This scheme proved unpopular and confusing to many involved parties and was phased out. After the Napoleon war, the British tried to expand their colonial rule in Africa and began to establish trade tides with Nigeria in 1898. Gradually, however, the trade forced major economic and social changes in the interior, although it hardly undermined slavery and the slave trade. The officers of the RWAFF were British. The Colonial Era (1882-1960) British colonialism began under the pretense of policing the slave trade. European colonialists had managed to quell the efforts by Africans to resist the establishment of colonial rule with one exception. [67], The Colonial Office, where Lugard was still held in high regard, accepted that changes might be due in the south, but it forbade fundamental alteration of procedures in the north. African resistance to colonial rule began with A) The arrival of the Europeans on the continent in the late 19th century B) The end of World War II C) . Selected petitions and written correspondence between Igbo women and British officials between 1892 and 1960 shed fresh light on how women navigated . Afeadie, "The Hidden Hand of Overrule" (1996), p. 1213. The NCNC backed creation of a midwest state and proposed federal control of education and health services. Despite the acceptance of European and North American influences, the nationalists were critical of colonialism for its failure to appreciate the antiquity, richness and complexity of indigenous cultures. Alan Lennox-Boyd, M.P., the British Secretary of State for the Colonies. Britain outlawed slavery in 1807 and pushed for forms of "legitimate commerce" such as palm oil and cotton, and in so doing developed an internal infrastructure to facilitate these markets. This rate rose to 20,000 per year in the last quarter of the century. Taxes became a source of discontent in the south, however, and contributed to disturbances protesting British policy. Significantly, Macauley's NNDP remained almost entirely a Lagos party, popular only in the area whose people already had experience in elective politics. refusing to pay. Demanding immediate self-government, the Action Group was opposed by the Northern Peoples Congress (NPC), which was composed largely of northerners and headed by several leaders, including Abubakar Tafawa Balewa. British merchants led the trade in palm oil, while the Portuguese and others continued the slave trade. Although lacking Azikiwe's compelling personality, Awolowo was a formidable debater as well as a vigorous and tenacious political campaigner. Until he stepped down as Governor-General in 1918, Lugard primarily was concerned with consolidating British sovereignty and with assuring local administration through traditional rulers. Most of these came from military backgrounds. According to the Trans-Atlantic Slave Voyage Database, 308,800 were sold across the Atlantic from Lagos in 17761850. American president Dwight D. Eisenhower was represented at the independence ceremonies by Nelson Rockefeller, the . [73], Due to the failure of the sanitation officers in Lagos, the virus would continue to spread throughout the southern provinces throughout September and finally make its way into the hinterlands by October. This is what happened in 1929 when Igbo and Ibibio market women in Owerri and Calabar (Nigeria) made war against warrant chiefs and colonial authorities over issues of taxation and colonial administration. In contrast to Lugard, Clifford argued that colonial government had the responsibility to introduce as quickly as practical the benefits of Western experience. Lugard informed the leaders of conquered Sokoto: The Fulani in old times [] conquered this country. The approaches of the two men to colonial development were diametrically opposed. When direct Portuguese contacts in the region were withdrawn, however, the influence of the Catholic missionaries waned. [32] This included a river fleet which it used for retaliatory attacks on uncooperative villages. . Falola, Toyin, Ann Genova, and Matthew M. Heaton. On 9 May 1913, Lugard submitted a formal proposal to the Colonial Office in which Northern and Southern provinces would have separate administrations, under the control of a "strongly authoritarian" Governor-General. It made anti-slavery treaties with West African powers, which it enforced militarily with the blockade of Africa. Trained as an army officer, he had served in India, Egypt and East Africa, where he expelled Arab slave traders from Nyasaland and established British presence in Uganda. [19] This scenario provided an opportunity for naval expeditions and reconnaissance throughout the region. [27] To produce all this oil, the economy of the southern region crossed over from mostly subsistence to the production of palm oil as a cash crop.