₦airaland Forum

This is somewhat ironic, considering what's happening in Jos and Benue.

@ Kobojunkie, Chyz's question was perfectly valid, I think he just missed that you were being sarcastic/satirical in that post of yours that he quoted.

[quote author=Chyz* link=topic=606188.msg7742992#msg7742992 date=1297881425]Can you give me a verse out of the quran, where these ingrates say permits the stoning of those who change their religion from Islam?[/quote]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apostasy_in_Islam

Apostasy in Islam (Arabic: ارتداد, irtidād  or ridda‎) is commonly defined in Islam as the rejection in word or deed of their former religion (apostasy) by a person who was previously a follower of Islam. While the Qur'an states that apostates will be punished by God, Islamic scholarship differs on the earthly punishment for apostasy, ranging from death to no punishment at all. Some say the reason for the harsh penalty for apostates is an attempt to silence ex-Muslims who may speak out against Islam.[1]

The medieval Sunni schools of Islamic jurisprudence were unanimous in holding that apostasy by a male Muslim is punishable by death, differing only on whether to execute the apostate immediately or grant the apostate an opportunity to repent and thus avoid penalty. They also differed on the punishment of a female apostate: death or imprisonment until repentance.[2] Abu-Hanifa and his followers like the jurist Sarakhsi refused death penalty for women[3] supporting jail for them till re-embracing islam. The four major Sunni schools of Islamic jurisprudence (Madh'hab) differentiate between harmful apostasy and harmless apostasy (also known as major and minor apostasy) in accepting repentance.[4]

According to Wael Hallaq apostasy laws are not derived from the Qur'an,[5] and Quran Alone Muslims do not support the apostasy penalty; many of them openly condemn depending on verses from Quran which advocate free will.[6] In addition to Quran Alone Muslims, scholars who oppose any penalty for apostasy include, Gamal Al-Banna,[7][8] Taha Jabir Alalwani,[9] and Shabir Ally.[10] Others who believe that the death penalty can only be applied in certain cases or when apostasy is coupled with attempts to "harm" Muslim society or that the punishment is not death penalty include,[11][12][13] Ahmad Shafaat,[14] Jamal Badawi,[4] Yusuf Estes,[15] Javed Ahmad Ghamidi,[16] and Maliki jurist Abu al-Walid al-Baji.

On the other hand, Zakir Naik stated that if a former Muslim speaks against Islam then that is considered as treason and punishable by death.[17][18][19] Contemporary Muslim scholars such as Bilal Philips,and Yusuf al-Qaradawi also advocate the death penalty for apostates.[20][21] Sheik Muhammad Al-Munajid, the owner and writer for the popular islam-qa.com site advocates the death penalty, in his rationale stating that this "may encourage others to forsake the truth".[22]

Some prominent recent examples of writers and activists killed because of apostasy claims include Mahmoud Mohammed Taha,[23] Faraj Foda,[24] Rashad Khalifa, Ghorban Tourani, Necati Aydin, Uğur Yüksel, and the Egyptian Nobel prize winner Najib Mahfouz has been injured in an attempted assassination.[25]

It's not from the Quran, but it's de facto Islamic policy apparently.

bokohalal:
today we bear british names cs they colonise us and we also speak their language.ds british dnt speak our language and dey dnt bear our names.
Senegaleese speak french and dey do bear french names.
portugueese colonise brazil.brazil bears their name and can speak portugueese.
If the benin as many of u are sayn truly colonise d yorubas,hw come they do bear yoruba names and most of them speaks yoruba.y is tht a yoruba dnt bear their names and they dnt speak benin?

