The town of Gembu is found on the Mambilla Plateau, in the southeastern part of Taraba State, close to the Nigeria-Cameroon border. Nonetheless, the Mambilla Plateau is the generally accepted historical Bantu Homeland. The people of Gembu are known for their warmth, hospitality, and rich cultural heritage. Despite facing challenges, they embrace life with unity and determination.
The Bantu people are ethnic groups of Bantu speaking people from all over Africa including Nigeria. The Africa Southeastern Bantu region has its roots in West Africa, an area that includes Nigeria and Cameroon, which is also the region believed to be where the Bantu languages originated 3,000 years ago.
Factually, it is generally agreed that some one-third of the continent today occupied by Bantu-speaking peoples was, until approximately 2,000 years ago, the dominion of other groups. The causes and itinerary of the subsequent Bantu migration have attracted the attention of several anthropologists.
Meanwhile, George P. Murdock of the United States postulated that the expansion of the Bantu was associated with their acquisition of certain Malaysian food crops (banana, taro, and yam), which spread westward across the continent at about the time that the migration is thought to have begun. These crops, Murdock argued, enabled them to penetrate the tropical rainforest of equatorial Africa, whence they spread southward. A more widely held view, however, is that the migratory route lay eastward, across the southern Sudan, and then south, past the great lakes of the northeast.
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Known as the coldest place in Nigeria. Gembu’s low temperature occurs because of its location, and the temperature rarely falls below 49⁰ f or above 78⁰ f. The town frequently witness torrential downpour with hail (ice). It’s the coldest place in Nigeria. The Mambila plateau has the daytime temperature of 21°C (normal) that hardly ever exceed 25 °C (77.0 °F).
Interestingly, Gembu stands at well over 1,830 metres above sea level, has a temperate climate with lush pasture green vegetation. The access route up the Plateau and the canyons are a breath-taking delight, with snake – like winding road that ascend the Plateau and along the road natural springs that bore through rocks adorns the road, so also is a spectacular bridge suspended over a valley. The bridge links/joins 2 spurs, and that itself is a sight to behold.
In addition, the route to Gembu for those in the southern part of the country links from a major road to Mambilla from Lagos, through Benin City, Onitsha, Enugu, Oturkpo, Yandev, Katsina Ala, Wukari, Mutum Biyu, Bali, Serti, Nguroje and finally Gembu. One could also take a connecting flight to Yola Airport, then drive a few miles down south to Mambilla.
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