THE IMPARTIAL OBSERVER
Placing Enugu in its Proper Context
Hank Eso
Thursday, August 27, 2009
Enugu is a city of many niches.
As a child of peripatetic civil service parents who lived all over Eastern Nigeria in the 1950s and 60s, I became accustomed to the social mores and perception of the identities of the various urban centers. For us children, each city, as we learned from the adults, had its identifying ethos, as reflected in a popular street assonance, which went thus;
Aba na anya,
Enugu na Omo
Onitsha na ori,
Lagos na oya ego.
Translated, Aba was a city of brash gawkers and unbridled enterprise. Enugu, especially of its white collared civil servants, had an affinity to Omo, the most popular detergent of the day, and thus personified cleanliness, quietude, and cosmopolitanism,. While the bustling city of Onitsha thrived commercially, it was also renowned for attracting thieves who, when caught, were made to drink several pints of liquid cement and then set free or, in cases of more severe crimes, had a six inch nails drilled into the head of the culprits, who were then hauled into the River Niger. Lagos, for its part, was an extremely expensive city, notorious for its endlessly cash-strapped inhabitants and their unrelenting quest to make money any which way. Port Harcourt or “Pitaakwa” was favored for its laid-back and easy social and cultural life, and its well-manicured gardens.
Unbeknown to many, Enugu, the “Coal City” and mayoralty founded in 1909, is 100 years old this year. To be exact, December 2009 will mark Enugu’s centenary as a city. From its niche as a rural community, mostly inhabited by subsistence farmers, the city has grown to a contemporary metropolitan area in the southeast geopolitical zone of Nigeria. More importantly, despite its transformation and the vagaries of Nigerian politics in the 21st century, Enugu retains its forte as a political hub and a distinctive urban city. Moreover, in post-dependent Nigeria and in spite of Nigeria’s dysfunctional politics, only three cities -- Lagos, Enugu, and Port Harcourt -- ever attained the political nomenclature of having an elected mayoralty. Enugu bears certain other unique characteristics. It is indeed in this stead that it was observed in the 1940s that Nigerian cities like Lagos and Port Harcourt have over time practically “replicated all the attributes of English and American municipalities, except for skyscrapers, subways, and other not so-necessary institutions” (A. A. Nwafo Orizu, Without Bitterness: Western Nation in Post War Africa, 1944). Enugu was not an exception in this context.
Topographically and in actuality, the name “Enugu” remains an anomaly. It is most unusual that a town in the expansive valley – “Ndida Ugwu” (foothills) – would end up with quite an opposite name, “Enu Ugwu” (hilltop). Such a paradox needs explaining to be grasped fully. Rather than the being a hilltop city, Enugu is actually a sprawling, mostly tin-roofed city nested in the running and interlocking set of valleys behind Udi Hill up to the farthest point northeast and astride the Nike Lake and riverbed and the plateau that stretches from Awkunanaw and beyond.
Indeed, the name “Enugu” derived more from the hilltop bastion, which the British colonial masters, responsible for the coalmines had set up for themselves on the Udi Hill Ridge, away from the locals. The location served two purposes: it was located strategically to offer a security vantage point in case of any attack. It was also removed for the byways, such that only those who had business there visited. Finally, it offered close proximity to the mines, but the elevation was cooler at all times and seasons. Naturally, the locals referred to the British hilltop encampment quarters in their local parlance, as Enu Ugwu, (shortened later and Anglicized as "Enugu") as distinct from the local shanty towns such as the “Ugwu Alfred” (Alfred’s Camp) and “Ugwu Aaron” (Aaron’s Camp), or Enūgwu Ngwuo village occupied by the Ngwuo (or Ngwo) people and immigrant laborers from the outlying villages.
Enugu, a town famed for its cleanliness, civility, and traditional hospitality was also renowned for it coal industry, hence, its moniker, “Coal City.” However, in its 100 years, Enugu has remained the quintessential civil service town, several times regional and state capital of Eastern Nigeria, Republic of Biafra, East Central State, Anambra State and, eventually, Enugu State.
