Migration, Occupation And Settlement Of The Alago People Of Nasarawa State From (1960-2001)

Migration, Occupation And Settlement Of The Alago People Of Nasarawa State From (1960-2001)

Chapter One

Preface

Background of the Study

Alago ethnical group are a people with common verbal and artistic individualities. The people are of Benue- Congo speaking group set up around the defunct Lafia Native Authority in the present day Nasarawa State with their agreements at Keana, Doma, Obi, Assakio and Agwatashi among others. The population of the people according to the National Population Census of 2006 estimated figure was that the Alago population is above seven hundred thousand( 700,000) people.

moment, Alago people are set up generally in the following Original Government Areas of what’s now Nasarawa State Doma, Keana, Obi, Lafia- East, Azara, Giza and Nasarawa. They can be set up in the agreement areas of Doma, Keana, Obi, Ribi( Ibi), Agaza, Alagye, Aloshi( Ole’shi), Agwatashi( Olosoho), Assakio( Owusakyo), Kadaerkop, Owena, ankani, Ajkpanaja, Okpata, Ediya among other small agreements including Amaku( Olonya) in Nasarawa Local Government Area.

By all norms the Alago group is one of the largest if not the leading group of the total of present day Nasarawa State with their population of about 712712. This is the status the people enjoyed indeed before the split of the former Plateau State which gave birth to the new Nasarawa State on the 1st October, 1996. Indeed, there can be no denying the fact that the choice of this subject for study for both ever and directly an attempt to satisfy an interest that isn’t only particular but also collaborative and ethnical in nature.

From another perspective Benedelto Crole editorialized that all history is contemporary since no matter how remote in time the events being reconstructed appear to be the history in reality refers to present requirements and situations where those events joggle. clearly 3, these requirements are represented by the desire to have a more salutary exposition of the history of the people whose generations after generations have continually been bombarded with clashing records and reports on the conduct of their ancestor. This is because Alago people in the post social period( 1960- 2001), keep migrating from one place to another in hunt of socio- profitable openings and installations rather than religious reasons.

Aim and Objects

In malignancy of the adding wide range of knowledge, works and amenities by scholars on the Alago, their traditions still remain academic , awkward as well as superficial in nature. still, the objects of this exploration work becomes imperative and it includes among other effects

To understand the nature, origin and character of the movement and agreement patterns of the Alago people of Nasarawa State, and examine the causes of their migration to their present agreement.

To examine the socio- political and profitable donation of the ethnical group to the timber of Nasarawa State.

To put in proper perspective the exact position and place the colorful Alago people( agreements) in history, within Nasarawa society, as well as to understand the socio- profitable relations of the people with their neighbours as a roadmap for public development.

also, the work is aimed at furnishing reference material in the history of the people, giving the discordant nature of their growth and development. This is so because the present generation of Alago scholars as well as elites need an over- to- date and a thorough( comprehensive) analysis of the history of their history.

Statement of the Problem/ Defense of the Study

History is repleted with movement of people and this movement can either be collectively or in mass. Migration being part of mortal geste ( Alago inclusive) frequently occasion by some natural or manmade forces. The need to move from one position to the other came imperative because of pining need to interest, hunt for food( cropland and trading) and a conducive terrain in which to live.

The post colonizer migration among the Alago people from 1960 has impringed or contributed to the development of the people under study. Many earlier agreements were forced to move or dislocate to new agreements of the same Alago people in Nasarawa State and these redounded to the development and or development of the people but in this case, development is mush counted, hence educational, social, profitable and political developments were achieved among the Alago people in Nasarawa State from 1960- 2001.

Compass and Limitation

This study still is confined to an examination of the Alago post colonizer migration and agreements from when the colonialists terminate their rule in Nigeria by 1960. This is to say that the study is only on Alago people and as well as some of their agreements in Nasarawa State.

The limitation was still faced with some circumstances beyond the capability of the experimenter. therefore, the compass in area of agreements couldn’t be adequately satisfied. Hence the experimenter decided to limit his hunt due to lack of applicable data to some named Alago settlemts similar as Ibi, Alagye, Keana, Doma, Obi, Assakio and Agwatashi since they all have identical traditions, customs and reasons for the post colonizer migration.

