Decolonizing Nigeria, 1945–1960: Politics, Power, and Personalities by Toyin Falola and Bola Dauda (review)

This volume, by the distinguished scholars Toyin Falola and Bola Dauda, endeavors to explain "the melodrama of the 'arranged marriage' of 248 ethnic groups that make up today's Nigeria" (p. 2). In recounting this story, Decolonizing Nigeria, 1945–1960: Politics, Power, and Personalitiesfocuses "on a great number of small events rather than a small number of great events" (p. 4). The authors use an abundance of primary and secondary source materials. The result is a comprehensive study, which achieves the authors' intention "to synthesize academic scholarship" and "popular history" (p. 21) in a book that experts and general readers alike will find enjoyable and highly informative.

During the nineteenth century, the United Kingdom gradually extended its influence over parts of West Africa. At the Berlin Conference of 1884–1885, the European imperialist powers recognized British dominance of the region that would become Nigeria. Climatic conditions made it infeasible for Nigeria to become a settlement colony. Accordingly, the British resorted to indirect rule, permitting native administration ultimately subject to British authority. This approach succeeded more in Nigeria's north, where established regional leaders enjoyed widespread followings, than in the west and east, where British authorities had to appoint warrant chiefs, whose leadership was respected by few beyond the British themselves.

While numerous ethnic groups lived in this area, three predominated: the Hausa in the north, the Igbo in the east, and the Yoruba in the west. The Hausa had converted to Islam, while Christianity and Western ideas had generally established roots in the other regions. Thus, from the beginning, Nigeria lacked a shared identity and cultural unity.

Nonetheless, Nigeria's independence as a nation-state came about because of powerful dynamics generated by the Second World War. Britain was reduced to near-ruin by that epic clash, and the struggle itself, fought against Nazi despotism, illuminated with incontestable clarity British oversight of a vast empire of oppressed peoples in Africa and elsewhere. "The Second World War," Falola and Dauda note, "set the stage for social and cultural changes" (p. 52), including challenging new perspectives about imperialism and racism, and long-held assumptions about the supposedly inherent superiority of Western civilization.

To some degree, such thoughts had gained currency before the war. Notwithstanding Winston Churchill's blustering claim in 1942 that he had not become prime minister to preside over the dissolution of the British Empire, his government's Colonial Office had already begun developing a secret plan for decolonization. In 1945, the Labour Party, with its "consistent anticolonialist ideology" (p. 35), took control of the British government, undoubtedly hastening the empire's dissolution. In Nigeria, "where anti-colonial activities were not widespread" (p. 38) before the war, nationalist groups increasingly found their voices during that conflict.

Obviously, nationalism in Nigeria could not be predicated on ethnic cohesion. Instead, Nigerians who called for independence did so in the hope that statehood would bring opportunities for improving "basic human rights" (p. 478) and increasing "economic development and education" (p. 49), all resulting in broadly shared prosperity and progress.

The British officials who supervised Nigeria's fifteen-year-long independence effort had two principal motivations: they sought to ensure that Nigeria would remain a single political entity, and they wanted to preserve and protect British interests as much as possible. The process was not an easy one. Yielding authority in stages, the British drafted several constitutions for Nigeria during the years before independence.

Under the prevailing circumstances, federalism, with a national parliament and considerable regional autonomy, was the only conceivable governance structure for an independent Nigeria. While other British colonial possessions, such as the United States and India, had benefited from having a single accepted top leader in their independence movements, Nigeria did not have that advantage. Instead, a trio of major regional leaders emerged: Sir Ahmadu Bello in the north, Chief Obafemi Awolowo in the west, and Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe in the east. As could...