Originally, a city of five boroughs-- Uwani, Ogbete, Ogui, Coal Camp, and Asata, Enugu was as gentle as its natives and urban denizens and remains so. The Ngwo people – the real sons of the soil—for long remained detached from the urbanization of their environs, living mainly on the other side of the hilltop – which tended towards the present day Ninth Mile Junction -- overlooking the city. Some indigenes also lived around Iva Valley, where products of the rich and ridged farmlands supported the workers of the mine industry. Yet, they were the real owners of the land, which itinerant farmers cultivated and artisans mined or plied their various trades, including silver mining. Today Enugu encompasses new areas such as New Haven, Independence Layout, GRA, and Trans-Ekulu Layout. The outlying towns of Akwunanaw, Abakpa-Nike (Iji-Nike) Emene, Akegbe, and some Nkanu communities have also melded with the city, serving as its embracing satellite suburbia. By natural topography and design, Enugu was a self-draining town, requiring limited modern sewer system to assist its red gritty soil drain without fuss or flooding.
Legend has it that it was a postscript entry in a colonial report to Her Majesty’s Government that triggered an interest in the possible presence of silver and coal in southern Nigeria’s foothill of Udi Hills. It was in early 1900s that some British explorers, on a reconnoitering visit to the eastern parts, chanced on a slate of outcropped coal with some pieces having discernible silver linings while hiking through the Udi Hills. That line report resulted in the first known expedition to the environs of Enugu beginning with the establishment, in 1903, of a Mineral Survey under the auspices of the Imperial Institute to explore the mineral resources of Southern Nigeria. The first actual surface and underground exploration took place in 1905.
When eventually Her Majesty Queen Victoria of England decided to formalize the exploration of mineral deposits in southern Nigeria, notably silver and coal, Enugu became a major prospecting destination. That exploratory duty fell on Sir Albert Ernest Kitson, a self-thought geologist, British peer and, later on, the 2nd Baron of Airedale. Having arrived Nigeria as Principal Mineral Surveyor (PMS) for Southern Nigeria, Albert Kitson and members of his geological survey team, which included, Messrs John Ritson and Kieran Geals of the Mineral Survey of Southern Nigeria, discovered an abundance of the original black gold – bituminous coal in the ranging hills that ran north from Udi to Enugu. The Enugu coalmines were expeditiously opened partly as a way of sustaining wartime military activities, but also to provide railways with local source of fuel.
Initially intended for export to help run British industries, as well as the colonial Government headquarters in Northern Nigeria and Southern Cameroon, Kitson was instrumental to the policy decision to construct an outlet to the sea for coal shipment. Hence, in 1912, the city of Port Harcourt was built and named after Sir Lewis Harcourt, then the Secretary of State for Colonies. Harcourt was instrumental in creating transit facilities for shipping of natural resources from colonies back to Britain, and he was officially the consignee for all such colonial proceeds. However, the decision to use Port Harcourt was not made until Sir Fredrick (later Lord) Lugard and Captain Child of the Royal Navy had ascertained that Port Harcourt would be more favorable than the existing port at the Bonny estuary, hitherto used for slave trade. Hence, Kitson with a resident administrative officer, Sir F. S. James, and the new exploration officer, John William Leck, took charge of developing Enugu as well as facilitating linking Enugu to Kaduna and Port Harcourt by a narrow-gauge rail. The railway was in place by 1916, just one year after the coal fields in Enugu began commercial output in 1915 and before its formal opening on 27 May 1916.
Sir Kitson oversaw the negotiations that resulted in British access and mining rights to Enugu lands in November 19, 1915. At the outset, the Ngwo people, represented by Chief Onyeama n’Eke and others, would only agree to ceding 10 square miles for mining, thus retaining most of the arable land in the valley area for subsistence farming. However, the Greater Enugu would eventually become Crown Property. The bigger challenge, however, was how to get the local workforce to be trustful enough to work with the colonists whose soldiers, in order to compel forced labor, had treated the people of Aro, Abakpa (Benue), Emekuku, Uyo, Eket, and Ikot Abasi with unreserved brutality. The same force would kill many Aba market women traders in 1929 for agitating against enforced poll tax and massacre Enugu coal miners in 1949.
