8.1a Background information on extracts from Nigerian newspapers, late 1970s-early 1980s.

This subsection contains extracts from Nigerian newspapers, published over various years between 1977 and 1984. These extracts are largely taken from the Nigerian Herald, published in Ilorin, and they contain material on the area known as the “Metropolitan Districts,”which became Ilorin, Asa, and Moro Local Government Areas. The area contained many descendants from slaves, who had been settled there by their masters or erstwhile masters, while it also contained some settlements which predated the arrival of the Fulani in Ilorin. The topics covered include the choice of district heads, the grading of chiefs, the return to party politics at the end of the 1970s, and the lack of development in the area.

Newspaper interest in the Metropolitan Districts had actually begun in the second half of the 1950s. For extensive use of newspaper material on this earlier period, see Ann O’Hear, Power Relations in Nigeria: Ilorin Slaves and Their Successors (Rochester, NY: University of Rochester Press, 1997), pp. 147-169 and endnotes. The newspapers cited therein include the Nigerian Tribune, Daily Service, and Daily Times. The book is available in this Archive, section 2.1a.