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It will be remembered that when the Fulani overran the State of
Kebbi during the jihad
they allowed the Chief, Muhammadu
Hodi, to slip through their fingers. They seem to have thought
that he no longer had any political significance, for they made
little or no effort to pursue and capture him. He and his followers
were therefore able to withdraw to the south of the Zamfara River
and establish themselves in the town of Gindi 1,
where for the next fifteen years they lay low and gave no trouble.
Meanwhile, in about 1820, the followers of Abdu
Salami, having made their submission to the Fulani after their
defeat at Kalembaina, had been allowed to return to the Zamfara
Valley where their previous settlement of Gimbana had been. There
they proceeded to found the new town of Jega which soon began to
grow in size and commercial importance. Among their former
adversaries, Abdullahi
had all along taken a more lenient view of their defection than
either Shehu or Bello and had
maintained, contrary to the views of the others, that by supporting
infidels in disobedience, as distinct from supporting them in
unbelief, they had not themselves become infidels 2.
For this reason, perhaps, he succeeded in winning their loyalty
where Shehu and Bello had failed.
As Gindi and Jega face each other across the Zamfara Valley, it was
not long before hostilities broke out between the reclaimed
followers of Abdu Salami
on the north bank and the still rebellious Kebbawa on the south
bank. The Kebbawa suffered an early reverse when they lost their
base at Gindi, but they recovered promptly by occupying the
neighbouring town of Kimba 3.
After that the fighting became indecisive. Nevertheless, in 1824 it
was still sufficiently serious for Bello
to have told Clapperton that an army was ravaging the country
through which the direct road between Sokoto and Yauri ran and that,
consequently, it would be impossible for him to take it 4.
In the following year, when Bornu again declared war on the Empire
and El-Kanemi launched
his invasion, the Fulani leaders were nervous that the Hausas might
rise against them in sympathetic rebellion. This anxiety no doubt
brought home to them how dangerous it was to allow a man like
Muhammadu Hodi, who still styled himself Sarkin Kebbi, to go on
living on the very frontier of the Empire.
In the dry season of 1826-7, therefore, a combined force drawn from
Gwandu, Jega, and Sokoto besieged Hodi in Kimba. Though the assault
failed, the attackers managed to fire the town by shooting flaming
arrows into the thatch of the houses. Later the inhabitants, fearing
for their lives and property if there should be a second assault,
turned Hodi and his followers out of the town. Soon afterwards he
was run down by the Fulani and killed 5.
If Usuman Masa is counted as the first (though in fact the Kebbawa
have never recognized him as a legitimate Chief), Hodi thus became
the second of five successive Chiefs of Kebbi to fall in battle.
Even then, however, the resistance of the Kebbawa was not
extinguished. A year or two after Hodi's death, his younger brother
Karari was proclaimed Sarkin Kebbi in Argungu and was supported not
only by the neighbouring towns of Kebbi but also by the Arewa and
Zabermawa in the west 6.
Three times he was called upon to submit, but each time he returned
a defiant answer.
The Fulani, recognizing that they had a serious rebellion on their
hands, at last bestirred themselves. In 1831 Bello mustered an army in Sokoto and himself led it down the Rima
Valley to support the Gwandu force which was already in the field.
One by one the Fulani reduced the Kebbi towns on the east bank until
only Argungu remained. For a time Karari succeeded in holding out
but, as at Kimba, the Fulani at length managed to set fire to the
houses and at this the inhabitants, led by the women, insisted on
capitulation. The gates were thrown open and so to avoid capture
Karari and his followers had to flee 7.
After this success Bello
returned to Sokoto and left it to the Gwandu forces to stamp out the
last embers of the rebellion. Meanwhile, after escaping from Argungu,
Karari had crossed the river and taken refuge in the town of
Zazzagawa 8.
Before long he was again closely invested. Despairing of
withstanding another siege, he and his son Yakubu Nabame now decided
to make a dash for safety in the hope of escaping to the west beyond
the reach of their enemies. They were spotted, however, and the hunt
was up.
Karari was no longer a young man and when he saw that he could not
escape he commanded Yakubu to save himself in order to preserve
their posterity. He himself then dismounted and seated himself on
his shield in the posture of prayer to await his pursuers. By
sacrificing himself in this way he enabled his son to escape 9.
