Chapter 2
Terms of
Reference
The tribunal was charged with the following terms or
reference:-
“To inquire into the atrocities and other inhuman
acts committed against persons of Eastern Nigeria origin in Northern Nigeria
and other parts of the Federal Republic of Nigeria during the month of May,
1966 and thereafter;
and in particular to:-
(i)
collect and compile evidence relating to the atrocities;
(ii)
ascertain the extent of loss of life and personal injuries;
(iii)
examine, interprete, and record medical cases brought to the notice of
the tribunal;
(iv)
ascertain the extent of loss of property and assess the value.”
The leading counsel to the tribunal in his opening
address made the point that the terms of reference were wide enough to admit
every relevant evidence relating to the planning and organisation of the pogrom
even prior to May, 1966. He therefore led evidence relating to the preceding
period in so far as it revealed the background to the atrocities which reached
their high points in May, July, September and October 1966. We accepted this
approach.
To us the planning and organisation of the pogrom
constituted the worst aspect of the atrocities. The evidence disclosed that
what happened was not the spontaneous outburst of riotous mobs acting under any
sudden provocation. The pogrom was the result of much planning and
organisation. As the main drama was enacted in Northern Nigeria, it will make
for a clearer understanding to have a sketchy historical background of the socio-political
complex that is Northern Nigeria.
Chapter 3
Historical
Background of Northern Nigeria
For a century before the advent of British
administration in Nigeria, the Fulani provided the ruling class of most
Northern Nigeria. The notable exception is the Bornu Emirate to the north/east
which is inhabited by the Kanuri. What we now know as the provinces of Sokoto,
Gwandu, Katsina, Kano, Zaria, Bauchi, Adamawa, Plateau and Niger fell under
varying degrees to the influence of the Fulani aristocracy. Northern Nigeria
was by no means a void nor was it without history. We do not propose to delve
into ancient history. This is hardly a useful exercise here. Suffice it to say
that British expansion met established Hausa states at varying levels of
development and prosperity. There were in all at this stage 14 Hausa states
which comprised, Daura, Kano, Zaria, Gobir, Katsina, Rono and Biram (the Hausa
Bakwai or legitimate 7 states); Zamfara, Kebbi, Nupe, Gwari, Gauri, Ilorin (Yoruba)
and Kwararafa (the banza Bakwai or upstart seven which developed to the south
and west of the original group). Each state had its own traditions and legends
of origin and at varying degrees had embraced or come under the influence of
Islam. It has been said that it would be strictly incorrect to refer to these
Hausa states as if they belonged to the same ethnic group. They were people who
spoke the Hausa language and adopted the Hausa mode of dress and life
generally.
When the 19th Century opened, the Fulani appeared to
be the predominant race in the Sudan. Fulani is the Hausa name for the people
who call themselves Fulbe. They themselves made a distinction between the Cattle Fulani and the Town Fulani; the latter included the
aristocratic families such as the Torobe.
The origin of these people is less than clear. What is more certain, however,
is that by the 16th century, there was a steady movement of those Fulani people
from the region now known as Senegal towards the East through Messina and the
Hausa states toward Chad and Adamawa and beyond.
From the rank of the Fulani the great religious
leaders of the 18th and 19th centuries came in the Sudan to launch a series of
religious movements which, as often happened in Islam, passed into political
wars. We are here concerned with the religious movement that affected Northern
Nigeria.
Usman Dan Fodio who was subsequently known as Shehu
or Sheikh was born a Fulani in the Hausa state of Gobir about 1750. He was
brought up with his brother Abdullahi as a strict Muslim and after studying for
some years in Agades he felt the call to dedicate his life to teaching the
faith. On his return from Agades, Dan Fodio acted as tutor to the Sarkin
Gobir’s two sons in Alkaluwa. One of these was Yunfa who was later to succeed
to the throne. In the interval before his accession Dan Fodio felt obliged to
withdraw from Alkaluwa giving his reason the reversion to pagan practices by
the court and hostility shown toward the Muslim faith. When Yunfa finally
became King, he sought out his old tutor and encouraged him to resume his
itinerant preaching. Dan Fodio soon fell out with the new king and in 1804 was
driven to flight. A party rallied to him, defeated the king, and proclaimed Dan
Fodio, (now their leader) Sarkin Musulmi, Commander of the Faithful, a title
which is still held by his successor, the Sultan of Sokoto. A general movement
broke out all over the area which later became Northern Nigeria.
The line of cleavage did not run clear between the
Fulanis and the Hausas but the Fulani who provided the energy and ambition to
the apparent religious cause. Everywhere followers of the Shehu, appointed or
self-appointed, received flags from his hands. They called upon the faithful to
drive out the old Hausa or as they were called the Habe dynasties and then set
themselves up in turn as rulers subject to Sokoto which had become the seat of
the Fulani authority in 1810. Not only was this change accomplished in the old
Hausa kingdoms but in the impetus of the movement, Fulani leaders pushed the
boundaries of Islam south, incorporating in varying degrees many pagan tribes.
