Moreover, Dr. Azikiwe whose party entered into a coalition with the NPC after the 1954 election and Chief Awolowo who led the opposition were better qualified for the position than Balewa in terms of academic qualification, international exposure, intellectual sophistication, charisma and, especially in the case of Dr. Azikiwe, a more pan-Nigerian outlook. But why did Sir Robertson anoint Alhaji Balewa as Prime Minister ahead of Dr. Azikiwe and Chief Awolowo? Sir Robertson justified his poor decision with the self-serving argument that he and Balewa would successfully persuade some southern politicians to support Balewa as Prime Minister. There is an intriguing personal angle to it as well. According to Robertson, “We [Balewa and himself] became very close and I appreciated the confidence he placed in me.
There was little we didn't examine, incorporating his concern with the Sadauna of Sokoto and his challenges with boisterous southerners who appeared to take every one of their quarrels and inconveniences to him. We talked about barrier and remote undertakings and I demonstrated to him all the British government papers that came to me about neighboring nations and the patterns in outside issues, despite the fact that they shouldn't be appeared to the Nigerian. I never had the scarcest dread that he would mishandle my certainty and on the grounds that I had the best profound respect for him as a man of the most elevated honesty and a most religious and true muslim." It is clear from the prior that insignificant subjective factors instead of wellness for the employment in light of legitimacy propelled Robertson to pick Balewa as Nigeria's Prime Minister even before the 1959 races. His activity validates Frantz Fanon's theory that colonialists want to hand control over to saps, to the individuals who might rely upon them and who they can control without genuine trouble.
The writer and history specialist, Chinweizu, in his little book, Caliphate Colonialism: The Taproot of the Trouble with Nigeria, insists that aftereffects of the 1953 enumeration and race of 1959 were controlled by the British and NPC to convey energy to the caliphate in October 1, 1960, which implies that the seeds of reporting swelled evaluation figures and appointive misrepresentation were planted by the British and their Nigerian colleagues previously autonomy. The 1953 registration gave the north 55.4% of the populace and 44.6% toward the south.
Presently, given that land mass does not really involve tenability, Nigeria is likely the main nation on the planet where parched and semi-dry territories are authoritatively decreed to be more crowded than thickly populated forested ranges. In the interim, regardless of British-administered gear of the 1959 parliamentary race to support the north, NPC and its partners accumulated 2,027, 194 votes, with an aggregate of 142 seats; the NCNC organization together with the Northern Elements Progressive Union (NEPU) got 3,103,627 votes and 89 seats, while AG and its partners assembled 1,986,839 votes and 73 seats. This implies a coalition by NCNC, AG and their partners would have thumped NPC hands, and on the grounds that NCNC had a more noteworthy number of seats than AG, Azikiwe would have developed Prime Minister. So, for the reasons displayed before, a coalition amongst NCNC and AG won't not have counteracted Alhaji Tafawa Balewa, the "divinely selected individual" by Sir Robertson, from getting to be plainly Prime Minister.
To that must be included the disappointment of southern political pioneers, prominently Dr. Azikiwe and Chief Awolowo, to cooperate reliably, talk with one boisterous voice and present a strong resistance against the maneuvers of British colonialists and their northern associates. Chinweizu claims that "however for the fight amongst Awo and Zik in the 1950's, the caliphate would not have acquired power from the British." Chinweizu is likely right.
Lamentably, the two first Nigerian legislators thought little of the purpose of ultra-preservationist northern decision intrigue drove by Sir Ahmadu Bello to catch power and utilize it to oppress the south. Dr. Azikiwe and Chief Awolowo neglected to subordinate their own desire, interests and differences to the more basic assignment of advancing southern solidarity as a stabilizer to the looming, British-built, northern political mastery of the nation.