The above question absolutely shows that you are not a student of history, kaka! While not saying that the Edo/bini conquered the Yorubas or vice versa,suffice it is to say that there are many examples in history where the conquerors took on the culture of the conquered. The Romans and the Greeks is a very common example. Even here at home, the settled Fulanis who humbled the Hausa states have taken the totality of the vanquished way of life,language and all.
The English language has more foreign words,even African, than anglo saxon,not necessarily due to conquests by others but by proximity,trade,foreign travel/adventure, diplomacy and cultural trends.
And for your information, the Edo/binis  DO NOT speak Yoruba unless those that have come in contact with Yorubas or live amongst them. Just as Yorubas in Edoland speak the native language. And as for the Yoruba names, those that worship Osun, Orunmilla,Ogun and other Yoruba gods are most likely to bear Yoruba names.Interestingly, there is no Bini Olokun worshipper that bears Yoruba names. Which goes to show that Olokun is an indigenous God that influenced some Yorubas.

The Osun of Benin is very different from the Osun of Yoruba religion. The Osun of the Yorubas is a river/sea goddess and a goddess of fertility.

The Osun of Benin was a specific magic and medical cult and the deity was a male god associated with birds that was worshiped by herbalists.


Ogun is the same for Benin and Yorubas, and probably derives from the introduction of Yoruba orunmila/ifa divination to Benin in the 17th century (according to Paula Ben-Amos in The art of power, the power of art : studies in Benin iconography).

Do they have any proof that he's an apostate?

Remember how some stories were claiming that he was from the North before? This sounds somewhat like that claim.

Odunharry:
today we bear british names cs they colonise us and we also speak their language.ds british dnt speak our language and dey dnt bear our names.
Senegaleese speak french and dey do bear french names.
portugueese colonise brazil.brazil bears their name and can speak portugueese.
If the benin as many of u are sayn truly colonise d yorubas,hw come they do bear yoruba names and most of them speaks yoruba.y is tht a yoruba dnt bear their names and they dnt speak benin?

Not that I'm an advocate of this "Edo colonized Yorubaland" thing, but I should point out that no group that was ever under Benin influence came to speak Bini. Yet we know that at some point some groups were under Benin. I also think that this idea of formal colonization, like that which occurred in modern times, is completely the wrong word in the context of this discussion, so places where one group paid tribute to or acknowledged one other group's influence or representatives doesn't necessitate that the language be taught or spread there.


As for names, what are these Yoruba names and what is the Yoruba that they speak in Benin? Just asking.

https://pmnewsnigeria.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/01/Bola-Ahmed-Tinubu.jpg



Look at that face.


A face only a mother could love.


I think it's clear that ACN isn't getting any votes in Bayelsa come election time.

RichyBlacK:
[size=18pt]Benin chief, 4 juju priests arrested for human trafficking[/size]
Cover Stories Sep 7, 2009
By Simon Ebegbulem

BENIN—THE National Agency for the Prohibition of Traffic in Persons (NAPTIP), Benin zone, has arrested a Benin Chief, and four juju priests over alleged involvement in human trafficking.

The agency also alleged administering of oath to some girls who are trafficked abroad for prostitution.
According to the Benin zonal Head of NAPTIP, Barrister (Mrs) Olufunke Abiola, who spoke to Vanguard on the arrest of the Chief and the juju priests, the arrest of the Benin Chief of Benin Kingdom, is sequel to a petition by one Mrs Juliet Osifo who claimed that the chief sponsored her daughter,  to Italy, enroute Libya but was trapped in Libya after she was arrested by the Libyan authorities.

She expressed worries over what she described as the incessant denials of the “fact that young girls of Benin decent are still in human trafficking and taken away for prostitution.

“Now as you would see, there is a very big case on hand that would prove to every body that no one is exempted, whether Benin, Urhobo, Itsekiri or Yoruba, every body is involved in this and it must stop.

“The young girls are ignorant. Like I said, sometimes, we find it difficult to prove a case against these traffickers because the girl will not want to expose her trafficker and apart from that, they are put under oath.

“So, this zone has been very very busy looking for all the juju priests that put some of the girls under oath. Some of them are even in our cell.

“We asked them to go and renounce that oath of the life of that girl so that the girl can feel free to be a human being because the oath ties them down spiritually.”

