Through unknown Nigeria

by John R. Raphael

To each and all I replied that I felt I was a greater sufferer than any. To every tale of woe, I represented my own plight and endeavoured, I must admit unsuccessfully, to play the martyr by setting forth the pathetic tale that “I cannot obtain either ink or paper.”

The Finance Department is specially interesting. There is no bank nearer than Zaria, and were it not for this Finance Department of the Niger Company the mines would have to keep very large sums of money for the labourers’ wages. It is not a banking business; money is only paid on demand. Of course, there has been a preliminary arrangement between the mining concern and the Niger Company in London by which the former guarantees to meet the cheques presented to the latter up to a stipulated sum.

That arrangement having been settled, the mine manager sends to Jos—maybe a distance of four miles, maybe a five days’ journey—for the money with which to pay his labourers weekly, presenting a cheque for the amount. The money is charged at a rateage according to where the cheque may be payable. Supposing it is drawn on the bank at Zaria, then 1½ per cent. is the rate; if it be drawn on the bank at Lokoja, which is further away, 2½ per cent. is charged.

Why this difference? In England we are not charged a larger rate for a cheque drawn on a bank at Newcastle than we do for one drawn on Birmingham. No; but in England transport charges do not enter into the question as finely as they do in Northern Nigeria. It all relates to the cost of getting up specie, which works out on the river at the rate of 1d. per £200 per mile; and, of course, land carriage adds to the expense. Cost of transport regulates the price of everything in the country, even of money.

Specie is made up into boxes, each containing £300, weighing 80 lbs. This is in silver coins, gold having practically no circulation in the country. A mine manager makes his personal provision for taking the money from the Finance Department to his own place. The usual plan is for the manager or one of his principal assistants, carrying firearms, to travel with his own carriers, who bear the money on their heads.

The Niger Company’s plan differs. A European accompanies the specie and has as a guard for it four dogarie, i.e., policemen belonging to one of the native rulers. Then, besides each carrier bearing a load, there is another between each of them as a relief. So if any of the men fall out his relief takes the load, which prevents the gang stopping or a box passing from the direct view of the European. When long journeys are undertaken stops must be made sometimes overnight, but the method of working is to get the men over the ground as quickly as can be done with as few stops as possible.

Although the Finance Department was established for the mines it is of very great service to anybody travelling through the country who may require cash. All that is necessary is a telegram from the bank where the traveller has a deposit to the Niger Company’s Finance Department authorising payment of the sum asked for. And a feature of the department is the patience and courtesy of the one in charge, Mr E. B. Simmonds, in dealing with the many matters, occasionally novel ones, which come before him from men strange to the country.

Another Niger Company department at Jos, separate from the others, is that of Transport.

Than transport no matter is of greater importance to the mines. Everything depends upon it. By “everything” is meant the primary items of food and machinery, on which all else rests. Even were the soil capable of being cultivated to an extent which would yield food for the labourers brought from other parts of the Protectorate, at least some years would have to pass before the process was in operation. Food must, therefore, be imported from the districts where it is grown.

It has been said there is not sufficient food in the country to satisfy the requirements of the 12,000 or so labourers on the mines. As, with insignificant exceptions, these labourers are all natives of Northern Nigeria, and no foodstuff to speak of crosses the border inwards, it is obvious that previous to coming on the tin fields they must have eaten indigenous products. I am sure that any difficulty in obtaining sufficient labour is largely, if not wholly, a question of food supply, and that supply cannot flow unless there are efficient channels for its passage: transport.