Everything considered, Dr. Azikiwe was credulous in his distraction with the possibility of One Nigeria with a solid focal government; he was presumptuous that the Igbo, given their unbeatable limit with regards to the quest for singular accomplishment, will "lead the offspring of Africa from the subjugation of the ages," without considering genuinely the way that for the north Nigeria must be directed as a vanquished an area by northerners. Boss Awolowo on his part feared the likelihood of Igbo political control to the degree that he changed the AG into a solid, profoundly trained political association that regularly beat Dr. Azikiwe's NCNC in western local decisions, in this manner dispensing with the prospects for co-operation between the two gatherings.
Looking at impartially what one may call Britain's change program for Nigeria's autonomy, one is struck by the degree British colonialists were eager to go keeping in mind the end goal to guarantee that northerners drove Nigeria promptly after freedom inspite of the reality we noted before that Dr. Azikiwe and Chief Awolowo had obviously better savvy qualifications and experience of administration in a law based setting than Sir Ahmadu Bello and Alhaji Tafawa Balewa. It is considerably additionally bewildering that Sir Robertson and the Secretary of Colonies in London did not think of it as abnormal and odd that the NPC they drove Nigeria was unwilling to change its parochial name from the Northern People's Congress to one that mirrors a container Nigerian viewpoint.
In a progression of papers entitled British Documents on the End of Empire Projects (BDEEP) distributed by the Institute of Commonwealth Studies, University of London, there are startling insights about how Sir Robertson enlisted a lesser government worker, Harold Smith, to fix the pre-freedom race with the goal that northern lawmakers agreeable to British control would win influence, rule the nation and serve British interests. As indicated by the report, Smith declined to do what Robertson needed, a choice that cost him his employment, profession and notoriety. Strangely, Sir Robertson was not certain about Nigeria's political future after freedom notwithstanding his outlandish control of the framework to enable northerners to secure political power.
In his own words, "The general standpoint of the [northern] individuals is so not the same as those in southern Nigeria as to give them essentially nothing in like manner. There is less distinction between an Englishman and an Italian, both of whom have a civilisation in light of Greek and Roman establishments and on christianity, than between a muslim villager in Sokoto, Kano or Katsina, and an Igbo, Ijaw or a Kalabari. By what means can any sentiment regular reason for nationality be developed between individuals whose culture, religion and method of living is so totally unique?" once more, Robertson's announcement brings to noticeable alleviation the express untruthfulness of Britain's provincial mission in Nigeria, and features the basic issue with the geopolitical architectonic they gave us, to be specific, the snow squall of fair administration.
The delicate and disrupted nature of the Nigerian state adumbrated by Sir Robertson is likewise reflected in the dissonant dreams of Nigeria by driving legislators from various parts of the nation earlier and not long after autonomy. By and large, for northern pioneers Nigeria exists to pastor to the interests of the north, more absolutely, the interests of the decision caliphate theocracy and their associates. For instance, Sir Ahmadu Bello, who was just keen on issues relating toward the south to the degree they had affect on the northern locale, demanded that Nigeria is the domain of Usman Dan Fodio, in which the minorities of the north are willing devices for the caliphate while the south is a vanquished an area that must be commanded and stifled by caliphate colonialists.
In a 1942 meeting of northern boss, the emirs contended that "Holding this nation together is impractical aside from by methods for the religion of the prophet. On the off chance that they [the south] need political solidarity let them take after our religion." The Sultan of Sokoto, while reacting to an appointment in 1944 from the West African Students' Union to request his help for proposed sacred changes, told the understudies that "Those southerners who want a unified Nigeria should first hold onto Islam as their religion."
In the interim, albeit Chief Awolowo was roused generally by tribalistic motivations to frame both the Egbe Omo Oduduwa and AG, his proposed outing to Kano in May 1953 to clarify the southern position on self-lead for the nation showed a bona fide want for an autonomous Nigeria. Dr. Azikiwe was so sharp about Nigeria picking up autonomy on October 1, 1960. In a meeting without further ado before the 1959 race, he emphasized that it didn't make a difference to him whether Chief Awolowo, Sir Ahmadu Bello or Sir Tafawa Balewa rose Prime Minister – inasmuch as Nigeria got her freedom as planned he would be fulfilled.
To be proceeded…
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