The Chief,  who spoke to Vanguard, admitted that his daughter in Italy requested he should bring the lady to Italy to assist her in her beer parlour, but that she was, however, stuck in Libya.  “So what we are doing now is to see how we can bring her back to Nigeria so that she can stay with her parents,”he said.

Meanwhile, over 500 indigenes of Edo state who have been languishing in Libyan jails arrived Benin weekend, just as they appealed to both the state and federal governments to assist their colleagues who are still left in the Arab country to come back home to avert further deaths of the Nigerians.

What's the actual name of his chieftancy title? Or was he trying to remain anonymous?

"Benin Chief of Benin kingdom" is certainly not a legitimate chief. Not doubting the story, just surprised that he could somehow remain anonymous after being arrested but that they would disclose that he was a chief.

fstranger3:
How do we know he is Igbo?

His grandfather was Igbo.

"Edward Wilmot Blyden’s story is remarkable. He was born on August 3, 1832, in the Virgin Islands in the West Indies, a descendant of Ibo slaves from Nigeria. He was an extremely gifted student, and at age of eighteen, attempted to enroll at a theological college in the United States. Upon realising that their potential student was a black man, the college in North America out rightly rejected him. According to reports, at this time, slavery was still lawful in the USA and his brazen attempt to try to fight the ‘system’ subjected him to many frightening experiences. A few months after his attempt to enroll was rejected, one white man named Reverend Holden, who recognised the high intellect in Blyden, assisted Blyden to emigrate to Liberia. Blyden thus boarded a ship with the intention of building a new life for himself in Africa. This young man remained in Liberia for more than thirty years, rising gradually to the highest levels of Liberian society. During his Liberian career, Blyden was a Presbyterian minister, a newspaper editor, a professor of classics, President of Liberia College, Ambassador to Great Britain, Minister of the Interior, and Secretary of State. In 1885, he was an unsuccessful candidate for the Presidency. It is reported that he lost the Liberian Presidential Elections by just a handful of votes. Fearing for his safety in light of his immense popularity which competed with the winner of the Presidential Elections, Blyden fled to Sierra Leone. He was already well known in Sierra Leone, where he had earlier spent two years (1871-73) as Government Agent to the Interior, leading two official expeditions — one to Falaba and another to Futa Jallon. Thus, it was easy for Blyden to become based permanently in Freetown. Blyden was in many ways a greater intellectual force in Sierra Leone than in Liberia.

However, in Liberia, Sierra Leone and the United States, Edward Wilmot Blyden was not without controversy. Infact, in some ways, the name Edward Blyden is synonymous with controversy. A brave and outspoken man who lived well before his time, Blyden did not allow the status quo to sway him from saying exactly what was on his mind. He was gifted with amazing oratoral skills which he would readily use to publicly make his points. Blyden believed that posterity would reward those who spoke with their conscience even if what was said was against powerful forces. Therefore, he traveled far and wide giving lectures and undertaking controversial actions. Naturally, for such a controversial figure who preached ideas that were way ahead of his time, he inspired mixed feelings in many. Some people hated him with a passion whilst others granted him near-messiah status. He had a deep conviction that men had a responsibility to future generations of the human race to always say and do what their conscience dictated as highlighted in the following words from him during a lecture he delivered to a jam packed church in Washington DC on one of several trips he made back to the USA from Africa:

"There is a talent entrusted to you. It is your duty to call into action the highest forms of your being. It does not matter what your calling may be - whether it be what men call menial or what the world calls honorable - whether it be to speak in the halls of Congress or to sweep out those halls - whether it be to wait upon others or to be waited on— it is the manner of using your faculties that will determine the result- that will determine your true influence in this world and your status in the world to come. Every one should do his part to advance humanity. Each should exert himself to be a helper in progress. Whatever your condition, you do occupy some room in the world; what are you doing to make return for the room you occupy? There are so many of our people who fail to realize their responsibility, who fail to hear the inspiring call of the past and the prophetic call of the future."

