Nigeria's "Marginal Men"

Abstract

T HE British colonial territory of Nigeria is undergoing rapid change today.2 There is a continued influx from the countryside into the urban areas; towns are springing up and cities are expanding. The means of communication, though limited, are being improved steadily, and the approach to independence has stimulated political activity to the point where it dominates the life of the country. This state of flux has had an immense influence on the people, especially in the cities where the urban masses and their leaders have come into a larger measure of control within the framework of British final authority.3 It shows itself in increased activity among political parties; in the firmly resisting attitudes of strking students at the Nation's only University College at Ibadan; in the recurring labor troubles; in a novel and daring pronouncement of a positive change for the better in the status of women by a regional premier; in the conflict over reorganization of the Eastern Regional educational structure to provide for the first time free primary education, and in the reglious conflict between Protestant and Catholic over this program; in the fight among traditional leaders over accession to traditional offices; the need for appointment of various inquiry and investigating commissions to examine all sorts of questions minorities' fears of discrimination, creation of more states, election redistricting, political corruption, political accusations and threats of party repression, and so on. All this helps to reveal in part that Nigeria is beginning to enter a phase of her history that will pick up in tempo as time passes, she experiences the impact of more and more ideas from the outside, and reaches out to find a new system to fit her to her new and expectant role as an autonomous member in the comity of nations.