map of Nigeria Prior to its official amalgamation into the Colony and Protectorate of Nigeria by the military forces of the
British Empire in 1914, the territory of Nigeria was a loose collection of autonomous states, villages, and ethnic communities. Many of these established themselves as pillars of art, trade, and politics in
West Africa as late as the 19th century; four of these cultural entities, the
Hausa-Fulani, the
Igbo (sometimes spelled
Ibo), the
Yoruba and the
Efik grew extremely prominent in the region before the arrival of
foreigners, dictated British colonial policies, and dominate national politics in Nigeria to this day. The modern
Hausa and
Fulani societies in northern Nigeria are the cultural successors of the
Sokoto Caliphate, a theocratic state founded by Muslim reformer empire-maker
Uthman dan Fodio in 1817.
Geographically isolated in the north, the Caliphate was governed by
Islamic laws as prescribed by dan Fodio's
Kitab al-Farq and maintained greater links commercially and culturally to North Africa and the Arab states than to West Africa and the Atlantic. By contrast, the
Yoruba, the
Igbo and the
Efik in the south had regularly experienced contact with Europeans since at least the 16th century. A minority of southerners converted to Christianity even prior to the establishment of permanent British control, but the majority followed traditional indigenous religions, worshipping myriad deities with vast domains spanning both cosmic and terrestrial spheres. Coastal Nigerians established thriving trade both regionally and abroad, fashioning the coast into a hub for products like
palm oil, a good sought after by rapidly industrialising Europe, while also serving as key source for the
slave trade prior to its international banning (the region came to be known as the
Slave Coast as a result). The Niger Delta region, which is roughly synonymous with the
Niger Delta province in location and the contemporary heart of the petroleum industry, is and was a zone of dense cultural diversity and is currently inhabited by roughly forty ethnic groups speaking an estimated 250 dialects. Some of the more relevant ethnic groups in the western part of the Niger Delta region include the
Ijaw,
Itsekiri, and
Ogoni. The Ijaw (sometimes spelled
Ijo), the fourth most populous tribe in Nigeria and by far the largest in the Delta region, lived during late medieval times in small fishing villages within the inlets of the delta; however by the 16th century, as the slave trade grew in importance, Ijaw port cities like
Bonny and
Brass developed into major trading states which served as major exporters of fish and other goods regionally. Other states such as those of
Itsekiri domain of
Warri sprang up at this time as well. The eastern Niger Delta region has the
Efik people (
Annang /
Efik /
Ibibio who are all related with a common language and ancestors who were all referred to as
Efik or
Calabar people in early Nigerian history). Their capital city of
Calabar, located at the coastal
southeast of Nigeria (eastern Niger Delta) served as the major trading and shipping center during the pre-colonial and colonial period. Calabar also served as the first capital of Nigeria and the point of entry of Western religion and Western education into southeastern Nigeria. The combined population of the
Ibibio,
Annang, and
Efik people is the fourth largest language group in Nigeria.
Colonial legacy (1800s–1960s) Even before the combination of British control over all of present-day Nigeria's borders in 1914 from the protectorates of
Southern and
Northern Nigeria, British forces had begun imposing drastic political and economic policies on the Nigerian people which would lead to important consequences in the future. Originally this was done primarily through the government-owned
Royal Niger Company. The company was crucial in securing most of Nigeria's major ports and monopolised coastal trade; this resulted in the severing of the ties which had linked the area to the flourishing West African regional trade network, in favour of the exportation of cheap
natural resources and
cash crops to industrialising nations. Most of the population eventually abandoned food production for such market-dependent crops (peanuts and cotton in the north, palm oil in the east, and cocoa in the west). Recent evidence has suggested a tax battle waged by American oil companies contributed to the regional and ethnic tensions that would lead to the outbreak of war. It was also during this period that, again thanks to the Americans, the opacity and concomitant corruption of Nigerian oil began to crystallise. However, evidence from leaked US State Department documents have proven that Britain, through
Shell-Mex & BP, The United States declared neutrality, with US Secretary of State
Dean Rusk stating that "America is not in a position to take action as Nigeria is an area under British influence". Despite oil's prominent role in national affairs, up to this time, the Nigerian federal government had only limited involvement in the
oil industry, and the government confined its financial involvement in the oil industry to taxes and
royalties on the oil companies. The companies were subsequently able to set their own price on the petroleum they extracted, and dominated petroleum to such a point that laws governing the oil sector were having a negative effect on Nigerian interests. However, even during the conflict with Biafra would force changes to the relationship between federal government and the petroleum industry. Gowon's military government instituted the 1969 Petroleum Decree which dismantled the existing revenue allocation system that had divided revenue from oil taxes equally between federal and state government, instead favouring an allocation formula in which the federal government controlled the dispensation of revenues to the states. After the loss of over 2,000,000 lives, the war concluded in 1970 and resulted in a victory for the Nigerian state, as the withdrawing regions were subsequently brought back into the Nigerian fold. Following the NNOC's genesis, the Nigerian government continued to garner control over oil revenues. In 1972 it declared that all property not currently owned by a foreign entity was legally the property of the government, which gained jurisdiction over the sale and allocation of concessions to foreign investors. The military regime oversaw the implementation of a number of other important milestones related to oil: 1974: Participation in oil industry by government increases to 55%. 1975: Decree 6 increases federal government share in oil sector to 80%, with only 20% going to the states. 1976: First exploration and development venture by NNOC undertaken and drills to uncover commercial quantities of petroleum offshore. 1978: Perhaps most importantly, the federal government created the
Land Use Act which vested control over state lands in military governors appointed by the federal military regime, and eventually led to Section 40(3) of the 1979 constitution which declared all minerals, oil, natural gas, and natural resources found within the bounds of Nigeria to be legal property of the Nigerian federal government. The remaining 1.5% was earmarked as a special fund to new develop oil-producing areas, but during the Shagari regime the corruption in Nigerian governance reached its zenith and
capital flight out of Nigeria peaked, while people in the oil-producing areas continued to receive little or none of the oil profits. Additionally, 1980 saw oil-generated revenues attain an all-time high of US$24.9 billion but Nigeria still managed an international debt of $9 billion. Shagari's NPN government was viewed by the majority of Nigerians as incorrigibly corrupt by the time the national elections of 1983 came about. Shagari and his subordinates steadily transformed Nigeria into a
police state where Nigerian military and police forces were permitted to utilise force quite liberally in order to control the civilian population. Such repressive measures were employed to ensure victory in the forthcoming elections, and this outcome was achieved largely through the bankrupting of the federal government's treasury. Another disturbing trend had also been gaining steam in Nigeria since the early 1970s: a steep drop in
agricultural production correlating roughly with the rise in federal revenues from petroleum extraction. Whereas previously Nigeria had been the world's lead exporter of
cocoa, production of this
cash crop dropped by 43%, while productivity in other important income generators like rubber (29%),
groundnuts (64%), and cotton (65%) plummeted as well between 1972 and 1983. ==Operating agreements==