For a year or two Yakubu Nabame remained in hiding in the west among
the faithful Arewa who concealed him from his enemies. In the end,
however, he decided to throw himself on the mercy of the Gwandu
Fulani. After some debate they agreed to spare his life, but,
fearing that he might again lead the Kabbawa into rebellion, they
banished him to Sokoto 10.
There we shall meet him again.
In the latter part of this campaign the Gwandu forces were led by
the new Emir Muhamman 11,
for the great Abdullahi
had died in 1828. In age, Abdullahi
stood half-way between Shehu
and Bello. In character
and outlook, no less than in years, he also occupied a position
between them. He shared with Shehu
a distrust of worldly affairs and a bent towards mysticism. Equally,
however, when the occasion demanded it, he could show talents as a
soldier and administrator which did not fall far short of Bello's.
If Shehu and Bello were the
complements of one another, then Abdullahi
was supplementary to both of them. Moreover, being a poet and a
jurist as well as a mystic and a man of action, he was the most
versatile of the three and incidentally the most complex in
character 12.
The major events in Abdullahi's
career, such as his victory at Tabkin Kwatto and his capture of
Birnin Kebbi, are so familiar that they hardly need recapitulating.
It may be, however, that the greatest service which he rendered to
the Fulani cause was his unspectacular but painstaking work as a
jurist. His three main legal works 13
became standard textbooks for later generations on the conduct of
the state and the duties of the ruler. If Shehu
inspired the jihad, and Bello
became the architect of the Empire, Abdullahi's
great though less spectacular contribution was to build up the body
of theoretical knowledge necessary for the conduct of government
based on principle and precept 14.
Possessing as he did a marked strain of humility and
self-abnegation, this is the tribute which he himself would probably
have appreciated more than any other as his epitaph.
While Abdullahi was still
alive, his great personal authority and Prestige helped to balance
the preponderance of Sokoto over Gwandu and preserve the conception
of a dual Empire. After his death, however, even though his
successors were very active in Nupe and llorin, as we shall see in
the next chapter, the primacy of Sokoto became more marked,
particularly as Bello
still had nine years of life ahead of him.
Though Bello was a
successful general and a prolific author, his fame rests mainly on
his ability as an administrator.
Shehu,
as we have seen, had aspired to create a theocratic community and
had always been deeply mistrustful of worldly power, its essential
bureaucratic framework hardly less than its pomp and trappings. It
had therefore been left to Bello to create the machinery for administering the Sultanate and
governing the Empire. To do so he had to abandon Shehu's ideal of simplicity.
As we shall see in a later chapter, the Fulani in other parts of
Hausaland were able to take over a feudal system that was already in
existence and adapt it, without many changes, to their own needs.
For Bello, however, the
task was more complicated because the metropolitan Sultanate was
made up not of a single state but of two Gobir and Zamfara — with
part of a third — the Chafe-Gusau-Kanoma area of Katsina — added
on to them. Geographically, moreover, the task was rendered more
difficult by the fact that the almost waterless Gundumi Bush, in the
passage of which Clapperton and afterwards Barth suffered so much,
tended to divide the eastern and western parts of the Sultanate from
one another. Nor was this all. While Shehu
had still been alive, his authority and prestige had been so great
that there had been little or no disposition on the part of the
conquered Hausas to rebel, while the Fulani and their allies, in
their disputes among themselves, had been ready to accept his
judgements. With Shehu's
death, however, as the revolt of Banaga dan Bature, the defection of
Abdu Salami, and the
rising of the Kebbawa had shown, this complaisance had disappeared.
For most of his reign, therefore, Bello
had to carry out his difficult administrative reforms with only one
hand, as it were, in order to keep the other one free for military
action.
He began straight away in the capital. Having first made Gidado his Waziri, he went on to create other posts and, in spite of
what Shehu had said to
the contrary, to dignify them with titles. The most important of the
new offices, in their order of precedence 15,
were those of :
·
Magajin Gari
·
Galadima
·
Magajin Rafi
·
Ubandoma
At the same time, with the death of the second
of the two Chief justices appointed by Shehu,
this office also fell vacant and Bello
was therefore able to make a fresh appointment 16.
