Native Courts and Customary Law in Colonial Ewedome, 1914-1949

Abstract

Customary law was an essential part of oral tradition and it was central to the debate and negotiation on power relations and identity within the colonial state. Throughout British colonies, native courts were the principal agencies through which indigenous law was adjusted to the needs of the new conditions with which Native Authorities were faced. The paper argues that the process frequently involved entry into a field in which the customary law itself afforded no precedents and created conflict between the local people, on the one hand, and the traditional leaders and colonial officers, on the other. By criminalising some customary laws and declaring others 'repugnant to natural justice', the colonial administration changed traditional jurisprudence; in which case customary law ceased to be wholly indigenous law