Thread by @RemiAdekoya1

Morning All! Day 12 of our #NigerianPoliticalHistory sessions based on my thesis research.

Today, we'll discuss how Awo's Action Group imploded in 1962 with him ending up in jail.

We'll also discuss Nigeria's first major census controversy. Who had more people, North or South?

By 1962, there was serious dissatisfaction in Action Group. A faction of the party believed AG, and Yorubas in general, were losing too much as a result of being in opposition at the federal level and should reach out to Bello's NPC for access to power and resources.

The group included Samuel Akintola, who succeeded Awo as the Western Region Premier after the latter resigned the post to lead the party's 1959 federal election campaign. Awo disagreed with those looking to cut a deal with Bello and his party.

Awo argued the West should focus on economic self-sufficiency, reducing its dependence on the federal government and thus rendering NPC irrelevant to the Region's future.

Subsequently, Awo tried to remove Akintola as regional Premier by having him expelled from AG, the ruling

party in the region. Akintola refused to give up his Premiership and violence erupted in the ensuing power struggle.

Prime Minister Balewa, happy to weaken Action Group, declared a state of emergency in the West, suspending the AG-controlled regional government for six months,

after which Akintola was reinstated as Premier, this time under the auspices of a new political outfit, United People's Party (UPP), which formed a majority coalition with NCNC in the Western Region assembly.
Action Group thus became an opposition party in its former stronghold.

Awolowo was then accused of plotting to overthrow the government by violent means and charged with treasonable felony, eventually being sentenced to 10-years imprisonment in a generally staged trial. In court, Awo blamed his situation on a conspiracy between NPC elites and

the Akintola-led Western politicians seeking to eliminate him from political life. He was, however, sent to jail.

In effect, the Western Region was now ruled by an NPC-friendly government.

Here is Bello's congratulatory letter to Akintola on his return as Western Premier:

Meanwhile, ethnic tensions were growing at the federal level as Southerners became increasingly resentful of NPC policies. For instance, in 1961, it was decided 50% of all military officers would be Northerners regardless of their qualifications vis-a-vis Southern compatriots.

Southerners became frustrated with a federal system that prioritized ethnicity over merit. Also, the bulk of development funds went to projects in the North as did those for health and education. Northern leaders justified this by arguing their region needed to catch up with the

South after its under-development during the colonial era. By 1962, many Southerners believed the only way to reduce NPC's power was via a census planned that year. The number of seats allocated to regions in the federal legislature was based on population figures from 1953.

Southern regional governments decided to manipulate the census results so their regions could gain seats and reverse the Northern advantage.

They released figures showing an improbable 70% increase in the South's population since 1953, compared to a 30% increase in the North.

These figures now gave the South a population advantage over the North. Bello's NPC rejected the figures, calling for a new census. Predictably, the 1963 result now showed significant population gains for the North. The new figures had Nigeria's population at 55.6 million,

of which a clear majority (29.7m) lived in the North. The South decried this figures as fraudulent. Michael Okpara, who was now the Eastern Region's Premier, was the most vocal in rejecting these results.

He said it was "ridiculous" for Northern Nigeria to claim so many people.

However, being in power, NPC had the authority to make the 1963 figures official. Premier Akintola, their ally, accepted the results on behalf of the West.

Dennis Osadebey, Premier of the newly-created mid-West Region, also accepted the results "for the sake of national unity."

Northern elites argued that at no time since amalgamation in 1914 was the South recorded to have had a higher population than the North.

They pointed to figures from 1933, way before anyone was thinking of federal representation, showing the North with a population majority.

Indeed, population estimates from the period 1931-33, available online, show the North with a population majority.

However, the Southern counter-argument to this has always been that these were just population estimates, not properly-conducted censuses.

Here is a letter from a Northern official to The Scotsman, a newspaper, presenting the North's arguments on the issue at the time:

All said and done, the 1963 figures were officially sanctioned. Federal representation, 1 representative per 100,000 people, thus continued to favour Northern political elites with all its implications.

Again, we see here crucial role of population count in Nigerian politics

at the time and the ethnic tensions the jostling over population numbers fostered.

Perhaps we shall stop there for today. Tomorrow, we'll discuss the 1964 federal elections, which were the first national elections organized in independent Nigeria.

Have a great Sunday folks 😃!

I should perhaps have added here that while the 1 representative per 100,000 citizens was the calculation used for Nigeria's first post-colonial federal House of Representatives, this was based on the 1953 census figures of there being roughly 31m Nigerians.

After 1963 census results showed 55.6m people, there were suggestions to expand House of Rep to 550 seats to maintain 1 per 100,000 representation.

However, it was ultimately decided to maintain a House of Reps with 312 seats, not more.

Thus, by 1964 election which we'll discuss tomorrow, proportion was 1 representative per 176,000 citizens.

Just so there's no confusion!