Our People
Fugar is located about 103 miles north-east of Benin City, in Etsako region in Edo State. Fugar is comprised of two villages, Ivhiunone and Ivhiarua and it is the headquarters of Etsako Central Local Government Area of Edo State with a population of about 50,000. The people of Fugar as well as the rest of Avhianwu are the descendants of a great ancestral father and founder, Anwu.
Today, Fugar is called ‘little Paris’ because of her rich heritage, culture and tradition with progressive and compassionate social and economic development that has outpaced the rest of the country. The people of Fugar today enjoy some of the most advanced community infrastructure than any other community in Nigeria. There is a network of distributed water supply, a functioning electrical grid that rivals the best in the country, with every street paved with interconnected public drainage systems.
Fugar is and has been the home to some notable Nigerians of distinction and is also the home of the first Nigerian Ambassador to the United States, the birthplace of the first Attorney General of Bendel State, now Edo State, home of the former military governor of Lagos State, the Commander of the Nigerian Navy, the Chief of General Staff and the home of the former Deputy Governor of Edo State and Chief of Staff of a former Nigerian President. Every child in Fugar is provided the opportunity to have a decent education regardless of gender.
Our Ancestry
The people of Fugar along with the rest of the Avhianwu Clan, migrated from Benin because of the inhumane treatment they received in the hands of the Bini Obas. On arriving Uzairueland, they settled at Ikpe (Jattu) briefly before moving to another settlement in the area of Unone and Arua. As freedom loving people who had left their original home in Benin to escape from ill treatment, they could not accept the tyranny of the headman, Oghie Omoazekpe, in Afasio and so they moved further eastward and settled in their present home.
Before the advent of the Nupe and the British, the people of Fugar with the rest of the other three villages that make up Avhianwu have developed a distinct and rich culture. Fugar today, like the rest of the Avhianwu Clan enjoys a separate identity as a clan among others in Etsako. It has a homeland and shares territorial boundaries with her sisters, Uzairue on the west, Ekperi on the south, Weppa-Wano to the east and North-Ibies to the north.
Avhianwu with her kinsmen and other neighbors are today collectively known as Etsako. The invasion of the Nupe slave raiders of Etsakoland and the areas beyond in the first half of the 19th century gave birth to an area that later became Kukuruku Division. Kukuruku Division is comprised of Etsako, Ivhiosakon and Akoko-Igarra. You can read the entire history of the Avianwu people in the book, ‘The Descent of Avhianwu’
Geneology of Avhianwu
Azama was the father of Anwu, who was the father of Unone, Arua, Egwienabo, Okholimhi , Adaeso (Adachi), Iraokhor and Imhakhena. Unone was the father of Obho, Ikhiya and Igieghe. Arua was the father of Adoko, Okpo, Abhe and Okhile. Today, the children of Unone and Arua form the various Quarters in Fugar.