Here in Sierra Leone, Blyden stirred controversy and lively debate in the Krio community by opposing the indiscriminate emulation of European culture. He told the Krios that they were "de-Africanised," scolded them for holding themselves aloof from the people in the provinces, and advised them to remember always that "you are Africans." After the 1887 publication of his masterpiece, Christianity, Islam, and the Negro Race, some Krios under Blyden’s captivating influence began to adopt African names and even to emulate traditional African dress. Although earlier pictures of him (two are shown accompanying this feature) sport him with European outfits, in his latter days, he wore only African outfits. Blyden looked forward to the rise of an independent West African nation and he urged the British to allow Africans more autonomy in political and church matters, and argued against the imposition of European culture. As early as 1872, Blyden called for an independent West African University to be run solely by Africans, teaching African languages, cultures, and values. Blyden, though a Christian himself, viewed Muslims as more authentically African, and he urged the British authorities to involve Muslim Africans in their colonial enterprise. Blyden taught himself to speak Arabic, and maintained close relations for many years with the Muslim community in Freetown. In his later years, he was Director of Mohammedan Education in Sierra Leone. When Edward Wilmot Blyden died on February 7, 1912, his funeral was attended by many hundreds of people from throughout the Freetown community, including both Muslims, who bore the coffin, and his fellow Christians. In a further reflection of how the respect Blyden commanded cut across race and colour, his monument sitting in front of the Freetown City Council was erected by his European white friends whilst the marble stoned monument at his graveside was erected by his Muslim friends. Edward Wilmot Blyden is dead but as the Internet Search Engines reveal, thousands and thousands of later generations of black intellectuals, in Africa, America, Europe and beyond continue to look up to Edward Blyden for inspiration."


http://news.sl/drwebsite/exec/view.cgi?archive=3&num=148

excanny:
I included Igbos having wars with the other groups. I guess you missed that.

Didn't miss it at all. There's no record of a war between Igbos and Itsekiri, Igbos and Urhobo, Igbos and Isoko, etc. so the overwhelming majority of your post was just wrong. If you want to say there were conflicts between Edos and Igbos in the past, that's a possibility. However rather than breaking it down to address every group, I just pointed out the most wrong aspect - the grouping of Urhobo, Itsekiri, and Benin like that as groups that warred with each other in the past.

 

I gave the 2 options that he's either Urhobo or Isoko. I also did mention that I could bet from my gut feelings that 'Okoro' is of Igbo origin. And I gave my reasons for feeling so. I need to really research that though.

Yeah, I was just saying which of the two he was. Gut feelings are just gut feelings. There is absolutely no evidence that the word itself is of only Igbo origin. All we know is that Igbos use the word in personal names (first, last, middle) more and there may be cultural or historical reasons for that.

I think I was a bit mistaken here. I thought he was arguing against the Igbo point of view.

I don't think you read the article. It's just about different southern Nigerian groups naturally sharing words and the word not being spread by the Benin empire's influence as claimed by one Bini "overclaimer", but existing among many groups naturally.

Bizarre

[quote author=tpiah! link=topic=603183.msg7736779#msg7736779 date=1297802507]there's an okoro county in uganda, same way there's a king called oyo there.

lighten up people.[/quote]I'm not surprised, actually. Okoro is such a basic, simple sounding word. Wouldn't be surprised if it was in some non-African languages (maybe some Asian languages).

ezeagu:
But do you believe that "Edo colonized Yorubaland"?

Oyo is not included in any supposed "colonization" of Yorubaland, and it was the largest part of Yorubaland.

I could post specific quotes from Biobaku's Sources of Yoruba History which go into detail about the apparent Edo influence and origin of many of the smaller non-Oyo, non-Ife, Yoruba city-states, but it would be a lot of typing. I might post a few parts, but I don't really share the OP's zeal for this "Edo colonized Yorubaland" idea.


