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From Wealthy Entrepreneurs to Petty Traders: the decline of African Middlemen in Eastern Nigeria, 1900–1950*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 January 2009

Anthony I. Nwabughuogu
Anthony I. Nwabughuogu
Affiliation:
University of Calabar
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Extract

This paper traces the process of the decline of African middlemen in Eastern Nigeria from wealthy entrepreneurs of the late nineteenth century to petty traders after 1930. Four phases are identified in their decline. During the first phase, 1900–5, the middlemen lost only the political control of their trading areas but benefited commercially. The establishment of colonial rule expanded their market. And with the reluctance of expatriate firms to move into the interior, the continued ignorance of the natives of the actual prices of their produce and of imported goods, and the encouragement from the colonial administrators, African middlemen prospered.

These advantages were lost during the second phase, 1905–16. As the firms began to move inland from 1905, they traded with the natives and fostered a new group of smaller and dependent middlemen. The middlemen's market began to contract and their wealth declined. Their fortunes worsened during the third phase, 1916–30. With the opening of the Eastern Railway to traffic in 1916 and the increased construction of roads during this period, the firms intensified their penetration of the interior, swallowing up what remained of the middlemen's market. The introduction of produce inspection in Eastern Nigeria in 1928 added more hardships for the middlemen, putting many out of business. And by 1930 the trust system, upon which most middlemen depended after 1916 for raising their trading capital, collapsed, leaving most of them impoverished.

Thus, after 1930 African middlemen were no more than petty traders, trading with little capital and making marginal profit. They became incapable of challenging the expatriate firms in the import–export trade as their predecessors had done in the nineteenth century. The firms employed various trade malpractices to ensure that the African traders retained this status until the 1940s.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Journal of African History , Volume 23 , Issue 3 , July 1982 , pp. 365 - 379
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1982

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References

1 Arhin, Kwame, West African Traders in Ghana in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries. (London and New York, 1979), 9–11.Google Scholar

2 Gertzel, Cherry, ‘Relations between African and European traders in the Niger Delta 1880–1896’. J. Afr. Hist. III, ii (1962), 362–5.Google Scholar

3 For the development of this idea see Flint, John, ‘Britain and the Partition of West Africa’, in Flint, John and Williams, Glynder (eds.), Perspectives of Empire: Essays presented to Gerald S. Graham (London, 1973), 93–111.Google Scholar For a detailed study of this policy in Southern Nigeria see Ofonagoro, Walter I., Trade and Imperialism in Southern Nigeria 1881–1929 (New York, London & Lagos, 1979).Google Scholar

4 Gertzel, , ‘Relations between African and European traders in the Niger Delta’, 361.Google Scholar

5 See for instance, Mockler-Ferryman, A. F., British Nigeria (London, 1902), 100.Google Scholar

6 For instance, in his report on the Cross River Trade in 1905 C. A. Birtwistle claimed that the middlemen were paying for palm produce at ‘extremely low rates…viz.: about £6 per ton in the Middle River, and £4 to £5 in the upper reaches’. See Great Britain, Public Records Office, Colonial Office Papers (hereafter cited as CO) 520/31, C. A. Birtwistle's Confidential Report on Cross River Trade dated 24 May 1905, enclosure in Egerton to Lyttelton dated 6 June 1905.

7 Ekejuba, Felicia, ‘Omu Okwei: the merchant queen of Ossomari: a biographical sketch’, J. Hist. Soc. Nigeria III, iv (1967), 633–46.Google Scholar Cf. Harris, Rosemary, ‘The history of trade at Ikom, Eastern Nigeria’, Africa, XLII (1972), 122–39CrossRefGoogle Scholar, where the career of Okim Ofufu was similarly highlighted.

8 See, for instance, Hopkins, A. G., An Economic History of West Africa (London, 1973), 204, 206Google Scholar; Mars, J., ‘Extra-Territorial Enterprise’, in Perham, Margery (ed), Mining Commerce and Finance in Nigeria (London, 1948), 76–87Google Scholar; Hodder, B. W and Ukwu, U.I., Markets in West Africa (Ibadan, 1969)Google Scholar; Afigbo, A. E., ‘Trade and Politics in the Cross River 1895–1905’, Trans. Hist. Soc. Ghana, XIII, i (1972), 24–49.Google Scholar Not even in their recently published works, West African Traders in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries and Trade and Imperialism in Southern Nigeria 1881–1929, have Kwame Arhin and Walter Ofonagoro respectively treated the process of the decline of African middlemen in the twentieth century.

9 One of these was the Okonko Society, which was persistently accused of closing the road and extorting tolls from traders. Cf. Ofonagoro, Trade and Imperialism in Southern Nigeria, chap. 1.

10 CO 520/15, Moor to Colonial Office, dated 25 Sept. 1902.

11 CO 520/31 cited in Egerton to Lyttelton dated 6 June 1905.

12 Southern Nigeria, Annual Report, 1907 (Lagos: Government Printer, 1909), 45–6.Google Scholar

13 Southern Nigeria, Annual Report, 1908 (Lagos, Government Printer, 1910), 69.Google Scholar

14 Southern Nigeria, Annual Reports, 1910 (Lagos: Government Printer, 1912), 382.Google Scholar

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16 National Archives, Enugu (hereafter cited as NAE), Confidential File 1680/105 CSE 1/6/20. See Chief Cookey Gam, Frederick Jaja and others to Divisional Commissioner Bonny dated 23 March 1905.

