Anti-Colonial Uprisings in Yoruba Land and the Challenges of Constitutionalism

Abstract

The unfriendly economic and taxation policies of the British government and other tax-related considerations were significantly responsible for the Africans defiance of British colonialism in south-western Nigeria. Using both primary and secondary source materials, this article examined how the Native Court pursued the interests of the colonial authority, both as tribunals of justice and the executive arm of government, and thus, contributed to the expansion of British influence in colonial south-western Nigeria. It found that the British colonial authority adopted ordinances and legislations to safeguard its political and economic interests through the instrumentality of the Native Authority.