As for Edo colonizing Yorubaland, I doubt it because the use of "colonization" implies a kind of relationship which I don't think Benin actually had with most of the groups or city-states whose institutions they influenced or originated. It was more loose than that, I think.

My view with regard to the Edos and Yorubaland is that the acknowledgment of the religious supremacy of Ife is what kept Oyo and Benin from really clashing all those years, but the Alaafin of Oyo was certainly not the vassal of the Oni of Ife and the Oba of Benin was certainly not the vassal of the Oni of Ife. In the same manner, neither the Oni of Ife nor the Alaafin of Oyo were the vassals of the Oba of Benin, so how can one say Edo colonized Yorubaland when it never subjugated or attempted to subjugate the two most important states of Yorubaland?


In 1863, Benin did seem to clearly feel that at one time long ago they had bequeathed "civilization" on the Yorubas, but of course that view got suppressed and overridden by the Johnson-Talbot-Egharevba construction of the Yoruba-Edo relationship. Whichever version of origins is true, I think "colonization" is not what happened between either group upon the other.

ezeagu:
The Ashanti held slaves up until the wars, does that take away from their contributions to African society?

Yeah, it actually does. No doubt that's why they're apologizing to AAs today.

I don't think everything they had should have been burnt to shreds though.

Truth.

A prominent Igbo of Sierra Leone:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Wilmot_Blyden_III


There are probably lots of other Sierra Leone Igbos without any name indicating that they are Igbo.

excanny: @ Physics

You are right when you say that 'Okoro' as a name is not exclusive to Igbos. You of all people should know that the Igbos, Binis, Urhobos, Isokos, Itshekiris used to have trades and wars among themselves before the advent of the British, hence the shared word. That however does not mean that a shared word has no original source.

For example, Essence(the nigerian singer) bears Okoro as her family name, yet she's Itshekiri by tribe.

The article you posted as to the origin of the name 'okoro' is a debate for  another day. But with the versatility that name is used in Igbo, I can bet it's of Igbo origin(okonkwo, okoronkwo, okoroafor, okafor, etc). No other groups using this name have different forms of the same name like this.

Additionally, the author Peter Ekeh is an Urhobo(maybe Isoko) man who was trying to be one-sided towards disclaiming an Igbo origin to the name. I'm sure if you ask him, he wouldn't even know that his own last name is still of Igbo origin.

1. The Binis, Urhobos, and Itsekiris did not have wars. Yes there was trade and intermarriage.

2. Peter Ekeh is Urhobo, not Isoko, and he was not at all one-sided toward disclaiming an Igbo origin for the names. In fact he actually posted the article because of a somewhat obnoxious Bini historian who claimed that all of Southern Nigeria got the word Okoro from the Binis, because Benin happened to have ruled all or parts of every group which happens to have the name. He was actually countering a Bini "overclaimer" and expressing his own knowledge of the word within his own culture, which he is familiar with. He is not an Igbo man, nor an Igbo scholar so there is no way he could go in depth about the significance and usage in all contexts and ramifications of Okoro to the Igbos.

In reality, you are biased towards asserting an exclusively Igbo origin to the word despite evidence to the contrary. He even stressed the similarity between the Urhobo and Igbo sense of the word:
"However, the similarities in these groups' uses of Okoro far
outweigh these tonal differences." P. Ekeh

3. Peter Ekeh is well aware that different groups in Urhoboland have different origin stories,  some of which include Igbo origins, so don't assume what he does or doesn't know about his own name.

http://books.google.com/books?id=fFdeYB1lIPwC&printsec=frontcover&dq=ekeh+origin+of+urhobo&source=bl&ots=L4WzLf0ZQN&sig=3MdC5yhTyjDB50KnFATUsCddz5M&hl=en&ei=lNdaTan7FIeEtgf1lIzwCw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CBMQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=igbo&f=false

Your arguments are really flawed. Every shared word has an original source if you trace it well.

