“Court Adjourned”: a Colonial Service literary interlude

Extract

From the very beginning immersion and competence in law and administration were looked on as the sine qua non of the District Officer's work. To all intents and purposes, these twin responsibilities could be regarded as his badge of office. In Northern Nigeria a common Hausa word for the DO was for many years Joji, a corrupted form of “Judge”. When I arrived in Muri Division in 1950,1 was introduced to the emir as Karamin Joji, the “small” or “junior” judge. In East Africa the DC was known as Bwana Shauri, the one responsible for affairs and court cases. Instruction in law (but not, I would emphasise, in administration) was a major feature of the Colonial Service training courses at Oxford, Cambridge and later London.