As indicated earlier, the movement for religious
revival degenerated into a political war of conquest. Consequently, the son of
the Shehu, Bello, who succeeded him became more interested in the military and
political results of the religious revival than in spreading the faith.
The record of Fulani success had some important
exceptions. The ancient Kanuri kingdom of Bornu with its capital near Lake Chad
and itself Moslem, threw back the Fulani invaders. The holy man of Bornu,
El-Kanemi, taunted Shehu Usman Dan Fodio with having turned a war of religion
into one of conquest and with attacking his co-religionists. El-Kanemi frankly
admitted that some of his chiefs had relapsed into heathenism, that the Alkalis or Moslem judges sometimes took
bribes and that women went unveiled; but he argued that this was not sufficient
excuse for war. This opposition from Bornu, as we shall see when we come to
consider the pattern and the spread of the atrocities in the 1966 pogrom, seems
to rear its head once again in 1966. Bello in his defence of his father’s
action justified it mainly on the ground of proselytism. Said he:
And the second reason for
our jihad was that they were heathens, the people of Hausa. A further reason
for the war was that we sought to aid truth against falsehood and to strengthen
Islam. For to make war on the heathen from the beginning, if one has the power
is declared a duty. So also is it a duty to make war on those heathen who have
converted to Islam and later have reverted to heathenism, if one has the power.
In truth we stated at the beginning of this book that the Hausa chiefs, their
people and their mallams were evil doers.
At the beginning of the present century, the British
administration emerged in Northern Nigeria. They based their title on conquest.
Sir Fredrick Lugard, the first British Governor of Northern Nigeria asserted in
one of his early reports as follows:- “The Fulani hold their suzerainty by
right of conquest. I can myself see no injustice in the transfer of the
suzerainty thus acquired to the British by the same right of conquest.”
The Fulani castle seemed to have accepted their
masters without much resistance. The explanation of this, it is said, was due
in part to the insecurity of the Fulani position in relation to their subjects
who had shown little loyalty to the Fulani during the period of their
confrontation with the British.
The British, by force of arms, broke the Fulani
accsendancy in the North, but by a twist of irony, restored that supremacy
under the system of indirect rule. Once the suzerainty of the British was accepted
by the Fulani, the British were content to allow and even to support and
consolidate the authority of the Fulani Emirs in their various Emirates. The
Fulani Emir was left as the head of the native administration, the head of the
native judiciary, the religious head, and practically the head of everything in
his emirate. Offices in the native administration, in the native administration
police, in the native judiciary, were filled by appointees of the emirs. These
appointees were invariably the relations of the Emir or his courtiers. Moslem
religion permeated every aspect of life in the Emirates. The society became a
‘closed shop’. Strangers especially non-Moslems, had no place in the society.
It is generally accepted that in 1966 there were
over 2 million Easterners in Northern Nigeria. Their presence in the North was
all connected with the amalgamation of Northern and Southern Nigeria in 1914 by
the British. Unfortunately, although they were there in such large numbers and
for so long and filled a very important position in the economic and political
development of northern Nigeria, they were never fully integrated into the
mainstream of life in society. They became what sociologists call a privileged
pariah class – ‘privileged’ because participating in and benefiting from the
modernising sectors of the economy to which the Northern moslems had been
induced to turn their back. Their standard of living was higher than the normal
run of life of most Northerners. They were ‘pariah’ because they were kept
outside the rank system of society. Because of the attitude of the Northern
Moslems to modern education, the administrators of the day were compelled to
employ these Easterners though they disliked having them. It cut across the
policy of the day of separating the North from the South. ‘Divide and rule’ is
a cliché which has grown odious by being frequently used for all situations
whether appropriate or not; but it really enshrined an important gem of British
colonial policy. The North and South were amalgamated in 1914 ostensibly under
one government yet the ‘writ’ of the Legislative Council in Lagos did not run
into Northern Nigeria. The British colonial administrator reserved the right to
legislate alone for the North until the Richard’s Constitution of 1946.
Easterners and in fact other non-Northerners were restricted in most of the
towns to strangers quarters called Sabon Gari. In these circumstances
the Easterners and Northerners grew up as separate communities. Dissimilarities
were accentuated and old prejudices hardened. Since 1950 attempts, especially
by Southerners, were made to bridge the gap but such attempts were regarded by
the Northern aristocracy as an imposition from the South and were smashed.
The emergence of political parties in Nigeria did
not improve matters in the North either. As far as the North was concerned it
did not succeed in breaking down the old barriers. The dominant political party
in the North (the Northern People’s Congress) started off as a party of native
administration functionaries and appointees of the Emirs and never really went
beyond that. It is our view that the foundation of Nigeria contained the seeds
of her own destruction.
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