17 CO 520/31. Confidential Report on the Cross River Trade by C. A. Birtwistle (C.I.O.) dated 23 May 1905. Encl. in Egerton to Lyttelton dated 6 June 1905. In accepting this report, Egerton recommended to the Colonial Office the withdrawal of the restriction imposed on the establishment of European factories between Calabar and Itu.

18 NAE 509/1910 (Confidential), CSE 1/19/30, Egerton to Harcourt dated 19 Oct. 1911, enclosed memo by Frosbery dated 27 April 1911.

19 NAE, Degema District Papers (hereafter cited as Degdist) 7/7/1, Captain Wauton's Papers, n.d. p. 20. Although no date was affixed to ‘Captain Wauton's Papers’ they were probably written between 1916 and 1924. Wauton's record of service shows that he served as Assistant District Officer and District Officer in Brass and Opobo at various times between these two dates. See Nigeria Civil Service List, 1929. Moreover, his Notes dwelt at length on the effect of the abolition of the ‘House Rule Ordinance’ on the social and economic life of the Brass and Nembe. The Ordinance was abolished in 1915.

20 Walker, Gilbert, Traffic and Transport in Nigeria (London, 1959), 63–4.Google Scholar

21 NAE, CSE 12/1/332, Annual Report, Owerri Province 1931 by Mr O. W. Firth, p. 21.

22 Hodder, and Ukwu, , Markets in West Africa, 142–5Google Scholar; cf. Arhin, , West African Traders, 74–6.Google Scholar

23 By 1924 trunk roads had already connected Opobo and Aba, Aba and Itu through Ikot Ekpene, Calabar and Ikang, Oron and Uyo, Oron and Opobo. See National Archives Ibadan (hereafter cited as NAI), Chief Secretary's Office, Lagos Office Papers (hereafter cited as CSO) 26/1, File 09488 pp. 27–33. Trunk roads also had connected Aba and Onitsha through Owerri and Oguta and also Port Harcourt and Owerri. An attempt was also being made to connect Umuahia and Onitsha while the Okigwe–Agwu road was nearing completion. See also NAI, CSO 26/2 File 11930, vol. 2, p. 43.

24 NAE, Degdist 7/7/1, Captain Wanton's Papers, pp. 20 and 40.

25 NAE, CER/77. Report of Committee Upon the System of Produce Inspection in Nigeria, Lagos: Government Printer, 1931.Google Scholar

26 The system made it compulsory for all produce intended for export to be exposed for examination and grading at one of the stations determined by the Director of Agriculture in conjunction with an advisory committee, and if found not to be of the desired standard, it had to be cleaned. It also provided for the exporting firms to pay a token sum of money (is. a ton of palm oil and 9d. a ton of palm kernel) to sustain the system: Ibid. 5–6. But as usual with expatriate firms whose only aim was the maximization of their profit, they passed the burden of payment to the middlemen and to the producers: Ibid. Besides, the operation of the system was inefficient and corrupt. In Owerri Province one examiner was sentenced to ‘six months imprisonment I.H.L.’ for ‘corruptly receiving money under cover of his employment’ from the middlemen: NAE, OW 481/30/1, Degdist 1/3/3 Handing-over notes Degema Division, Webber to Poter 24 Sept, 1931, p. 21. In Ogoja Province, ‘the people detailed to carry out the inspection…had not any knowledge of the produce they had to deal with, this led to considerable friction with both traders and merchants’: NAE, OG 266/1928, Ogoja Provincial Papers (hereafter cited as Ogprof) 1/15/11, Ogoja Division Annual Report, 1928, p. 26. These were frustrating experiences for the middlemen.

27 Ogoja Division Annual Reports 1928, p. 25.

28 NAE, OW481/30/1, Degdist 1/3/3 Handing-over notes Degema Division, H. Webber D.O. to J. C. Porter D. O. Dated 24 September 1931, pp. 4 and 24.

29 By 1930, most European firms were reported to have either stopped giving ‘trust’ altogether or were giving small sums of money to a few trusted traders. See NAE, EP2546 – CSE 12/1/529. Replies from Senior Residents for Calabar and Owerri Provinces to Secretary, Southern Provinces dated 19 Nov. 1930 and 26 Jan. 1931, to the Secretary, Southern Provinces inquiries regarding the operation of the ‘trust system’. There are indications, however, that the system lingered on in some areas, notably Oguta, Opobo, Calabar, Nwaniba and Ibagwa, until 1937 but on a very small scale. Even then, it worked against the middlemen who when ‘given say, 4 cases of sugar valued at £5, sell them in native markets at below their credit value…in order to get cash with which to purchase oil’. See Bridges, , ‘Report on Oil Palm Survey, Ibibio, Cross River and Ibo Areas', 1938’, appendix viii, p. 3.Google Scholar

30 The Dawn, Calabar, 18 Oct. 1930. See extracts in NAE, CSE 12/1/529, Position of European Trading firms and African Middlemen in Regard to trade with Aboriginal Natives, pp. 1–3.