All the men chosen to fill these posts were Fulani. One of them,
Muhammadu Ali, who now became the Ubandoma, was the son of Shehu's
elder brother, Ali, and therefore Bello's
first cousin 17.
The others were not related by blood but were all connected to Bello or Gidado by
marriage. Although they possessed fiefs in the home districts, they
habitually lived in the capital and indeed wards of the city grew up
round their town houses. They were never formally appointed as
Councillors but, as they were always on hand to advise the Sultan or
receive his instructions, they gradually came to constitute the
Council of both the Sultanate and the Empire 18.
The only non-Fulani who occupied a major post in Sokoto at this time
was Sarkin Adar Ahamat. He seems to have been the younger brother of
the Agale, whom we have already met, and was certainly the leader of
the only group of Tuaregs who had remained staunch throughout the jihad. They were already semi-sedentary and, as a reward for their
loyalty, they had been allowed to settle in Sokoto where they had
populated the northern quarter of the city. By virtue of this
background, Sarkin Adar seems to have been admitted to the Sultan's
confidence, though not to the innermost Council 19.
During Shehu's lifetime
there had been no Court, but now, with these Councillors as its
nucleus, a Court came into being. Most of the Fulani, coming as they
did from very different backgrounds, were unschooled in these
matters and ignorant of how they should comport themselves. But one
of them, the new Galadima Muhammadu Deshiru, had in his earlier days
attended the Gobir Court at Alkalawa. He therefore became a kind of
Court Chamberlain and gave his less sophisticated colleagues
instruction in protocol and punctilio 20.
In the districts of the Sultanate, Bello's first problem, as Abdu
Salami's defection had revealed, was to win and hold the loyalty
of the great feudatories. His second task was to establish between
them and the capital an efficient channel of communication which
would bring to him the information and revenue that he required and
take to them the specific orders or general instructions that he
would need to give. The achievement of the first end depended in the
last analysis on the Sultan's personality, prestige, and wisdom. Bello
was strong in all these qualities, but he nevertheless deemed it
prudent to reinforce the ties that bound the great territorial
magnates to him by conferring honours upon them. The titles were
often, though by no means always, taken from the vanquished Hausas.
Muhammadu Moyijo, for example, whose
early conquests round Yabo had provided Shehu
with his first base when hunger had compelled him to abandon Gudu,
was honoured with the style of Sarkin Kebbi 21.
Similarly, although Namoda himself had been killed in 1810 while
besieging the stubborn fortress of Kiyawa, Bello
now conferred the titles of Sarkin Zamfara on the senior branch of
his family and of Sarkin Kiyawa on his brother Mamudu, who had
finally succeeded in capturing the place 22.
Within a short time of Bello's
accession, therefore, titles had become as common among the Fulani
as they had previously been among the Hausas.
The second problem, that of maintaining an effective channel of
communications between the centre and the periphery, Bello solved by adopting the kofa system which had probably been
evolved in earlier times. The word in Hausa means ‘gateway’ and
the ‘Kofas’ were the intermediaries at Court through whom the
Sultan dealt with his vassals-in-chief. Their role was
part-political, part-administrative. They were responsible for
keeping themselves informed about the affairs of the fiefs concerned
and for advising the Sultan on them. The Sultan's orders and
instructions were transmitted by them and conversely any favours
that the vassals wished to beg or representations that they thought
to make had to pass through the Kofa. One of their main duties was
to collect and check the tribute from the fiefs for which they were
responsible and they were rewarded by being given a share of the
revenue.
Under this system the Ubandoma in Sokoto served as the Kofa for two
of the great feudatories mentioned earlier, namely Sarkin Zamfara of
Zurmi and Sarkin Kiyawa of Kaura Namoda, while the Galadima was
responsible, among others, for Gusau and Chafe 23.
The system had its drawbacks, particularly the case with which it
could be abused, but it possessed certain solid advantages. In the
districts it gave the vassal a friend at Court whom he could consult
and on whose influence he could rely. At headquarters it provided
the Sultan with a source of information and advice on each of his
fiefs and an officer of state to whom all matters of routine could
safely be delegated. In a land where distances were great and
communications poor, it was probably as effective a link as could
then have been devised. Certainly, it worked satisfactorily and
indeed, as we shall see in a later chapter, it was soon extended to
cover the Emirates of the Empire as well as the fiefs of the
Sultanate.