Ojo(definitely Yoruba origin)

Obasi(Ibibio origin)

Olorogun(likely of Yoruba origin from the way it's constructed. Many Yoruba words look like that. E.g olorioko, olowo,olomo, etc)

I'm sorry but this is horrible reasoning. Every shared word does indeed have an original source but your identification of the original source with whichever group you are familiar with that more often uses that word for first or last names is downright ridiculous. The word Smith is used by British and Schmidt by Germans, and if through history or culture (for example, a greater number/percentage of blacksmiths and other smiths in one society than the other, leading to one group adopting it as a name much more frequently) it ends up being more prevalent for one group as a first name or last name, you will now claim that that group originated it?

In reality English (Smith) and German (Schmidt) are both Germanic languages.

In the same way, Igbo, Urhobo, Itsekiri, Esan, Yoruba, Bini etc. are all Eastern Kwa or "Volta-Niger" languages and the presence of cognates and false cognates between these languages is nothing unique or extraordinary and can't just be written off every time by assertions of war and trade or intermarriage.

For the record, ojo appears to be the word for a certain plant in Igbo:

http://books.google.com/books?id=A68qyOyhOdkC&pg=PA555&lpg=PA555&dq=ojo+igbo&source=bl&ots=BOSJiCVBtU&sig=O0QNWjaHEtjGIm_AfOWU8U9CsBg&hl=en&ei=49haTd_QDIq5tgeRzITXCw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=10&ved=0CFsQ6AEwCQ#v=onepage&q=ojo%20igbo&f=false

(Not that Africans name themselves after plants , just showing that the sound itself is not exclusive to Yoruba. If ojo had come to mean something different in Igbo, or Igbo culture had been different (adopting plants as names, like "Rose" which some English speakers have as a name), ojo might be prevalent as an Igbo name.)

ezeagu: I think it's nonsense to discredit him for his works and contributions to African independence because he served as a medical officer in the British Army. It is just as much as it would be nonsense for someone to discredit all that Malcom X had done because of his past as a gangster. James Beale was one of the first to speak up against White superiority and the thinking that everything African was inferior. He was one of the men who set up the foundations of what would become the independence movements in Africa. I don't need to lionize him, the man is a legend.

How is it nonsense? He had the opportunity to turn down serving as an officer to an army that was invading an independent African kingdom but he went twice to assist them. Kumasi was burned the second time. Kumasi and the Ashanti in general were an example of something that challenged ideas of black barbarity, and when the British entered Kumasi they were impressed by the palace. Then they burned the capital. Today all we have are photos of a few houses and a few reconstructed buildings. And then today they tell us that Africans were not capable of architecture - only huts.

As for setting up foundations of what would become the independence movements in Africa, I can't recall a single independence leader or movement that traced its inspiration to him. For example J.E. Casely Hayford, Edward Wilmot Blyden, and  I.T.A. Wallace-Johnson, tower over him in influencing independence movements.

As for being a legend, he's actually quite obscure in comparison with other black nationalists.

I just see a contradiction in assisting those who would occupy, burn and pillage an independent African kingdom and then going on the way he did. Let's just agree to disagree.

seanet02:
i have always said the man is a YORUBA man, but people like ezeuche, physicsmhd and afam4eva called me names in the cultural section, the labelled me a liar.

When? When did I even discuss this with you?


Lay off the weed.

[quote author=Me_Aboki link=topic=603323.msg7735243#msg7735243 date=1297783546]I would have responded to earlier posts of rebuttals by PysicsHD et al but it seems Jenifa's penultimate post would for now suffice the need for any further response [/quote]If you can defend her assertion, do so. Her penultimate post was an evasion, as far as I'm concerned.

