It was on a cloudy Sunday evening in Lagos. A large number of eager fans were gathered on the sandy pitch and the venue was the Jalisco Sports Centre at Oshodi, a highly populated area in the state.
The fighters looked set for the showdown, however; the nervous looks on the faces of the spectators were frank enough to take a calculated guess of the amount they had wagered on the contest.
Then the referee whistled for the fight to begin. With that official command, the two men sweating to hold back the fighters suddenly let go of the leashes and the animals charged at each other like raging bulls.
The sound of the collision rang round the playground and was immediately met by a huge cheer from the crowd.
“Oh! This is real fun; Shakiti Bobo is no match for Kill and Go,” a spectator with a deep voice shouted.
Our correspondent figured that the black ram was named Kill and Go while its opponent, a white ram with a brown patch at its back, was Shakiti Bobo.
Kill and Go and Shakiti Bobo slowly retreated in opposite directions and then charged at each other again. And as they got closer to each other, they reared a little and brought their heads down to deliver the resounding blows.
The ritual went on again and again and again, each time, with renewed venom.
Ram fighting: the sport
It was the preliminary round but a lot was at stake. A chance to make it to the group stage of the Annual National Ramfighting Competition beckoned the owners, and unfortunately for the rams that have to endure the head butts too. It was a realistic prospect for the owners as their rams repeatedly charged at each other.
Then the rams showed signs of fatigue. Soon the glorious prospect of making the national tournament perished for Skakiti Bobo, who had started to retreat, surely to the satisfaction of Kill and Go’s fans in the crowd, including the man with the deep voice.
The last blow it delivered seemed to have done the job as Shakiti Bobo fled the pitch with its owner at its heels. The fight was settled. Kill and Go had won the bout.
Wild jubilations seized the playground as someone in the crowd lifted Kill and Go up, saying the winner would be a worthy representative of the zone.
The proud owner of Kill and Go, an IT consultant, who identified himself as Yinka, said his hard work had paid off.
With a huge grin, he likened the way rams are prepared for fights to the way professional boxers are carefully managed before bouts.
“It goes way beyond what you witnessed here today; it is a lot of work and it is very deep,” he said with palpable satisfaction.
Ram fights are usually held in round enclosures created by the bodies of spectators in Nigeria, where it is a traditional sport, particularly among its Muslim population.
The deadly sport, which is for the entertainment of spectators, has continued to grow in popularity and the competitions have grown bigger with millions of Naira, cars, motor cycles, freezers, generators and other prizes at stake for different categories of winners.
Rams are raised and trained specifically to fight and therefore not killed for their mutton (meat) or sacrificed during Muslim Sallah celebrations, except they have passed their prime.
Findings by Saturday PUNCH showed that preparing rams for bouts and competitions starts from prospecting for lambs that are potential champions.
The breeding and feeding of such potential champions of ram fights also take special forms.
The Ram Owners Association of Nigeria and the Ram Lovers Association of Nigeria are the two major groups involved in the sport in the country. Also, a Facebook forum called RAM Combat: Fan Zone, offers an online platform for members of the group to discuss events, buy and sell fighter rams otherwise called gladiators and share videos and pictures from events.
Interestingly, rich celebrities, foreigners and executives of banks and multinational companies are some of those involved in the sport.
A breeder, Mr. Ganiyu Otobo, identified aggressiveness as one of the qualities to look out for when shopping for potential gladiators. The horns and foreheads are also features considered integral for rams to be used for fights.
A pronounced forehead, which is referred to as ‘guarding’ in the local parlance is one of the important features of good fighter rams.
Big horns hardly break, which also make them a good attribute for rams. Some breeders cut off the horn tips as experience has taught them that such horns are replaced by larger ones.
Some breeders also incise the forehead of rams to remove a thick mould of flesh that often prevents rams from fighting once it gets damaged.
“What we do is to encourage a ram that wants to fight,” Otobo said.
“When I notice that a ram is aggressive towards others, head butting them while they are eating together from the same bowl, then I may be interested in it, particularly if it also looks fit. Even then, I will still have to do a lot of work to improve on its fitness by taking it for frequent road walks.”
Otobo lives in Surulere in Lagos and has employed a nomad, who takes his rams for road walks to far distances like Costain, Oyingbo and even the Lagos Island.
Some breeders in Lagos take their gladiators on fitness walks to other places like Aganga, a deserted area off College Road in Lagos, where rams can be taken for 10 to 15 km walks and Odo Akonko (Akonko River), a mountainous area in Ogba, also in Lagos, which has 77 steps that can be walked up and down.
“At Akonko, the ram can be taken up the 77 steps 20 times and the essence is to enlarge its heart and improve its fitness,” a ram owner, Mr. Oyindamola Akanni, said.
