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Item THE DEVELOPMENT OF BRITISH ADMINISTRATION IN EKITILAND, 1915 - 1951(1995-07) ADELOYE, T. S.The thesis focuses attention on the development of British Administration in Ekitiland from 1915-1951, It discusses the British occupation of Ekiti- land and analyses the efforts made by the British to consolidate their administration through the creation of a centralised political authority. It examines the administrative structures evolved and observes that the Ekiti Oba were generally used as Instruments of British Administration, It is shown that under the new political dispensation, the Oba virtually became ciphers in the hands of British Administrative Officers. It is argued that some of the responsibilities assigned to the Oba eroded their traditional power, authority, status and prestige. The thesis also examines the efforts made at creating a central Administration in Ekitiland between 1920 and 1936, The attendant problems of this political experiment are discussed. In particular, the political agitations for secession, autonomy and other political reforms by some communities such as Ado-Ekiti, Akure, Igbara-Odo, Ilawe, Osi etc between 1938 and 1946 are discussed, It argues that these agitations not only threatened political Integration in Ekitiland but also contributed largely to the failure of central Administration put in place by the Colonial Government. The re-organisation efforts made by the British to re-invigorate their tottery administration in Ekitiland between 1946 and 1951 are analysed. The new political dispensation, which was a shift from a rigid centralisation of political authority that was unpalatable to Ekiti Oba to that of loose centralised Administration which allowed them (the Oba) to retain their sovereignty, succeeded to a large extent up to 1951. The economic dimension of British Administration in Ekitiland during the study period is also examined. While contending that British Administration was largely exploitative and resulted in a monumental disruption of the pre-colonial economic structure of the Ekiti society, it identifies certain sectors where the British Administration achieved some measure of development. The study concludes that though the British Administration tried to consolidate itself in Ekitiland, their initial objective of rigid political centralisation that would have brought Ekiti Kingdoms under one central authority was not realised. Furthermore, it observes that British Administration was a mixed blessing to the people of Ekltiland. The Ekiti accepted some of the changes considered beneficial to their society while rejecting those they considered detrimental to their well-being. The thesis has complemented the existing studies on British Administration in Nigeria in general and has also revealed the abysmal failure of British attempt to create a Central Administration in a society which was hitherto apparently segmentary.Item CHRISTIAN MISSIONS AND THE MARINE OF NIGERIA 1841 - 1891(1958-07) ADE-AJAYI, J. F.It is the contribution of various missionary societies in shifting the frontier of European influences from the coast where it had remained after three centuries of European trade connections into the interior of Nigeria in the half century before the establishment of British rule in the country that is the subject of this thesis. For, in their anxiety to deepen and widen Christian European influences in the country, the missionaries were laying the social and economic foundations of Nigeria, particularly Southern Nigeria. Struck by the high rate of European mortality in West Africa, and haunted by the memory that Christianity had once been introduced into West Africa and had been wiped out, the missionaries were anxious to leave a permanent mark on the country that the eventual withdrawal of European missionaries, whether sudden or gradual, could not efface. They wished to raise a large indigenous clergy, they wished to introduce not only the Bible but also the art to read and the art to make the Bible, in short, something of the technological civilisation of contemporary Europe. Central to this programme was the creation of a Middle Class of mission-educated Africans. The emigrants returning from Sierra Leone, Cuba and Brazil provided the nucleus of such a class with them, the missionaries embarked on a programme of practical education in trades and industry. They tried to gather the emigrants together in particular centres round the Mission House, in little mission villages to which Individual converts from the old town, physically or spiritually, attached themselves. This new society it was hoped would grow and replace the antiquated ways of the old town. Things did not always work out as the missionaries planned. Their resources were inadequate. They were dependent on traders whose objectives were different from theirs. The society of the old town did not crumble as readily as was expected. The missionaries saw the power of the African rulers on the coast passing to the consul and the traders, not to the educated Africans