Judicial Intervention in Selected Colonial Boundary Disputes in South West Nigeria: Surveying the Provenance and Effects of Procedural Errors

Abstract

Boundary disputes form an integral part of regular disputes commonly found across the world. There is no doubt that such disputes have occurred in both pre-colonial and colonial Nigerian societies, and more generally in both agrarian and nomadic economies around the African continent where land has been central to culture, political and family survival. Arguably, when these conflicts took place in pre-colonial polities of South-West Nigeria, they were settled. However, when the British colonial administration attempted to adjudicate in this kind of disagreement, they committed a number of procedural errors. This essay examines selected cases adjudicated by the colonial administrators who doubled as judicial officers during the colonial period with specific focus on these procedural issues. In some cases protocols were respected; but there were also cases where the procedures were relaxed in the interest of British colonial economy. It is argued here that where the procedures were followed, there was a fair resolution; whereas when procedures were relaxed, issues still remain unresolved very many years after.