REMARKABLE EPISODE

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume XXIII, Issue 16, 30 December 1932, Page 10

REMARKABLE EPISODE

STORY OF AFRICAN CHIEF QUEEN VICTORIA’S GIFT. CHIEFLY WAND OF OFFICE. There died a few weeks ago, in a rambling old African building at Lagos, the steamy capital of the greatest British dependency in Africa, Prince Eshugbayi Docemo, otherwise “The Eleko,’’ head of the African house which ruled that part of what is now Nigeria when, nearly a century ago, a naval officer took charge of affairs there in the name of the British Government. This stout old African chief, says a correspondent of the Manchester Guardian, was the reluctant centre of a remarkable episode in the political and legal history of British West Africa.

Early in her reign. Queen Victoria gave to the head of what had been the reigning house before that part of West Africa was taken over a staff of ebony topped with silver. This was so greatly cherished that it became a wand of office. Who had this was the chief’s mouthpiece. A little over 10 years ago a dispute arose between the Government of Nigeria and one of the Lagos chiefs about the right to take over and the price to be paid for a piece of land expropriated for public purposes. Tho chief was dissatisfied with his treatment. On the advice of solicitors in Lagos and in London he decided to go before the Privy Council, where, incidentally, hei won his case.

ERROR in transmission. The Eleko lent to the appellant chief the treasured staff. Opinion is somewhat divided as to whether he ought to have done this. His purpose was to authenticate the chief, so to speak. The staff was carried about in London by an African politician who accompanied the chief and who was naturally regarded as a rather troublesome person by the British Governor of the moment. No suggestion of conscious unfairness must be made against that Governor, who, during all his official manfully championed the interest oi the peoples he governed. The bearer of the staff was interviewed by a London newspaper and spoke of it as a grievance that the head of the old African house, which had ruled Lagos in the far-off days, received from the British but a few hundreds a year, despite the enormous trade, with its attendant revenue which had developed in less than three generations. He spoke of the Eleko as “titular king of Lagos.” Somehow or other—whether there was a mistake in

cabling, or whether the cable was incorrectly copied—it was represented to the Governor that the claim had been set up that the Eleko was “titular king of Nigeria.” EXHIBITION OF DIPLOMACY. The Governor felt that a false and mischievous claim had been made in London, and called upon the Eleko to send the public bellman round Lagos and declare to the people the falseness of what had been said. The sub-chief and the staff-bearer were, of course, still in London. The Eleko consulted with his councillors, and the result was an admirable exhibition of natural diplomacy. He said that he had authorised no such false statement, and if he found on the return of the voyagers that he had been thus misrepresented he would surely disavow them; to which end, he blandly added, he would await their return. This proposal the Governor would not accept. There must be instant disavowal or else withdrawal of British recognition of the Eleko and of the yearly allowance (some £360). Then, said the Eleko in effect, so it must be, but he would wait.

The Governor took his steps. Another man was set up as the Eleko, was installed in the official building, and was paid the allowance. When the party from London returned the leaders sought to get the Government’s decision reversed. But there came in the old question of prestige. The Government would not give way; it would not discuss the matter, which it regarded as closed.

REACHING THE PRIVY COUNCIL.

Then began a long legal duel between the legal department at Lagos and the original Eleko and his friends, who became so numerous that there were two great parties at Lagos, with many occasions on which serious clashes were prevented mainly through good luck. The business took all sorts of legal forms—one incident was the deportation of the Eleko to another part of Nigeria and his prompt approach to the Supreme Court to reverse this step. To the detached observer the thing 'seemed to resolve itself into this: The Eleko and his friends said to the Government, “We will go to the Privy Council and get your action reversed”; while the legal gentlemen, who had the not.unimportant advantage of doing all the fighting with the Africans’ money, replied, in effect, “Get to the Privy Council, will you? You may find the way a little difficult.” And so they did. For over half-a-dozen years the chief and his friends failed to reach the Privy Council office, but at last they got there and the original matter had not to be gone into deeply before the whole structure set up in official quarters in Lagos was swept away and the Eleko declared to have been in the right. NEW GOVERNOR’S ACTION. Long before this, although the legal machine kept up its end of the dispute, the Governor originally concerned had retired from Nigeria, but there were still two great parties among the local Africans —those who stood by the chief of the old line and those who stood with the Government and the new man —and feeling between the two sections was as bitter as ever. Then came on the scene a new Governor, the present head of Nigeria, Sir Donald Cameron. He, of his own motion and almost as soon as he got into office, treated false prestige as it ought to be treated—namely, thrust it aside —bringing the dispute to ar. end by restoring the old man to his original place and power and dealing fairlv and justly with the chief of the intervening period. Now the Eleko has died.