[quote author=Jenifa_ link=topic=603323.msg7732762#msg7732762 date=1297749923]i'm disappointed in you I must say.

anyways, I didn't make up my statement about northern nigeria being more organized. This was the british rationale as evident in historical documents. You can find them online. and you yourself just described a very clear system of organization in your post.
If you want to argue against my comments, do so constructively
please argue reasonably rather than resorting to personal attacks please and thank you.

historical documents will also tell you that northern nigeria wasn't receiving as much imperial funds as southern nigeria. even the colonialists in the north were living under worse conditions than the southern nigerian government. They cited the presence of minerals and natural resources in the south for the unequal resource distribution.
it had always been that way.

When I learn something new, I thank the poster for the info and acknowledge my ignorance. I don't understand why some people will rather resort to insults rather than ask a simple question. ex. ask me where i got my info from and argue against it with your own sources and argument. etc[/quote]1. There wasn't a single insult or personal attack in my post and I'm somewhat puzzled and disappointed by this response. Asking you if you're actually a Latvian is not an insult. My agreement with fstranger was to the effect that you were not a Nigerian. It is not only this thread which made me reach that conclusion, but I was silent until now.
2. I indeed described a system of organization in my post. I never said the North was not organized. However, I was not the one who alleged that the North had a "relatively organized structure" relative to the Yorubas. If you don't know anything about the organizational systems of the Yorubas, just admit it and don't resort to accusing me of resorting to insults. I did ask a simple question. I asked you how the North was relatively more organized than the Yorubas given the system that I outlined. If you can't answer it, read Saburi Biobaku's Sources of Yoruba History, which has a chapter discussing Yoruba organizational systems, and then get back to me and we can have a reasonable discussion about whether your original assertion was correct.
3. Historical documents will tell you that Northern Nigeria was not producing as much imperial money as Southern Nigeria and that was the reason for the 1914 amalgamation of the Northern and Southern protectorates, so that the Southern protectorate could carry the North financially and greater investment in the development of the North could occur. By 1966, a disproportionately high number of the military and political institutions of the country were located in the North (see Nwankwo's and Ifejika's book on Biafra for evidence, I don't have the book with me and can't be bothered to get it just for this discussion), many of which had been built before the 1960 independence of Nigeria.
4. Please provide some evidence that "even the colonialists in the north were living under worse conditions than the southern nigerian government." I find this claim extraordinary and would like to know its source.


Do you have any idea what a Native Authority was in colonial Nigeria? Do you think they were not in Yorubaland?

[quote author=eku_bear link=topic=603323.msg7732706#msg7732706 date=1297747305]

Reference for this?[/quote]"This was one of the last major slave societies, with high percentages of enslaved population long after the Atlantic slave trade had been cut off. Heinrich Barth, a German scholar who spent several years in northern Nigeria in the 1850s, estimated the percentage of slaves in Kano to be at least 50%, most of whom lived in slave villages.[11]"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kano#cite_ref-lovejoy_10-0

The actual source is:

Lovejoy, Paul (1983). Transformations in Slavery: A History of Slavery in Africa. Cambridge UK: Cambridge University Press. p. 195. ISBN 0521243696.

https://comps.fotosearch.com/bigcomps/IST/IST527/2326022.jpg

Ivory box, Benin, Nigeria, 16th-17th century

https://comps.fotosearch.com/bigcomps/IST/IST527/2326014.jpg

Brass figure of a hornblower or trumpeter at the Benin court, Nigeria, probably 17th century

https://comps.fotosearch.com/bigcomps/IST/IST527/2326019.jpg

An ivory carving of a horse and rider, Benin, Nigeria, 18th century

https://comps.fotosearch.com/bigcomps/IST/IST527/2330064.jpg

Brass plaque which decorated the palace of the Benin Obas, Benin City, Nigeria

https://comps.fotosearch.com/bigcomps/IST/IST527/2326024.jpg

Plaque depicting a messenger, Benin, Nigeria, probably 17th century

https://comps.fotosearch.com/bigcomps/IST/IST527/2326016.jpg

Ornamental brass hip-mask, Benin, Nigeria

https://comps.fotosearch.com/bigcomps/IST/IST527/2326012.jpg

Terracotta head of a man, Benin, Nigeria, 17th century