Sabo
by Ron Singer
[ places - march 08 ]
The outsiders' enclaves in Ibadan, Kano, and many other Nigerian cities are known as sabon gari. I served with the Peace Corps in Nigeria from 1964-67, and knew these places as strangers' quarters: predominantly Ibo traders in the Northern markets, Hausa/Fulani cattle sellers in the South. (I will follow the common practice of referring to this single entity as 'Hausa'. For the two centuries since the jihad of Usman dan Fodio, the so-called 'Fulani war', the fates of Hausa and Fulani have been intertwined.) We may also remember the sabon gari as flash points for the terrible Hausa-Ibo mutual massacres of the mid- 60's that ultimately precipitated the Biafran secession/Civil War (1967-70).
Given the strife of the 60s, it may come as a surprise that the political system of the sabon gari was designed to keep the peace and to foster ethnic harmony. In Ibadan, a large city in western Nigeria, or Yorubaland, at least until recently the system did just that. Since Yoruba-Hausa alliances formed the basis for the uneasy Nigerian political hegemony of the early 60s, since the Yoruba then joined the Hausa in defeating Biafra, and since the 1999 return to civilian leadership was also based on a North-West rapprochement of sorts, the coexistence over the years between Ibadan's sabon gari (called 'sabo') and its hosts may not be so surprising. I have tried to answer two questions: traditionally, how did the sabo function in the larger Ibadan community? And how have sabo-outsider relations fared in recent years? I became interested in the sabo as a possible microcosm of ethnic harmony in a largely disharmonious nation.
The sabon gari was created during the colonial era as an arm of indirect rule, the process by which the British controlled the populace by tolerating and sustaining indigenous Hausa rulers and institutions. In this case, they actively supported the spread of Hausa traders from northern Nigeria to cities throughout Anglophone West Africa. During the early 19th century, the jihad had already brought the Hausa into several Yoruba kingdoms, where they were soon trading in 'commodities' such as cattle and slaves. The sabon gari that formed around this trade were socio-economically heterogeneous, comprising groups from rich traders to escaped slaves. The initial name for these enclaves in Yorubaland was Ojo Oba, or Kasuwa Sarki - the King's, or Emir's, markets. After World War 1, the Ibadan enclave was relocated to what was then a bush area and dump, which the inhabitants optimistically named Sabon Gari, or New Town.
By then, Ibadan was the hub of Hausa life in Yorubaland, with its rulers also controlling the sabon gari in all the other towns. As was the case with the Old Testament Israelites and with so-many other groups throughout history, the two principal motives for this concentration of authority were control of crime and coping with powerful outsiders. Generally speaking, the Ibadan system met these needs well - at least until recently. (Bible-literate readers will recall the story of the Levite and his concubine in Judges, Chapter 19, when the inhabitants of a nasty town demanded sex from a traveller, who cravenly threw his concubine to them, resulting in her death, and providing an argument for centralized authority - a king - to replace the looser polity then in place.)
How, exactly, did the Ibadan system work? The sarkin sabo (ruler of the sabo) and his lieutenant (waziri) guaranteed peace in the enclave and support for the Yoruba king, the Olubadan. After Independence, for example, the sarkin joined Yoruba-, not Hausa-led, political parties. In return, the sabo was allowed to go about its business in peace. Interestingly, sabo leaders had a long history of resisting Northern control. Today, some of the early leaders enjoy the status of legends, including the revered waziri, Alhaji Audu Dunguru, who began life as a handicapped street beggar.
In the first three decades following Independence (1960), the sabo saw remarkable continuity. In 1990, as in 1960, 30 landlords dominated sabo economic life, and the number of residents grew in surprising tandem with the total Nigerian population, from 5,400 to 10,000 (1963 census: 43 million; 1991, 89 million, although these figures remain disputed). As is so often the case with populations in exile, Sabo culture itself remained very conservative. When the Independence movement tried to quash 'tribalism,' the sabo, which needed to remain very close-knit because of the trust required for credit in the cattle and kola nut trades (by then the twin engines of the sabo economy) reacted by becoming more ethnically conservative and, since Islam functioned as a social cement in the community, more zealously Islamic.
