By The well known ‘Mammy Market’ scattered in several barracks nationwide, came due to the industrious woman identified as Mammy Ode or Mrs. Maria Ochefu.
In 1959, 14 years old Mammy Ode, from Jericho-Ugboju in the present Otukpo Local Government Area of Benue State was married off to Anthony Aboki Ochefu, a young Colonel in the Nigerian military, who had just been posted to Enugu from Abeokuta.
They were quartered at the Army Barracks, Abakpa, Enugu.
To beat idleness and earn some money, Mammy Ode decided to establish a soft drinks business in her home at the barrack.
Initially her husband did not agree with the idea because soldiers wives were usually housewives.
But he later agreed when she told him it is to support their young family financially.
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She prepared gruel, which is popularly called ‘Umu or enyi’ in Idoma, or kunu in Hausa, for sale to the soldiers in the barrack to help quench their thirst and energise them.
She soon became popular with selling umu as soldiers trooped to her house to buy the local brew made from guinea corn.
Some of her customers were officers, who always sent their batmen to buy the gruel for them, Monday through Friday and even during the weekend when they are not working.
Somehow, one of the Non-Commissioned Officers, the RSM, did not flow with the enthusiasm, which Mammy’s gruel generated among other military men in the barracks.
He complained that the stuff was attracting flies into the barracks and ordered Mammy Ode to stop her production and sale.
Though disappointed at the order of the RSM, she stopped the production and sale of umu in the barrack.
For weeks Mammy Ode agonized over the fate of her business, just as officers and men of the Nigerian Army who enjoyed her brew because of its freshness and nutritional value lamented over the situation.
From several quarters, pressure mounted on the RSM for a reversal of the order.
After a while, he succumbed to the pressures and directed that a section of the barracks be reserved for Mammy Ode to produce and sell her umu.
Her joy knew no bounds.
Few days after, a section at the back of the barracks was allocated to her for the purpose of selling her umu /kunu.
With the help of young officers, she built a small stall for her business and soon, her business began to boom again.
Many of her customers even booked far in advance for the quantity of umu they want to buy from her.
Before noon, she would have finished selling the available umu for the day.
Soon, other women in the barracks became inspired by her industrious nature and tapped into her industry and started selling other items like burukutu, pito, palm wine, kain-kain and other alcoholic beverages in addition to snacks and peppersoup.
It was not long before that portion of the barrack was named Mammy market.
Not long, it became a policy to establish markets inside or near military barracks in the country, initially for the exclusive use of officers and men of the rank and file, and such markets were also named Mammy market.
Mammy Ode also hands over her business to any willing females (wives of other soldiers) each time her husband is transferred from one state to the other, then she opens another in her new location.
Today, no visit to Abuja, Nigeria or any military barrack in Nigeria is complete without a taste of fresh fish/food and drinks in one of the Mammy Markets.
After General Yakubu Gowon was overthrown in a Military putsch, Anthony Aboki Ochefu, Mammy Ode’s husband who was then a colonel, was posted to East Central State as the Military Governor.
So Mammy Ode and her husband returned to Enugu as the first family.
Colonel Anthony Aboki Ochefu and his wife Mammy Ode incorporated a company called Mammy Markets, which was into haulage and trading.
Mammy Ode is still alive and lives at Otukpo as one of the prized legends of our time.