[28]. The Lander brothers were seized by slave traders in the interior and sold down the river to a waiting European ship. The European struggle to establish forts and trading posts on the West African coast from about the mid-1600s to the mid-1700s was part of the wider competition for trade and empire in the Atlantic. The central government, presided over by the governor-general and accountable to the secretary for the colonies in London, was more powerful but distant from the people. In 1960, the country attained independence from British rule. This became the Lagos Constabulary, and subsequently the Nigerian Police Force. Nigeria Lugard and Indirect Rule. The arrival of the British. Nigeria (/ n a d r i / ny-JEER-ee-), officially the Federal Republic of Nigeria, is a country in West Africa.It is situated between the Sahel to the north and the Gulf of Guinea to the south in the Atlantic Ocean.It covers an area of 923,769 square kilometres (356,669 sq mi), and with a population of over 225 million, it is the most populous country in Africa, and the world's . Ouidah (now part of Benin) and Lagos were the major ports on the coast. It is not a federal state with federal Executive, Legislature and finances, like the Leewards. A new constitution was created in 1922 under British colonial rule, largely due to Nigerian calls for reform. Nigerians also requested more political representation. [81] In 1936, of 6,259,547 income for the Nigerian state, 1,156,000 went back to England as home pay for British officials in the Nigerian civil service. [56], Walter Egerton's sixfold agenda for 1908, as detailed on 29 November 1907, in a telegram to the Colonial Office, is representative of British priorities. [43][44] The British forces began annual pacification missions to convince the locals of British supremacy. Acephalous . [11][12], In 1900, the British Government assumed control of the Southern and Northern Protectorates, both of which were ultimately governed by the Colonial Office at Whitehall. In the 1920s, Nigerians began to form a variety of associations, such as professional and business associations, like the Nigerian Union of Teachers; the Nigerian Law Association, which brought together lawyers, many of whom had been educated in Britain; and the Nigerian Produce Traders' Association, led by Obafemi Awolowo. Native Administration was responsible for police, hospitals, public works and local courts. Retrieved October 11, 2014 from. Each was under a Lieutenant Governor and provided independent government services. The economy suffered from the decline in the slave trade, although considerable smuggling of slaves to the Americas continued for years afterward. They later discovered that the demand for . In the early stages of British rule, it is desirable to retain the native authority and to work through and by the native emirs. With the exception of Brandenburg-Prussia's short-lived attempt to gain a foothold on the West African coast and to participate in the 17th-century transatlantic slave trade, German colonialism began only in the 1880s. In April 1927, the British colonial government in Nigeria took measures to enforce the Native Revenue (Amendment) Ordinance. Total revenues of central and regional governments nearly doubled in relation to the gross domestic product during the decade. Years of colonial rule yieleded system w/ all-powerful central government surrounded by weak and economically insolvent states. In some cases, British assignment of people to ethnic groups, and treatment based along ethnic lines, led to identification with ethnicity where none had existed before.[84]. Unification meant only the loose affiliation of three distinct regional administrations into which Nigeria was subdividedNorthern, Western and Eastern regions. 22. After the Willink Commission examined and reported on this issue in 1958, independence was granted. Harding, director of Nigerian affairs at the Colonial Office, defined the official position of the British Government in support of indirect rule when he said that "direct government by impartial and honest men of alien race [] never yet satisfied a nation long and [] under such a form of government, as wealth and education increase, so do political discontent and sedition". Because of the hazards of climate and tropical diseases for Europeans and the absence of any centralized authorities on the mainland responsive to their interests, European merchants moored their ships outside harbours or in the delta, and used the ships as trading stations and warehouses. From Lugard's point of view, clear-cut military victories were necessary because the surrenders of the defeated peoples weakened resistance elsewhere. In the immediate post-World War II period, Nigeria benefited from a favourable trade balance. [67], This system, in which the structure of authority focused on the emir to whom obedience was a mark of religious devotion, did not welcome change. Davies and Nnamdi Azikiwe. After the 1930s, political activities focused primarily on ways to end British rule. Maji-Maji Uprising (Tanganyika) 4. To prevent any united opposition to its authority, the British adopted a divide-and-rule policy, keeping Nigerian groups separate from one another as much as possible. But the history of Nigerian demands for greater representation go back to the 1920s. I will be dealing almost exclusively with the areas of East and Central Africa - Kenya, Tanzania, Mozambique, Malawi, Zimbabwe - where a more or less coherent debate can be seen. The exploitation of the women's work led to resistance movements and led the women to develop more political awareness and engage in and aid existing decolonization movements. The British finalized the border between Nigeria and French West Africa with the Anglo-French Convention of 1898. Internal self-government was granted to the Western and Eastern regions in 1957. By the end of World War I, most of Africa had been effectively colonized. The British Culture in Nigeria. In the meantime, public sector spending increased even more dramatically than export earnings. 