As in so many cultures, the roles of women in the sabo were also crucial to its stability. By our lights, these roles are somewhat surprising. Until at least the 1960s, many individual women lived, first, as out-there prostitutes, and then, after a purifying ceremony, as shut-in, protected wives. This dual role may have been one of the sources of friction between local and Northern authorities, since from a distance the 'system' certainly looked as if it licensed un-Islamic adultery. Both functions, however, helped maintain the enclave's insularity. Prostitution kept young, unmarried men away from women of other ethnicities, and the women's dual experience is said to have reduced divorce rates. That the rich wives/traders of the sabo amassed wealth in the form of huge collections of imported Czech pots also suggests that no one was planning to take up roots anytime soon. By contrast, among other local nationalities whose wives were traders, there was much less stability. Yoruba wives circulated and had love affairs, often divorcing to marry lovers. Nupe wives traded and travelled widely, used contraception, worked part-time as prostitutes, and loaned money to their husbands, sometimes creating such levels of debt that the husbands became virtual slaves. Many Nupe men, in turn, had recourse to juju cults in which women were evil witches; men, benign wizards.
The strict administration of justice within the sabo was always essential to peaceful coexistence with the wider community. The sarkin and waziri were chosen for their wisdom, patience, and accommodation, all primary Hausa virtues. The epitome of these virues was kirki, a state of quiet, calm dignity. Under the proverbial African shade tree, in a very ritualized manner, the sarkin and his waziri administered justice. In a 1990 case, for instance, a young Hausa involved in a pay dispute with a Yoruba market woman was so rude and violent to both her and the arresting police constable that he was lucky to reach the shade tree alive. When he remained so recalcitrant that not even the basic facts of the dispute could be established, the waziri who heard the case apologised to the woman and police, paid them off, and in their presence told the young man that the next offence would result in his being sent packing to the North in custody, there to face sharia law. This sounds like the type of incident that, but for the kirki of this waziri, could have escalated into an ethnic riot.
By 1990, however, there were changes in the sabo that may have contributed to systemic weakening. For instance, there were new kinds of diversity. The sabo now comprised Hausa from the north, Hausa born in the West, other Northerners, and even some Christians. Although most Hausa in the sabo were still traders, members of the other nationalities also worked as students, tailors, mechanics, etc. By then, predominantly Hausa settlements had also arisen in Ibadan outside the sabo, and these were not under the control of the sarkin or waziri.
I have not been able to find enough information to do more than speculate about possible underlying causes for the apparent weakening of sabo order that took place during the 1990s. On June 26. 1999, Hausa-Yoruba coexistence broke down in Ibadan, at least temporarily. A cattle herder was said to have killed a trader in a dispute over a goat. When the police released the alleged killer, lethal violence erupted between traders and herders. Ethnic war songs were sung, abandoned cars and over 100 shops were burnt, riot police arrested 10 people, and at least seven more were killed. If, in fact, this incident involved the sabo, (which my only source, a BBC news account, does not specify), one can only imagine the frantic efforts of the sarkin and waziri during the fighting, and then afterward, all that they must have done to try to calm the waters. If, in fact, the riot took place outside the jurisdiction of the sabo, there must have been a lot of "I told you so"s.
This clash took place shortly after the May 29th installation of Olusegun Obasanjo, the first Nigerian civilian president in almost two decades; shortly after the adoption of a new constitution; and concurrently with the worst ethnic clashes in the history of the Niger Delta. Were any of these events related? And what has happened to the sabo in the nine subsequent years? I have found no news accounts of an Ibadan aftermath to the June 26, 1999 riot, but in the ensuing months there were riots in Shagamu and other Yoruba towns, and, ever since, there have been periodic clashes between Hausa and Yoruba in the South, including a major episode in Lagos in 2002. Was June 26, 1999 simply an early instance of the settler-indigene conflict that became endemic during what we may now call the Obasanjo era (1999-2007)?
When I began reading about the sabo, I was hoping to have unearthed a microcosm of Nigerian unity. Now I just hope the sarkin and his waziri are still in business.
Sources:
BBC News: World: Africa. Seven Dead in Nigerian Market Riot, June 26, 1999
Cohen, Custom and Politics in Urban Africa, University of California Press (Berkeley, 1969)
Gavin, review of White, The Making of Modern Nigeria, Journal of African History, v.24, #3, 1983
Salamone, 'The Waziri and the Thief: Hausa Islamic Law in a Yoruba City,” African Studies Review, v.39, #2, 1996
Uwichie et al, Inter-Ethnic and Religious Conflict Resolution in Nigeria, chapter 6 (Lexington Books, Lanham, MD, 2003)