In the Sultanate and Empire alike, Bello proved himself to be a strong ruler. Near home, his
suppression of the local revolts of Abdu
Salami, Banaga dan Bature, and Karari have already been
described. Further afield, when the Emir of Kano Sulimanu had died
in 1819, he had not hesitated to change the dynasty by recognizing
Ibrahim Dabo as his successor. Likewise, in Zaria, first in 1821 and
again in 1834, he passed over the sons of the Emirs who had died and
appointed men without hereditary claims. Again, in order that the
family of the conqueror of Ngazargamu should not remain unrewarded,
he insisted in 1831 on the Emirs of Bauchi and Katagum surrendering
in favour of Gwani Muktar's son, Mamman Manga, their conflicting
claims to a town and its surrounding districts 24.
In this way he created the new Emirate of Misau. Similarly, in 1835,
in order to reward a Fulani called Sambolei who had distinguished
himself in battle, he brought the new Emirate of Jama'are into being
25. From his Emirs, in short, he expected and indeed received
unquestioning obedience. It will be remembered, for example, that at
the time of El-Kanemi's
invasion he sent the Waziri
Gidado to take supreme command over all their heads. Later, as
we shall see, when he needed their support for another major
enterprise, he did not hesitate to call them and their feudal armies
out again.
In every sector but one Bello's
statesmanship, which was compounded of firmness, patience, and
magnanimity, proved successful. Even the Kebbawa were quiescent and
the Empire as a whole enjoyed a period of tranquillity and good
government. In spite of all his efforts, however, which included
some liberal and imaginative measures, Bello
achieved no lasting success with the Hausa diehards in the north.
It will be recalled that, after the defeat of Katsina and Gobir in
the jihad, the great bulk
of the common people had submitted but that many of the ruling
classes had fled north to the borders of the desert. Since then
these irreconcilables had been maintaining a precarious existence
round Maradi, their new capital, but as the rainfall was sparse and
the soil sandy, it was hardly possible for them to support
themselves there. Necessity as well as inclination therefore
prompted them to live by raiding across the borders of the Empire.
Bello's policy was to
contain these raids and prevent them from reaching the populous
parts of the Sultanate. To protect the home districts of Sokoto he
first set up the war-camp of Magariya, which Clapperton often
mentioned, and then in about 1828 replaced it by the fortified town
of Wurno, which he founded in the same part of the Rima Valley 26.
Later, by building Gandi in the neighbouring valley of the Sokoto
River and installing his brother Atiku with a garrison in the Burmi
town of Bakura, he created a chain of fortresses facing north-east 27.
In the east he pursued the same policy and, to protect Zamfara,
founded the town of Lajinge in the Valley of the Upper Rims. The
command of this fortress he gave to a young man called Fodiyo, his
own son by a woman of the Gobir ruling family called Katambale, who
had become his concubine after the capture of Alkalawa 28.
If Fodiyo had not turned out to be a libertine 29
this imaginative move, with its strong hint of conciliation, might
have been more successful.
As for the Gobirawa who had remained within the borders of the
Sultanate, Bello sought
by another liberal gesture to reconcile them too. Ali, a member of
the old ruling family, was appointed to be their Chief. Moreover, he
was made directly subordinate to the Sultan, paying his allegiance
in Sokoto, and was permitted to retain the title of Sarkin Gobir 30.
For ten or fifteen years Bello's experiment in Indirect Rule worked satisfactorily. Sarkin
Gobir Ali remained loyal and the submissive Gobirawa acted as a
buffer between the Fulani and their unreconciled cousins over the
border. Ali, however, was under constant pressure from the diehards
to throw off the yoke of Sokoto. For a time he ignored their threats
and taunts, but in 1835 they at last succeeded in goading him into
rebellion by sending him, it is said, a set of butcher's knives to
signify that he was no better than a Fulani slave 31.
Certainly, in that year he renounced his allegiance and joined a
coalition which had been formed by his kinsmen in exile with the
Tuaregs and the diehard Katsinawa.
After eight years of comparative peace Bello now suddenly found himself facing another dangerous crisis. He
reacted with all his old vigour. First he sent messages to his
Emirs, calling on them to join him in a military expedition, and
then he collected his own forces and led them to the rendezvous
which he had appointed. The majority of the Emirs also commanded
their contingents in person and the host which gathered at Isa was
probably the greatest that the Fulani ever assembled for any
campaign 32.