“The larger the heart, the more it can withstand the stress of fighting. There are gymnasts that take the rams on such rigorous walks for a fee.
“The rams must also be well-fed and there are special feed compositions that are given to them which are different from what are given to rams reared for meat purpose.
While rams reared for meat are allowed to grow fat, their counterparts that are bred as gladiators are not permitted to get heavy. Their breeders are after less fat, strong bones, horns and teeth for the animals. So they don’t like the special drug locally called ‘Mawumawu’ that some ram sellers give to their animals to enhance their size.
Therefore, they are fed special combinations of malt extract, corn shaft, plantain skin, cassava peel, wheat cover, sorghum, bean shells and Ugwu leaves.
They are de-wormed quarterly and washed regularly with shampoo to safeguard them against infections since logically; an ailing ram is a bad fighter.
Fighter rams are given Codeine injection, an opium-containing painkilling drug that is sometimes given to horses. They are also given a lot of calcium to ensure strong bones and teeth.
Some owners add Indian hemp (powder, seeds and/or weed), gin, beer, salt and stimulants to their rams’ rations.
“Such inducements do not give my rams power, but they make them fight more fiercely,” said a breeder, Afeez Folahan, who admitted to including Indian hemp in his animals’ rations.
Luckily for him, rams are not tested for drugs before or after fights, unlike organised human sport competitions.
Akanni, who confirmed that some rams are fed with drugs, described the breeding of gladiators as an expensive venture.
He said, “It is very expensive but it also depends on how deep the owner’s pocket is. Those who give their rams Indian hemp powder, seeds or weed to eat want to enhance their aggressiveness. So it won’t make a ram that is not fit fight better but it will make it to be aggressive.
“Some rams that are really crazy also take gin and beer, usually the ones in green bottles because rams from the north usually take drugs from bottles.
“So when they see a green bottle, they may run after you, thinking it contains their drugs. Some breeders indulge their rams. The rams will grab the bottles of alcohol with their mouths and drain the contents. After being fed with Indian hemp or alcohol, you will see the rams misbehaving, spoiling for a fight and chasing after persons and animals in sight. And when there is no person or animal in sight, such will start hitting their heads against the wall.
“We give rams stimulant to make them eat well but we don’t enhance their growth with a drug called ‘Mawumawu’, which some ram sellers use to blow up the size of their animals. This is the essence of de-worming them so that they can lose their worms and a lot of fats. After de-worming, rams lose a lot of weight.
“Once they are given salt to eat, it helps clean their mouths and makes them eat better. An alternative to that is black stone, which is often sold at ranches and polo clubs, where they are used for horses. They perform a similar job as the salt.”
Akanni also explained how rams should be bred on pallets and not on concrete floors to prevent their droppings from getting stuck in their hooves, as this can give them infections.
It is also believed that rams charge faster during fights when their hooves are dry, healthy and free of impediments.
Interestingly, rams are also psychologically prepared for fights.
About two weeks to the time that Femi Olubayo’s biggest ram, Agbako, is to fight, he makes sure he prevents it from seeing the sunlight.
Naturally, gladiators are kept in separate cages and Olubayo said that keeping it away from sunlight makes it more hostile when it is brought out to fight. Extended periods of isolation, he said, works for rams’ psych and make them realise their mission when brought out to fight.
He explained that isolation “helps gladiators rest well and prevents them from getting used to the company of other rams.”
At the same time, a gladiator ought to be prepared ahead of major competitions to deal with the large crowd.
Some rams, though good fighters, can be intimidated by large crowds.
A ram owner, Mr. Ajibike Lawal, recalled that he once had a ram that was the neighbourhood champion, but ran from a major fight because it was not used to fighting before large crowds.
The experience taught Lawal to take his rams with him to competitions in order to acclimatise them to noise and large number of people.
“When you take rams to major competitions, they also learn to fight better apart from the fact that it helps them to be less intimidated by large crowds,” he said.
“After a while, the rams understand the game and know what they are there to do. They learn from other good gladiators how to fight better.”
Ram fights are not peculiar to Nigeria; for instance, the event is a tradition in Russia and in central China, particularly on the first day of the Chinese New Year.
In Algeria, rams also compete in fighting tournaments, a local Algerian tradition held in the lead up to celebrations for Eid al-Adha or the Feast of the Sacrifice.
Gambling and violence
However, ram fighting is often linked to gambling, drug use and violence.
Apart from the winning prizes, spectators engage in side wagers to back their ram of choice.
And with the huge amounts of money involved in betting come the propensity for violent conducts by losers, Otobo said.
He recalled attending a competition where up to N5
