Ughelli is a town in Delta State, Nigeria, and one of the 24 kingdoms that make up the Urhobo Nation. It also serves as the headquarters of

Ughelli North Ughelli North is a Local Government Area of Delta State, Nigeria. Its headquarters is in the city of Ughelli. It has an area of 818 km2 and a population of 321,028 at the 2006 census. The postal code of the area is 333. Notable towns in ...

local government area of Delta State. The city is indigenous to the Urhobo ethnic nationals, but there is a mixture of several other tribes from the country, such as the

Igbos The Igbo people ( , ; also spelled Ibo" and formerly also ''Iboe'', ''Ebo'', ''Eboe'', * * * ''Eboans'', ''Heebo''; natively ) are an ethnic group in Nigeria. They are primarily found in Abia, Anambra, Ebonyi, Enugu, and Imo States. A siz ...

Edos Edos is a discontinued operating system based upon IBM's original mainframe DOS (not to be confused with the unrelated and better known MS-DOS for the IBM PC). The name stood for extended (or enhanced) disk operating system. It was later purchase ...

and others. It is an industrial and agricultural spot of Delta State. Ughelli is in a central location in Delta State and a major town for the Urhobo Tribe, also one of the oldest kingdom in Delta State tracing back to the 14th and 15th century. The city of Ughelli is ruled by a traditional ruler which is known as

Ovie Ovie is a given name, nickname and surname. It may refer to: Nickname * Alexander Ovechkin (born 1985), Russian ice hockey player * Ovie Alston (1905–1989), American jazz trumpeter, vocalist, and bandleader * Ovie Ejaria (born 1997), English foo ...

, and is passed from father to son. The current king is His Royal Majesty, Oharisi III who lives in the Ovie Palace situated at Otovwodo-Ughelli.

History

Ughelli oral tradition has it that the great

ancestor An ancestor, also known as a forefather, fore-elder or a forebear, is a parent or (recursively) the parent of an antecedent (i.e., a grandparent, great-grandparent, great-great-grandparent and so forth). ''Ancestor'' is "any person from whom ...

and founding father of Ughelli ("Ughene"), is the second son of

Oghwoghwa Oghwoghwa Is the forefather of four Urhobo Kingdoms in Urhobo Land in Nigeria, namely *Ogor (Ogọ) *Ughelli (Ughẹne), * Agbarha-Otor (Agbarha) and *Orogun. Each of the Kingdom is headed by a traditional ruler known as Ovie Ovie is a given ...

(a Prince from

Benin Kingdom The Kingdom of Benin, also known as the Edo Kingdom, or the Benin Empire ( Bini: ') was a kingdom within what is now southern Nigeria. It has no historical relation to the modern republic of Benin, which was known as Dahomey from the 17th c ...

). As history has it,

in search of his own kingdom first settlement was at Tarakiri and later left for Oviri Ogor (current site of Ogor Techinal College). Ughene later left Oviri Ogor and founded Ovwodoawanre (Old Settlement), before the present settlement headquarters at Otovwodo (traditional headquarters). Ughelli Kingdom

Ughelli has several schools, a general hospital, and a local government secretariat. The city is a link between

Delta North Delta North is a provincial electoral district for the Legislative Assembly of British Columbia, Canada. History The electoral district was created for the 1991 election from part of the dual-member Delta riding. Members of the Legislative ...

and

Delta South Delta South is a provincial electoral district for the Legislative Assembly of British Columbia, Canada. Member of Legislative Assembly The current MLA for this riding is Ian Paton. The previous member was Vicki Huntington, the only Indep ...

. The city has crude oil and gas reserves hence the presence of

Shell Shell may refer to: Architecture and design * Shell (structure), a thin structure ** Concrete shell, a thin shell of concrete, usually with no interior columns or exterior buttresses ** Thin-shell structure Science Biology * Seashell, a hard ou ...

Petroleum Development Company (SPDC). Ughelli town is the administrative headquarters of Ughelli North Local Government Area.

Location

Ughelli's latitude and longitude coordinates are: 5.500187, 5.993834. It is a city in southern Nigeria and the oldest kingdom of the 24 kingdoms of the Urhobo people

List of rulers of Ughelli Kingdom

Notable people

Efe Abogidi Efemena Tennyson "Efe" Abogidi (born October 11, 2001) is a Nigerian professional basketball player for the NBA G League Ignite of the NBA G League. He played college basketball for the Washington State Cougars of the Pac-12 Conference. Early lif ...

Efe Ajagba Efe Ajagba (born 22 April 1994) is a Nigerian professional boxer who holds the record for the fastest victory in boxing history after his opponent was disqualified for leaving the ring one second after the opening bell. As an amateur, he won a ...

Gamaliel Onosode Gamaliel Oforitsenere Onosode (22 May 1933 – 29 September 2015) was a foremost Nigerian technocrat, administrator and a former presidential candidate of the All Nigeria People's Party of Nigeria. Educated at the Government College, Ughelli and t ...

Ben Okri Ben Okri (born 15 March 1959) is a Nigerian-British poet and novelist.Ben Okri"
British Council, ...

References

Populated places in Delta State {{deltaNG-geo-stub