Moreover, before setting out, they all swore a solemn oath to
conquer or die 33.
Bello now marched this
army northward in search of the enemy. They left the Rima Valley at
the top of its great bend and entered the featureless semi-desert
which lay beyond. Here, before long, they were painfully afflicted
by thirst, and the shortage of water was so great that it seemed
doubtful whether they could go on. Go on they did, however, until
they reached a place called Bulechi. After staying there for two
days they pressed on with a double forced-march. While they were
resting between these marches, Bello
forbade the kindling of camp-fires, because he wanted to take the
enemy by surprise 34
and in this he seems to have been completely successful.
The result of the battle which now took place at Gawakuke 35
was an overwhelming victory for the Fulani. Ibra, the Tuareg
chieftain, made his escape, but the leaders of the two diehard
factions, Sarkin Katsina Rauda and the turncoat Sarkin Gobir Ali,
were both killed with thousands of their followers. Bello
was usually generous in victory, but on this occasion he had no
mercy and, while women and children were spared, about a thousand
combatant prisoners were put to death 36.
In its completeness, as well as in its sequel, Gawakulte was a
Cromwellian victory.
After this disastrous defeat those of the Gobir diehards who had
survived fell back to the north-east on the Maradi area where the
Katsina diehards were already concentrated. There they founded a new
town, Tsibiri, which was to be their headquarters for the rest of
the century 37.
When he heard of this, Bello
decided to lead another joint expedition against both places with
the object of finally subjugating the diehards and pacifying his
northern frontier. Had he had time to carry this plan into effect he
would have crowned his life-work and bequeathed to his successors a
realm that was united within and unchallenged without. Before he
could do so, however, he suddenly fell mortally ill.
During his last illness Bello
sent for his eldest son Akyu and warned him not to attempt to make
himself Sultan by unconstitutional means. Later the Waziri invited
him to nominate his successor by saying:
— In whose hands do you leave us ?
But Bello refused to make
any choice.
— I leave you, he said, in the hands of God 38.
On the following day he died. By his own wish he was buried in the
town of Wurno, which he himself had founded and made his capital.
The nature of Bello's
qualities and achievements have already been described. He was
exceptionally well endowed with a wide variety of talents-a good
brain, a strong personality, and a sound and uncomplicated
character. These assets were fostered by the kindly influence of his
father and uncle and at the same time fortified by his rigorous
education and austere upbringing. The jihad gave him his opportunity and, though he was not Shehu's
eldest son, he soon came to the forefront. At the start he was a
young man fighting hand-to-hand under the walls of Alkalawa. At the
end he was in supreme command of the combined forces that took the
place and so brought the war to an end.
As a soldier, Bello took
part in forty-seven battles and sieges 39.
As a writer, he produced over eighty works in prose and verse 40
and, though he lacked Abdullahi's
sense of style, he wrote in Infaku'l Maisuri the best account we
have of the jihad. As a
religious leader, he made a worthy successor to his father. Finally,
as a secular ruler, he was easily the greatest of all the Sultans of
Sokoto.
There was only one other man of this generation in the central Sudan
whose stature and attainments approached those of Bello.
That was El-Kanemi. In intellect, learning, ability, and strength of
character these two towered over the rest of their contemporaries.
They were born at about the same time, they died within a year or
two of one another, and during much of their lives they were
destined to be in conflict.
Bello, though devout, had
none of Shehu's mysticism
and never experienced Abdullahi's
revulsion from the world and its ways. On the contrary, he obviously
had a taste for power and enjoyed wielding it. Nevertheless, he
never allowed it to cloud his vision or tarnish his standards. That
for twenty years he was the most powerful man in the whole Sudan,
and yet remained completely uncorrupted, must be counted among the
greatest of all his achievements.
