African colonial boundaries and nation-building
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Date
2016-01
Authors
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Publisher
University of Zululand
Abstract
This paper is an attempt to examine the consequences of the Berlin Colonial Conference of 1884-1885 as an artificial
creation and indicate that this artificatility has created a number of problems that bedevil nation-building in Africa today.
The paper has adopted qualitative content analysis of archival material, national dailies and some secondary sources. The
first concern is the fact that some of these boundaries cut across pre-existing ethnic groups, states and kingdoms. This
has caused widespread social disruption and displacement. Today, some of the Ewe live in Ghana, some in Togo and some
in Benin Republic. The Somalia are shared among Ethiopia, Kenya and Somalia. The Senufo are found in Mali, Cote d’Ivoir
and Burkina Faso. The examples can be multiplied. The paper highlights the consequences of this situation to include
border disputes that have plagued the relationship between some independent African states such as those between
Sudan and Uganda, between Somalia and Ethiopia, between Kenya and Somalia, between Ghana and Togo, between
Nigeria and Cameroon, in particular over the Bakassi Peninsula. There is also the factor of France’s political and economic
stranglehold, on her former colonies in particular. The 1961 bilateral agreement between France and her former colonies
was to retain close military, economic and cultural ties. The aim of France is to inhibit the growth and stability of the
ECOWAS as a sub-regional economic integration. The paper argues that this Francophone dichotomy is a divisive
tendency that contributes to territorial disputes, border skirmishes, unguarded border posts and patrols, smugglings, the
menace of refugees and illegal aliens on Nigeria. The case of Cameroon is more illustrative than tjat of other Francophone
states. It is our findings that because of the artificiality and arbitrary nature of these boundaries, each of the African
nation states is made up of people of diverse cultural backgrounds, traditions of origin and languages that pose the
problem of nation-building in modern African states.
Description
Peer reviewed article published under Inkanyiso journal, Volume 8 Number 2, Jan 2016, p. 117 –124
Keywords
Berlin Colonial conference, artificial creation, widespread social disruption and displacement, border disputes and problem of nation-building
Citation
Gbenenye, E.M., 2016. African colonial boundaries and nation-building. Inkanyiso: Journal of Humanities and Social Sciences, 8(2), pp.117-124.