As a corollary to the Aba women revolt, British soldiers led by one Capt. J. Hill, resident in Enugu had been responsible for the mowing down in cold blood, of the market women of Abak, Eket, Etinan, and greater Uyo on 16 December 1929, among whom was Mary Adiaha Edem, the mother of the late Hon. Justice Udo Udoma. Given the prevailing trepidation, hostility, and distrust towards the British, reconciliation task fell of Sir F. S. James, an amiable local administrator who reportedly acquitted himself creditably. It was he who negotiated and kept his promise for the mineworkers to be paid weekly and given time off regularly, unlike their counterparts in the employment of the Nigerian Railways and the Public Works Department (PWD), or those in the employment of the Native Authority in Northern Nigeria. Enugu, thus, was instrumental to ending the British conduct of forced labor and the institution of weekly wages for coal miners and laborers.
Given the acephalous nature of the Igbo communities, the notoriety of British engagement in southern Nigeria due to the arbitrary imposition of warrant chiefs and the resistance it encountered, recognition must be accorded to the collective vision and role of Enugu chieftains in negotiating pragmatically with the British representatives, thus guaranteeing for their people the benefits of the evolving development. Certainly, Enugu leaders had an eye on the geopolitical relevance of the “Coal City,” a fact since borne out by historical and political development. Nwafo Orizu catalogued “some of the good results of the war” thus: “At the end of 1916, the Eastern Nigerian railway was completed, and the Udi Coal field developed…the Jebba Bridge-- where the Western Railways crosses the River Niger -- was opened… mobility was stimulated and many Southern Nigerians began to rush to the North and vice versa.” (Ibid.)
Despite this accomplishment, recorded history has not been unanimously positive about the supremacy of Chief Onyeama n’Eke, whom in one account was described as “controlling the flows of labor to the emerging coal mining industry and established himself as powerful ruler, combining wealth with terror and magical power over his people.” (Axel Harneit-Sievers, Afrika Spectrum, Vol. 33, No. 1). Indeed, his grandson, Dilibe Onyeama, affirmed this disposition by describing his grandfather as an “African God.” (See “Chief Onyeama: The Story of an African God: A Biography,” 1982) In addition, history has not been kind to the British efforts to rob Nigerians of their culture and language, all in the pretext that both represented backwardness.
A City Of Niches
Enugu is a city of many niches. Enugu developed pari passu as an industrial and geopolitical base of the British in southeastern Nigeria, acquiring first a township status in 1907 and was formally designated a city in 1909, bringing it in line with Lagos and the ancient city of Kano. However, its designation as the capital of the Southern Protectorate came much later. Along with that development, came the ancillary services, the building of tree-lined lanes and roads, and the initial development of the Government Reserved Area (GRA) complete with modern asbestos-roofed Georgian and Victorian houses with distantly setback “Boys’ Quarters” breached by barb-wired and high-level brushes.
As the British consolidated their hold on the coal mining industry, several administrative structures inevitably followed, including golf parks, polo fields, clinics, and recreation and hunting clubs. British trading companies, initially based in Lagos, Badagry, and Lokoja, also moved south, setting up skeletal units in Enugu. Such businesses included G. B. Ollivant, African Traders Corporation (ATC), African Nuts, United Africa Company (UAC), John Holt, Kingsway Stores, and inevitably, the British Bank of West Africa, and the Catering Guest House, which catered for the burgeoning enterprises and expatriates. The quantum leap in commerce and population, influx of wealth, a diversified population, and proliferating governmental establishments, helped reshape Enugu, making it the pivotal hub of British administration and influence in the entire Southern parts of Nigeria. Enugu fitted well into the bill and perspective of the colonial masters, for as Sir Edward Grigg once observed, “On the average, out of the total revenue of the African colonies, seventy-five percent is spent in a manner that inures directly to our benefit every year. We unquestionably do well out of these colonies.”
Just as it would eventually become the pivotal point of pre-independence political agitation, Enugu was the base of Nigeria’s pre-independence industrial enterprise and, indeed, two distant cities, Port Harcourt and Kaduna, owe their development to entrepreneurial interests that emanated from Enugu. Enugu was also the bedrock of Nigeria’s electric power generation, and, indeed, the anchor of its railways system, which was entirely dependent on coal from Enugu to function. Coal from Enugu mines (Ogbete, Victoria, Inyi, Obwetti, Ezinmo, Amansiodo, Okpara, and Onyeama,) remained the mainstay of industries in Nigeria and southern Cameroon and power generation until oil exploration began commercial yield. Civil war disruption, the construction of the Kanji Dam, and eventual diversification to hydropower generation helped to seal the fate of the Enugu coal industry, yet its role in generating electricity at the Oji thermal power plant is broadly acknowledged.