whom the traders and some of the missionaries on the spot as well regarded as rivals. Nevertheless, a class of Africa was rising, as clergymen in the church, agents of European firms or independent merchants on their own. The most notable of them was Crowther who was made a Bishop and who used an all- African staff to establish churches on the Niger. But just as such Africans, were beginning to be given responsibility and, among other things, were proceeding to make the Church less of an alien community in society, the new wave of European interest in the country made European change their attitude to Africans, and the old policy of advancing educated Africans was overturned, Even Bishop Crowther was ousted from his post and with his resignation in 1891, this period of missionary work came to an end.Item POLITICAL HISTORY OF THE PALWO 1400-1911(1973) ADEFUYE, A. I.The Palwo are a branch of the Lwo who settled on the northern part of Bunyoro-Kitara kingdom. Their history is essentially that of rivalry between two ethnic groups, the Lwo and the Bantu, vying for supremacy in the empire of Bunyoro-Kitara, Originating from the Sudan, the Lwo settled in the hitherto exclusively Bantu inhabited empire, overthrew the ruling dynasty, and set up a new one. While intermarrying with the majority Bantu population, the Lwo kings ensured that only sons born to them by their Lwo wives (full-blooded Lwo) succeeded them. It was an attempt by the Lwo to make the throne their exclusive preserve. When one of the Lwo kings found himself compelled by circumstances to bypass convention and chose one of his children born by a Bantu woman to succeed him, the Lwo protested. They attempted to undermine the authority of this Bantu king who had no other alternative than to wage a war to 'crush the rebellion'. Henceforth children bom by Bantu women ascended the throne. The period of the rule of the Lwo appeared to have ended. While taking refuge from the war which crushed their rebellion, a good number of the Lwo left Bunyoro-Kitara and established their hegemony in the neighbouring areas. But some of them later came back and with the coming of more Lwo from the Sudan and Northern Uganda, the Lwo population in Bunyoro-Kitara a century after their rebellion was back to nearly what it was before the war. But the memory of their clash with the Bantu king was not forgotten by the Lwo. To them, it was humiliating to be deprived of a throne which for centuries had been occupied by their own people. Taking the Northern extreme of present day Bunyoro district as their base, the Lwo directed their activities for the following two centuries towards regaining their lost privileged position in Bunyoro-Kitara empire. However, in spite of their success in undermining the authority of some Bantu kings and launching series of military attacks on them, in spite of their economic boom caused by the activities of foreign traders, and which the Lwo attempted to turn into military advantage, they never succeeded in winning back the throne of Bunyoro-Kitara. Kabalega, a Bantu king, permanently converted them into an insignificant minority in the empire.Item A HISTORY OF WESTERN EDUCATION AMONG THE KIKUYU, 1898-1952(1978-01) ADEBOLA, A. S.The response of most Kikuyu to Western education was initially negative. This was due In part to the nature of their Indigenous system of education which was intimately related to their political, social and economic set-up, and partly due to their reaction against the initial impact of colonialism on their society. This attitude was abandoned largely as a re stilt of the First World War when colonial demands became intensified and many people were forced to leave their homes to work as carriers. Their experience of meeting others, in camps and during journeys, from societies so such different from their own, suddenly opened up a new world of experience that the indigenous educational precepts could not fully explain or cater for. Their hope after the war that the missionaries would assist then to obtain an education which would enable then to play roles other than serving the white settlers as labourers did not materialise, neither was the government anxious to take over responsibility for African education from the mission societies. This in turn forced the Kikuyu to look for alternative means of securing a type of education which would not be preoccupied with either vocational training or proselytization. The ‘independent’ schools which became widespread in Kikuyu from the 1920s; the 'Githunguri Scheme’; the willingness of the people during the Second World War to devote a substantial amount of money they got through the war to education; the dispute between the AIM and their Kikuyu adherents in Muranga district which led to the establishment of yet another independent educational body; and the rejection of the Beecher Commission on African Education, which in turn led to the closure of all the schools that would not accept its recommendations; were all part of the efforts of the Kikuyu to make their education relevant to the needs of their society.