Was It Only Yesterday? The Last Generation of Nigeria's "Turawa"

Abstract

Trevor Clark, ed. Was It Only Yesterday? The Last Generation of Nigeria's Turawa. Bristol: British Empire Commonwealth Museum Press, 2002. xi + 352 pp. Photographs. Maps. Appendixes. Bibliography. 5 £25:00. Cloth. 5 £15:00. Paper. This is a remarkable book. Yet it may discomfit many Americans, for it makes clear why the boy scout approach to imperialism may in the end be more successful than the bluntly commercial variety. Indeed it is possible that the subtleties of Indirect Rule, as demonstrated so brilliantly in Turawa (White Men) may yet gain appreciative consideration in Washington as options are pondered in these increasingly difficult days of post-Saddam occupation in Iraq. Aside from compiling a masterly portrait from an enormous variety of highly individual, brightly colored creations the Turawa canvas, Trevor Clark has edited a book with several strengths. First, from his selection of topics and arrangement of contributions, the reader gains a panoramic yet detailed feel for the country of the north, a land of astonishing variety, great power, and appeal. I was particularly captivated by descriptions of the well-forested and watered Cameroonian border territories: their wild, remote, mountainous terrain and their fiercely independent animist peoples, many of whom have managed to hold out over the centuries against the sword of Islam and dominance of the Fulani. To the consternation of the correct, these same peoples voted against independence in the U.N.-monitored 9 199 59 plebiscite. Turawa's second major contribution is the picture it conveys of the north-south politics of colonial Nigeria, and more specifically, of Ahmadu Bello, the Sardauna of Sokoto, leader of the north's approximately 30 million people during the turbulent, politically intense 1950s and early '60s, who figures in nearly every section. What comes through is the extent to which Bello was a fiery autocrat of almost lethal force, with the result that successive governors had to handle all administrative matters-which perforce were almost always highly political-very carefully. Supported by most of the Muslim north and many fiercely loyal British officials, the Sardauna wanted nothing to do with the south, with democracy, or with Nigerian independence. To the Sardauna, opposition party leaders were enemies of the state. One British DO who spoke up for the opposition leader Joseph Tarka so enraged the Sardauna that he demanded his execution. Yet it was along the democratic path that Whitehall had decreed Nigeria must go, and quickly. How then to keep the Sardauna, supreme leader of the vast and numerically dominant north, on board? Comments made by many contributors offer compelling insights into the persistent efforts requiredingenious initiatives at which the British, under pressure, excelled. The concluding observations in chapter 30 add still another dimension. Rather surprisingly, the immediate public response of many northerners to the assassination of the Sardauna in the January 1966 coup was not one of shock and sadness, but rather indifference, even suppressed elation, as though a great weight had been lifted (312). Yet at a deeper level, other more powerful and dangerous feelings connected to regional pride and outrage at perceived religious sacrilege had been ignited. We are all-too-aware of the horrific results that came about when these burst forth. …