Though hardly discussed or documented, the nexus between the importance of Enugu as an energy production hub and the decision to amalgamate northern and southern Nigeria remains clear, even though for political reasons the colonial government considered it prudent not to highlight such linkages. That inextricable link is affirmed by practicality and, indeed, reality. Hence, while coal from Enugu was shipped 150 miles southwards to Port Harcourt for export, and by overhead conveyor to Oji Thermal Power Station, which supplied electricity to all of Eastern Nigeria, a surfeit went north to Kaduna to support the growing local tin and textile industries. [The alternative to shipping via Port Harcourt was to ship to Onitsha, which was 60 miles from Udi but 150 miles upstream from the Bonny Port.] Locally, coal from the mines also supported the embryonic asbestos industry in Emene and the cement factory at Nkalagu.
The importance of Enugu grew exponentially that in 1939 it was formally declared the capital territory of the Southern Protectorates and subsequently the Eastern Group of Provinces. Still, in the post-World War II years, Enugu and its coal became part of the mainstream colonial resources, which were indispensable for the rebuilding of England and other parts of Europe. As Elspeth Huley observed in 1949,
“It is to Africa that Britain must look for that field for investment, source of raw materials and expanding market which she needs in order to survive, and she must win it quickly from the swamps and forest and high-veld of the last continent to be pioneered”
(Foreign Affairs, Oct. 1949)
Such fixation certainly reflected the anxiety that resulted in the British mishandling of several labor, industrial, and political situations.
Inevitably,
exactly two decades after the Aba market women revolt, Enugu and its coal mines
would form the backdrop of another resistance to colonial subjugation which,
sadly, resulted in the November 1949 shooting of 22 miners at the Iva Valley
mine, after the authorities tried to renege on the contractual terms for the
labor force. It seemed that the British preoccupation with exploration of
natural resources had obliterated any humane consideration in making colonial
public policies. There were other pertinent dimensions, including deep-seated
intolerance for local dissension and claim to any rights in southern Nigeria,
quite in contrast to the docility and acceptance that prevailed in northern
Nigeria.
As David Adam observed in the summer of 1950,
“In Nigeria, where the anti-imperialist moods are very developed, as a result of a mine strike, in November 1949 the government declared a local state of emergency after the police had killed 19 persons.”
(The eventual toll was eventually 22).
That singular incident in Enugu was remarkable, since it marked the beginning of the domestic agitation for the disengagement of colonial Britain and the quest for Nigeria’s independence. More importantly, it marked the beginning of one of the most formidable political alliances between Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe and Dr. Michael Okpara. Since Okpara was not an original member of the Zikist Movement, it is credible that both reportedly met for the first time during the Enugu mine crisis.
In retrospect, the issue of revenue derivation that continues to bedevil Nigeria, especially the complaints that oil revenues from the south were essentially being used to develop the north, did not start today. It is a part and parcel of the legacy of the erstwhile colonial administrators. Indeed, Rt. Hon. Creech Jones (Shipley) decried such parlous policies, fueled by war motives, on the floor of the British Parliament in 1942. His directed his exact words to Rt. Hon Harold Macmillan, British Under-Secretary of State for the Colonies:
Industrialisation and the exploitation of minerals and other natural wealth in our Colonial Empire should be very carefully controlled and developed with an eye on future policy and the consequences when the war is over, because such exploitation of mineral and natural wealth has a profoundly disturbing effect on native life in all its aspects. It is also important that in planning Colonial economy to keep an eye on maintaining some sort of balance in Colonial economies…Finally, what steps are being taken to safeguard the local native economy while the men are withdrawn? There are other questions which occur to me in regard to the Northern Nigerian situation. What are the terms and periods of employment? How long are these people to be away from their homes?
(Hansard, HC Deb 04 August 1942 vol 382)
Though the linkage is uncertain, it can be presumed that for these questions about working condition in Northern Nigeria to be asked in British Parliament, some thirty years after the Enugu chiefs secured regular pay and time-off rights for the locals who worked in the Enugu mines, was indicative of the ad hoc nature and double standards that plagued British administration. This is not to suggest that the policy was not deliberate and convenient for Her Majesty’s Government.