As a man, he could sometimes be inflexible, as he was with
Clapperton, and occasionally ruthless. These were but the defects of
his virtues, however, for the hall-mark of his character was
magnanimity. In his career we encounter this magnanimity again and
again — in the objectivity of his historical works, in his
forbearance under Abdu Salami's provocation, in his reconciliation with Abdullahi,
in his avoidance of bigotry 41,
in the great sweep of his own achievements, and in the sense of
personal humility before God which, in the moment of his greatest
triumph at the taking of Alkalawa no less than on his death-bed,
never deserted him. It is well illustrated in the words which he
himself wrote at the height of the theological conflict with El-Kanemi:
May God be gracious to us in our end and to El-Kanemi
in his end. May He keep us both upon the straight way and show us
mercy.
In company with his father Shehu, though in a wholly different way, he proved himself to be one
of the most remarkable men whom Africa has ever produced. As a
Sultan, Sokoto was not to look upon his like again.
Notes
1. Sokoto DNBs, History of Kebbe.
2. Hiskett, Introduction to TW, pp. 13-20.
3. Gwandu DNBs, History of Jega.
4. Clapperton, Travels, vol. II, p. 342.
5. Gazetteer of Sokoto Province, p. 16, and Sokoto DNBs, History of
Kebbe. For his share in this exploit Buhari clan, Abdu
Salami was given the title Sarkin Kebbi, which the Chiefs of
Jega still bear.
6. Gazetteer of Sokoto Province, p. 17. For the family tree, see
Table 6 in Appendix II.
7. Gazetteer of Sokoto Province, p. 17.
8. This was the town which Muhammadu Kanta had founded three hundred
years earlier as a settlement for prisoners captured in his wars
with Zazzau.
9. Johnston, op. cit. pp. 127-8. In the Moslem tradition his gesture
signified that to refused to surrender but was ready to die.
10. Johnston, op. cit. pp. 128-9.
11. For the family tree, see Table 3 in Appendix II.
12 See Note 10 in Appendix I.
13. Diya'al-Hukkam, Diya'al-Sultan, and Diya'al-Siyasat. See Hiskett,
Introduction and Appendices to TW, pp. 22 and 134.
14. Hiskett, Introduction and Appendices to TW, pp. 22 and 134.
15. Sokoto DNBs, History of Durbawa.
16. Sokoto DNBs, Historical Note on the Chief Alkalis.
17. More than thirty years later he was to receive with great
kindness the explorer Barth, who described him as a cheerful old man
of about seventy-five with pure features and a noble demeanour
(Travels, vol. IV, pp. 173-4). He must therefore have been about
forty when first appointed.
18. Sokoto DNBs, Histories of Hamma'ali and Durbawa Districts and of
Sokoto City.
19. Ibid. Histories of Dundaye District and Sokoto City.
20. Ibid. History of Durbawa.
21. Sokoto DNBs, History of Yabo.
22. Ibid. Histories of Zurmi and Kaura Namoda.
23. Ibid. Histories of Hamma'ali and Durbawa.
24. Gazetteer of Kano Province, p. 33.
25. Hogben and Kirk-Greene, op. cit. pp. 492-3.
26. Sokoto DNBs, History of Wurno.
27. Ibid. Histories of Gandi and Bakura.
28 Ibid. Histories of Sabon Birni and Isa. Confirmed by Alhaji
Junaidu.
29. Hajji Said, loc. cit.
30. Sokoto DNBs, History of Sabon Birni.
31. Ibid. The Fulani, being devoted to their cattle, always left
butchering to their slaves.
32. Alhaji Junaidu, op. cit. p. 28.
33. Ibid.
34. Ibid. p. 29.
35. Earlier historians often confused it, quite wrongly, with the
village of the same name near Sokoto.
36. Alhaji Junaidu, op. cit. p. 29. In 1903 a British officer was
shown a mound about twenty feet high and was told that it contained
the remains of the 20,000 men who had fallen in this battle. The
figure is probably an exaggeration, but the size of the mound shows
that the casualties must have been extremely heavy. Major-General C.
H. Foulkes, article in the Royal Engineers' Journal, vol. LXXIII,
no. 4, 1959, pp. 429-37.
37. Sokoto DNBs, History of Sabon Birni.
38. Hajji Said, loc. cit.
39. Alhaji Junaidu, op. cit. p. 30.
40. Hogben and Kirk-Greene, op. cit. p. 397.
41. A comparison of Denham's account of life in Kuka and
Clapperton's account of life in Sokoto suggests that El-Kanemi's
rule was stricter, and his punishments more Bevere, than Bello's.
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