3 The Amakholwa's upsurge as a black, conservative, and educated class in the Cape Colony helped establish political resistance to colonial rule. The Nigerian Resistance. All were knighted. He definitely laid the basis for British claims. [12] Trade was also conducted through a mechanism of barter and credit. Like in other countries under imperialist rule, colonialism in Nigeria resulted in numerous positive and negative impacts. [59], Lugard advocated constantly for the unification of the whole territory, and in August 1911 the Colonial Office asked Lugard to lead the amalgamated colony.[60]. Ethnic and kinship organisations that often took the form of a tribal union also emerged in the 1920s. The Action Group was largely the creation of Chief Obafemi Awolowo, General Secretary of Egbe Omo Oduduwa and leader of the Nigerian Produce Traders' Association. Ajay. As a philosophical movement and critical . As a latecomer in the struggle for colonies, Germany had to settle for four territories, called "protectorates," in . For some time, missionaries operated in the area between Lagos and Ibadan. The NPC continued to represent the interests of the traditional order in the pre-independence deliberations. The principal figure in the political activity that ensued was Herbert Macauley, often referred to as the father of Nigerian nationalism. [18], In 1807, the Parliament of the United Kingdom enacted the Slave Trade Act, prohibiting British subjects from participating in the Atlantic slave trade. Algeria fought back and eventually was granted self rule and nigeria was put down and never got independance. The risings in the midwest of Nigeria and the Niger delta during the early stages of the war cannot be understood except in the context of falling prices for palm products, and the drop in trade due to the exclusion of the . Although the Muslim emirs eventually collaborated with the British to establish such rule in Northern Nigeria, the absence of similar authority structures in the South led to more direct colonial rule. The conditions that led African peoples to resist colonial rule often emerged from longstanding grievances against colonial labor exploitation taxation racist and paternalist practices arbitrary violence and political illegitimacy. The trade subsequently continued under the Portuguese Empire. Political opposition to colonial rule often assumed religious dimensions. Some indigenous peoples, such as those in the Americas, were forced to move to reservations or killed outright by invading European colonizers. Although Azikiwe later came to be recognised as the leading spokesman for national unity, when he first returned from university training in the United States, his outlook was pan-African rather than nationalist, and emphasised the common African struggle against European colonialism. The only significant interruption in economic development arose from natural disasterthe Great Drought of 191314. While each generated considerable political controversy, they moved the country toward greater internal autonomy, with an increasing role for the political parties. Although realistic in its assessment of the situation in Nigeria, the Richards Constitution undoubtedly intensified regionalism as an alternative to political unification. On a subsequent expedition to the Sokoto Caliphate, Scottish explorer Hugh Clapperton learned about the mouth of the Niger River, and where it reached the sea, but after suffering malaria, depression and dysentery, he died before confirming it. (This was also reflective of growing pan-Africanism among American activists of the time.) Menelik II, emperor of Ethiopia, led his army to accomplish this unique feat in March 1896, defeating General Oreste Baratieri's Italian . Lagos became a major slave port in the late 1700s and into the 1850s. The discussion of pragmatic resistance in Africa comes full circle with the former Portuguese colonies, South Africa, and Kenya. The growth of Islam in pre-colonial Igbomina / Adesina Yusuf Raji. 1324 Words6 Pages. The policy of indirect rule used in Northern Nigeria became a model for British colonies elsewhere in Africa. European traders in Nigeria initially made widespread use of the cowrie, which was already valued locally. Battle of Adowa (Ethiopia) 5. History of Islam in Nigeria. Colonial Nigeria was the area of West Africa that became the modern day Nigeria, during the time of British rule in the 19th and 20th centuries. British influence in the region began with the prohibition of slave trade to British subjects in 1807. Oil income was still marginal, but the prospects for continued economic expansion appeared bright and accentuated political rivalries on the eve of independence. In 1944 Macaulay and Nnamdi Azikiwe, an Igbo who had been educated in the United States, united more than 40 different groups to establish the National Council of Nigeria and the Cameroons (NCNC). Published August 7, 2020. Central Africa to 1964. In the Bight of Biafra, the major ports were Old Calabar (Akwa Akpa), Bonny and New Calabar. [36], The company, as was common among European