Enugu also blazed the trail in other areas. Indeed, by following the British pattern of municipal government, Enugu adopted a system where the councilors elected the local council chairperson annually as the mayor of the municipality. Accordingly, the first Lord Mayor of the Enugu Municipal Council under NCNC was a northerner, Malami Umaru Altine from Sokoto. He was succeeded by Mr. L. B. C. Ezechi of Umuaga, Udi Division, in April 1957. It was following in that line of succession that indigenous politicians like Chief C. C. Onoh would emerge in Enugu and national politics and make their political mark as great defenders of the people’s rights, especially of state-creation agitation. Meanwhile, following the example of Enugu, the first Lord Mayor of Port Harcourt, Mayor Richard Nzimiro of Oguta, was a non-indigene. Likewise, in Lagos, Mrs. Mabel Ojike, a non-Yoruba, served as deputy mayor of Lagos Municipality.
Enugu also wrote the political script on formidable grassroots and opposition politics and led the campaign for people to have political and residency rights to run for public office wherever they were domiciled, starting in the 1950s, with the group called, the “ Stranger Elements Association.” The key architects included Oba D. A. Nwandu of Enugu-Ukwu, Malam Umaru Altine, and Alahaji Baba Sule, both northerners, and Mr. Izu Areh, an Onitsha indigene and a political acolyte of Nnamdi Azikiwe. These men challenged the status quo under which municipality elected officials were predominantly Enugu or Waawa indigenes.
True to its commercial progressive niche, Enugu was also the base of the first Igbo-owned bank, the African Continental Bank (ACB). Similarly, it was also the bastion of great journalism and proactive print media. The Eastern Sentinel and, eventually, The Nigerian Outlook, were the city’s initial and dominant newspapers. Post civil war, the city newspaper was called The Renaissance, but the name was changed in 1975 on the directives of now late novelist Cyprian Ekwensi, who found the name a mouthful for the locals. The paper then became The Daily Star.
In the sporting realm, Enugu was and remains the home of Rangers International Football Club. Historically, it is also the city of one of the fiercest rivalry in Nigerian football history – the Rangers IFC vs Vasco Dagama FC battle-royale fame.
The Bottom Line
Hindsight is a wonderful thing. As the city’s centennial is marked, it behooves those who know, or who are aware of the historical place of the City of Enugu, to reflect fully on its geopolitical importance, if only for the benefit of posterity. In the history of the political development of Nigeria, Enugu could never be a footnote, but a major entry and a critical city, right from the era of British colonial rule to the present day. However, history is often not so neutral to the indifferent.
Like many symbolic statues around the world, the Coal Miners’ Massacre Memorial at Enugu stands in testimony to the city’s unremitting role in Nigeria’s political emancipation. The memorial also stands for the continued struggle of Nigeria’s working class and, indeed, for the nation’s independence struggle -- just as the Statue of Liberty stands for America’s long history and commitment to democratic freedoms and liberty. For the Igbo nation, Enugu is one of their greatest symbols and will always retain its endearing symbolism as the city of the dream that was, but never materialized. Like Masada, Enugu fell and a dream died with it. Perhaps, like Masada, Enugu will grow from strength to strength as a cosmopolitan and an all-embracing city for all comers, until such a time when it can be proclaimed, “Enugu shall not fall again."
Thomas Eliot once observed, “History has many cunning passages, contrived corridors….” As we celebrate the centenary of Enugu, it is imperative that the city’s honored place as part of Africa's decolonization history should be acknowledged. Similarly, its noteworthy role as one of the pivotal points of emergent Igbo politics, Nigerian nationalism, and local resistance to colonialism must be documented. Those who know must share for the benefit of posterity. Meanwhile, we celebrate Enugu!
With neither anger nor partiality, until next time, keep the law, stay impartial, and observe closely.
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Hank Eso is a columnist for Kwenu.com. His observations on Nigerian, African, and global politics and related issues, has appeared in various print media, journals, and internet-based sites.
© Hank Eso, 23 August 2009
Email: hankeso@aol.com
See also:
M. O. ENE