31 NAE, CSE 12/1/529. Position of European Trading Firms and African Middle-men… See memo by E. J. G. Kelley, District Officer (D.O.) Aba to Senior Resident Owerri, dated 17 Jan. 1931. CF NAE, OW 481/30/1, Degdist 1/3/3, Handing-over notes Degema Division 1930–34, pp. 215–18, for a list of 33 outstanding cases in the Magistrates courts of Degema Division. All were cases involving the European firms as plaintiff and African middlemen as defendants. The defendants were all charged with failure to pay the ‘balance of cost of goods delivered’ to them.

32 Mars, J., ‘Extra-Territorial Enterprises’, 119–20Google Scholar: ‘The result of the penetration of European firms into retail buying and selling in the bush is the squeezing out of existence of the old generation of African traders…Most Africans disappeared because they were unprepared for the post-war slump of 1921 and 1922 when exports dropped to one-half of their 1920 value. They eliminated themselves by their business methods. They held large stocks of imported goods and exhausted their credit. When the slump came and the prices of their goods fell heavily, they could hardly manage to pay their debts, and most of them, in fact, remain debtors to the Europeans who consequently took over their businesses.’

33 NAE, CSE 1/85/895, Owerri Province Annual Report, 1916, p. 32.Google Scholar

34 NAI, CSO 26/2 File 11929 vol. 6, Calabar Province Annual Report, 1928, p. 69.Google Scholar

35 NAE, Nigeria Legislative Council Debates 1934.Google Scholar Lagos: Government Printer, 1935. See contribution by the Hon. C. C. Adeniyi-Jones, 12 June 1934, p. 50.

36 See for instance NAE iii/vol. iv, Abadist 1/26/103 Produce Prices. Memo by D.O. Aba to Resident Owerri dated August 1941.

37 NAE, CSE 1/85/8170 Petitions. See Resident Calabar Province to Secretary Eastern Provinces Enugu, dated 5 July 1939.

38 Ibid.

39 See NAE CSE 1/85/8170. Petition by Chief S. U. Asama, seventeen chiefs and about 450 produce traders of Uyo, Uruan and Itam (Itu areas) to Governor of Nigeria dated 27 March 1939. The Secretary, Eastern Provinces considered the accusations against the firms strong enough for him to order the Resident, Calabar to bring the petitioners' complaints to the notice of the Calabar Chamber of Commerce'. See Ibid. Secretary, Eastern Provinces to Chief Secretary to the Government, Lagos, dated 18 July 1939.

40 For details of the development of the bicycle transport industry and its role in the produce trade in the 1930s and 1940s, see Nwabughuogu, Anthony I., ‘Political Change, Social Response and Economic Development: The Dynamics of Change in Eastern Nigeria 1930–1950’. Ph.D. Thesis, Dalhousie University, Halifax, Canada, 1981.Google Scholar

41 NAE EP 18038/40 vol. 1 – 1/85/8587. Restrictions on the sale of Tyres and Tubes. L. T. Chubb to Director of Supplies Lagos dated 14 April 1945. He was referring specifically to the period ‘before the war’. The dominance of the cyclist middleman was said to have spread to other parts of Eastern Nigeria. On the other hand, the bicycle ‘made it easier for the producer to get factory prices and be independent of the middleman if he wishes’. See Bridges, , ‘Report on Oil Palm Survey’, appendix vii, p. 3.Google Scholar

42 NAE EP 10776 – CSE 1/85/5318. Bicycles on Palm Oil Traffic: Taxation on. See memo by Waddington, D.O. on special duty to Resident, Calabar Province, dated 16 Jan. 1934. This may have been an exaggeration in view of the fact that Waddington's aim was to convince the Resident of the need to tax cyclist traders. Besides, his computation appears spurious. He assumed that a cyclist trader would trade continuously for ‘300’ days in a year making a daily gain of is. 6d.

43 NAE, CSE 1/85/8170. See petition by A. E. Anyameluna and other produce traders at Ifiayong and Nwaniba Uyo Division to the Senior Resident, Calabar through the D.O., Uyo dated 31 Aug. 1938.

44 Ibid. D.O. Uyo to petitioners dated 6 Dec. 1938 quoting the Resident.

45 NAE, 969, Abadist 1/26/506, Palm Survey Ibo Areas. See D.O. Aba to Resident Owerri Province, Port Harcourt dated 29 Dec. 1938.

46 Ibid. See Resident, Owerri to Secretary, Southern Provinces, Enugu dated 14 November 1938.

47 NAE, Abadist 1/26/907. Palm Produce Production. See memo by Resident Owerri Province to D.O. Aba dated 29 May 1943.

48 Ibid. See McCall to Resident Owerri Province and all D.O.s Owerri dated 8 July 1943, pp. 39–43, 87–92.

49 Ibid. See Deputy Controller of Palm Produce to D.O. Aba dated 11 February 1944.