effective, it must be backed with incantations that will draw powers from the metaphysical realm.
So, aside from the herbs, do these medicines depend on other powers for their potency?
Yes, and this is the reason the practice is not open to everybody. Practitioners of traditional medicine are either called, initiated into it or they inherited the powers from their forbearers. This is to empower the person, make him or her have authority and power generally referred to as ase or awase from God. Without the ase no traditional medicine will have the potency to heal. So, having it would enable the traditional medicine practitioner to prepare concoctions that heal people.
Is paraga or agbo part of traditional medicine?
Yes, but there are a lot of charlatans doing it in the name of money. They lie to people that paraga cures so many sicknesses. I have even seen people hawk it. Traditional medicine practitioners have been complaining about this set of people, even to point of getting to the National Agency for Food, Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC), because some of the concoctions they sell are dangerous. Instead of these mixtures relieving the problems they are meant to cure, they aggravate them. They are dangerous and could damage internal organs such as the kidney, liver and even the lungs. In fact, no one medicine can cure all sicknesses, for there are different preparations for different illness. Another thing about these street paraga is that they do not have dosage and as such they make buyers take them as much as they could, which dangerous.
But some of the pagara sellers in the street claim they have their own registered body and are certificated to prepare and sell their concoction?
They may be right because there are different organisations out there claiming to be for traditional medicine practitioners. I know we all have different bodies, but there are some fraudsters that are masquerading under one or two organisations to sell their mixtures.
How effective are these medicines when they are put inside gin?
They still perform the same thing; they still have the same potency. There are some roots you cannot cook, traditional healers use gin to make them ferment for those that take alcohol. Gin makes the root to ferment on time. It makes the herbs to steep faster and good for those that love alcohol. Moreso, gin takes less than eight hours while water takes 10 to 24 hours to steep and they are good for people that do not like alcohol. One thing herbs do to alcohol is to make it lose its flavour; the herbs usually take over the power of alcohol. However, we advise anybody mixing herbs with alcohol to use the local brew, the original gin and not ethanol. Ethanol has long time effect on human internal organs; it is dangerous to health and should not be consumed.
Some say roots should be better consumed cooked than taken raw, so, raw and cooked, which is more effective?
You cannot cook all roots; there are some leaves we cook while there are some we just squeeze to get the fluid. There are some leaves for headache that you do not even need to squeeze or cook, all you need to do is put it on the person’s head and make some incantation and the headache will go. You cook some and use some raw.
Are roots products good for consumption?
If they are from genuine practitioners, I would say yes, but if not, my answer is obvious. Some of these street herbal medicine hawkers use original roots, but the exception there, is that they combine different roots into one to make their preparation a cure-all mixture. A traditional medicine practitioner must have an area of specialisation; he is usually certified by the State Traditional Medicine Board after proving that he is capable of healing the sicknesses he claims he could heal. A practitioner is usually made to undergo some scrutiny to authenticate his claims and failure to prove ones ability means there will be no certificate, and anything you do will then be tagged fake.
For instance, if you claim you can heal someone who suffer from stroke, a stroke patient will be brought to you to heal and you would be allowed to use your said prescriptions on the patient. This is done under the supervision of seasoned practitioners and if under the specified time, usually three months and the patient is certified healed, you will be instructed to go ahead and produce your prescriptions for sale. These are the bottled herbal medicines you find in such places like Ewu Monastery, Yaba Traditional Herbal centre and others.
Do traditional or herbal medicines have dosages?
Yes, they do. They have dosage depending on the seriousness of the illness. But many people believe you can just wake up and take agbo or any other traditional medicine for the cleansing (washing and setting) of the body for the day. In fact, agbo is of the two types: there are agbo iba for malaria and agbo typhoid for typhoid. A pregnant woman cannot take agbo typhoid and if she does, she will have a miscarriage. It is to be taken twice a day, full glass without blood tonic, but as time goes on with the sickness going away you reduce to a glass per day. The mixture has a special root that would make anybody taking it to eat well. There is another, you can just bath with. Anything outside these prescriptions becomes an overdose. All medicines have dosages.
It is a common belief that herbal medicine helps men’s libido, how true is this?
What causes weak erection is dysentery (jedi jedi) and all one needs to do is take Jedi jedi medicine. It is usually purgative, but it will clear the system and make you hard. Jedi jedi could be caused by too much intake of sweet things or sugar based products. Other things that could cause erectile problem are infection, which could be contacted from public toilet or poor hygiene, diabetes, stroke and nerves related illness. Any man suffering from weak erection should first find out if he has jedi jedi or other infections before thinking of using sex-enhancing drugs. This is to avoid the long-term negative effect of sex-enhancing drugs. It is always good for anybody with erectile problem to go for comprehensive medical check up to know the real cause and how to treat it, instead of going for aphrodisiac that will later endanger one’s life. The side effects of these drugs are dangerous.
What do you suggest for men using libido drugs?
It’s bad, they should rather go for check up to find out if their problem is associated to infections such as sexually transmitted disease that was not well treated in the past or jedi jedi, so that they would know what to eat or take.
Supposing it is associated to age
Age will never make any man lose interest in sex. My late father had a child when he was 120 years old. It is only women that lose the urge for sex with age, especially when menopause sets in. Men do not suffer menopause, so, they keep on kicking. Secondly, erection is a thing of the mind, when the mind is not settled no matter the woman’s beauty, you can never have erection.
Can a woman take herbs to enhance performance?
There are no special herbs for that, rather, most women are inflicted by spiritual husbands. After satisfying themselves in the spiritual realm, they wake up to deny their physical husbands sex, which is really the major cause of most broken home.
Some say traditional medicine is the same as voodoo practice or witchcraft?
We have two types of traditional medicine practitioners or native doctors. There are two types of witches or wizards. The white witches or wizards are those initiated with ordinary kolanut, while the black ones are initiated with fish or meat. The black witches are for destruction or evil and they are dangerous. But the white witches or wizards are like the military police to the soldiers: military police arrest soldiers who misbehave. So, the white witches destroy the bad ones. There are some bad native doctors, we cannot rule that out, they destroy and enjoy doing that, so, we call them witchcraft native doctors. But there are those that use their power for good. God gave us herbs to cure our sicknesses and to keep life going. If you go to Ezekiel 47:12 you see that.
Prophet Ezekiel was the first native doctor in the Bible. He told us how to use herbs: that is the reason he said ‘blessed are those that do His will,’ the will of God is always good, and never bad. The spiritual power that follows is that most sickness are not natural, there are a lot of hatred, jealousy and the urge to eliminate one and take over his or her position, so most of this will lead to those wanting to achieve their inordinate ambition to inflict harm on others. So, what most native doctors do, especially those called, are to set loose those inflicted by all manner of affliction by the wicked ones. You need to be called to do this; it is like the pastors too.
How long are you in practice?
I was initiated into it at the age of seven; in short, it runs in my family, my grandfather and father were both native doctors. But despite that, I attend Trado-medical School in Ghana and have been practicing since 1985. I have many titles and high profile men including commissioners, traditional rulers and ministers as clients.
Source:guardiannews