businesses in Africa, paid its native workers in barter. Whereas Lugard had applied lessons learned in the north to the administration of the south, Clifford was prepared to extend to the north practices that had been successful in the south. Asante Resistance (Ghana) 6. Areas with lucrative crops such as cacao and peanuts (groundnuts) profited, while many people in different parts of the country had to migrate to work elsewhere as tenant farmers or use their newly acquired education and skills to work in cities as wage earners, traders, and artisans. A third of the people associated with an 1842 riverine expedition died. Quiz. The proliferation of labour organisations fragmented the movement, and potential leaders lacked the experience and skill to draw workers together. He also led the Nigerian National Democratic Party, which dominated elections in Lagos from its founding in 1922 until the ascendancy of the National Youth Movement in 1938. While initially organised for professional and fraternal reasons, these were centres of educated people who had chances to develop their leadership skills in the organisations, as well as form broad social networks. Chapter 2 argues that following the transformation of the Northern Nigerian region by the Sokoto Jihad in the nineteenth century, Islamic structures provided the crucial structural and ideological frameworks on which the British colonial administrative system was rationalized in the Northern Nigeria Protectorate in the first half of the twentieth century. Herbert Richmond Palmer developed details of this model from 1906 to 1911 as the Governor of Northern Nigeria after Lugard.[66]. Britain also annexed Freetown in Sierra Leone, declaring it a Crown Colony in 1808.[20]. The receding British presence enabled local officials and politicians to gain access to patronage over government jobs, funds for local development, market permits, trade licenses, government contracts, and even scholarships for higher education. The protectorate was organised to control and develop trade coming down the Niger. The NPC was called on to form a government, but the NCNC received six of the ten ministerial posts. This led to protests known as Women's War. Afeadie, Philip Atsu. The Emirs and chiefs who are appointed will rule over the people as of old-time and take such taxes as are approved by the High Commissioner, but they will obey the laws of the Governor and will act in accordance with the advice of the Resident. To be sure, there were widespread resistances against colonial rule, which include the 'Abd al-Qadir led resistance against the French in Algeria, the Asante King (Prempeh I) led revolt against British colonialists in Ghana, the Maji Maji revolt in Tanganyika, the Ndebele rebellions in Rhodasia, the Ijebu Kingdom and the Opobo resistances in . Colonial Lagos was a busy, cosmopolitan port. Discover how the Mandinka Empire, Zimbabwe, Ethiopia, and Nigeria resisted European colonists and the impact each conflict had. Under the Political Department of the Civil Service were Residents and District Officers, responsible for overseeing operations in each region. He was prepared to introduce educational and economic changes to strengthen the north. [23] Regardless, slavery had decimated the population and fuelled militarisation and chaos, thereby paving the way for more aggressive colonisation.[21][24]. By the eighteenth century, evidence of Christianity had disappeared. Earlier elements related to this were its founding of the Sierra Leone Colony in 1787 as a refuge for freed slaves, the independent missionary movement intended to bring Christianity to the Edo Kingdom, and programs of exploration sponsored by learned societies and scientific groups, such as the London-based African Association. Consequently, he may well deserve the epithet of the "father of Nigeria", which historians accorded him. RESISTANCE. Despite these difficulties, the Action Group rapidly built an effective organisation. [58], Some of these public work projects were accomplished with the help of forced labour from native black Africans, referred to as "Political Labour". [61] John Anderson diplomatically suggested: If it is the necessity for formally submitting the drafts that hurts Sir F. Lugard, I should be quite prepared to omit that provision provided that the period of publication of the draft prior to enactment is extended from one month to two. It was not a walk over for the British to conquer Nigeria, some individuals and groups resisted the imposition of colonial rule. We bind ourselves not to have any intercourse with any strangers or foreigners except through the said national African Company (Limited), and we give the said National African Company (Limited) full power to exclude all other strangers and foreigners from their territory at their discretion. Park reached the upper Niger the next year by travelling inland from the Gambia River. He argued that the division into two separate colonies was advisable unless a stronger central government could bind Nigeria into more than just an administrative convenience for the three regions. The company's major imports to the area included gin and low-quality firearms. They took the right to rule over it, to levy taxes, to depose kings and to create kings. 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