As mentioned before, one among the limitations was the issue of terrain of the agreements that were to be visited. The roads were bad and weren’t motorable and this brought delayance for the experimenter to carry out his exploration work at the applicable period of. There was alsonon-availability of numerous written sources on Alago ethnical group as a result of making the reference accoutrements veritably little. Non-access to archival accoutrements was also endured by the experimenter during the course of study of the people under consideration.

Exploration Methodology

In hunt for knowledge of the history, the annalist relies on colorful sources. chroniclers, utmost especially those of the advanced societies used written documents similar as records of government conditioning that were left before by factual actors or spectators of early events. These were tenable only in areas where the art of jotting and attestation were available and in use. still, for utmost of African societies, the hunt for knowledge of the history was grounded substantially on oral accounts appertained to as oral traditions.

For the purpose of this exploration, giving that oral tradition arising from saved recollections has remained one of the major sources in African historiography. One is frequently irked by the acting nonstop exposure of once records of utmost societies. It’s on this note that a Ugandan professor of history, Kiwanuka has frequently been quoted as saying

The minds of our fore- fathers are libraries

Waiting to be tapped and the death of an old man

In Africa is the death of a whole library

clearly, there can be nothing further correct in the applicability on, and significance of oral tradition as a literal source in African historiography. Hence the recollections of our fore- fathers over time shall be reckoned upon substantially. still, in literal attestation, irrespective of the form and nature of these sources as may be available to the annalist, they in themselves don’t constitute history. Hence the annalist has to engaged in a careful selection process to bring out the literal data from the lost of accoutrements available to him.(E.H. Carr).

For the purpose of this work thus, a number of these sources have particularly been used for the attainment of the asked thing. before works by scholars in the form of design or thesis have been consulted and made use of. Indeed, I embarked on the collection and harnessing of source accoutrements through particular interviews, readings and relative analysis of the available accoutrements .

It must still be stressed that in the course of doing this, the deficit of in- depth and reconcilable accoutrements on the issue under consideration without mistrustfulness posed serious problems. This is why more frequently than not, utmost African system of reconstructing the history through the use of oral traditions formed the dominant and central source which that was depended heavily for this study. Then too, the problem of deformations has created downsides in the attempt to achieve a near perfect reconstruction of the history of the Alago people in Nasarawa State.

In handling these problems thus, a careful, relative analysis was carried out on the scores of accoutrements available and selection was grounded on a more concrete substantiation of the history of the people as contained in their traditions. nonetheless, for the source, accoutrements upon accoutrements were gathered, collated and served or anatomized in line with the thinking ofH.P.L Fisher who said

To write or indeed to read it’s to be

Endlessly engaged in a process of selection.

numerous data are called but many are chosen, on

Implicit and rational criteria of factual significance 6.

The study dependent on two broad source types primary and secondary sources. For primary sources, oral accounts of eye- substantiations and actors as passed from generations to generations have been collected and collated to give significant base. This was done through particular interviews and direct visits. In the case of the secondary source, the multitudinous workshop of earlier experimenters and chroniclers were also consulted to give some literal sapience into the history of the people in question. By and large, the jottings of scholars have served as reference points and attendants on the general approach to the study, in substance, maximum use of available accoutrements has been applied to supplement and also round the primary sources.

It must be asserted that, in carrying out a exploration work of this nature, a broad methodological approach must be used. By so doing oral interview and particular visits or connections were carried out. These were redounded to the problems of Bias history or hidden of information by the original people, problem of language interpretation either by the practitioners or the experimenter himself.

Theoretical/ Abstract Framework

Migration is a change of hearthstone from one particular place to another whether on a endless orsemi-permanent base. Migration is an natural aspect of mortal behaviour. Throughout mortal elaboration, the appetite to move has been part of the characteristics of man’s actuality. The need to move from one position to the other came imperative because of pining need to interact, search for food and a conducive terrain in which to live. Migration simply put is the act of moving from one position region and or country to another.7

Richard Schafer sees migration as a fairly endless movement of people with the purpose of changing their place of hearthstone. He described movement over a sizable distance, rather than from one side of a megacity to another. 8

Migration has been an age old mortal miracle. Right from the ancient world. History is replete with movement of people either collectively or mass frequently occasioned by some natural or man- made forces. As a complex social miracle, migration has assumed several confines. The factors which tends to gusto mortal population movement varies, while some were motivated by the prevailing profitable openings of the time, others were amp by some other factors like religious partisanship, war, political dominance and some other social forces, therefore causing a forceful mortal migration from one area to the other.

Migration generally speaking, means the movement of people, more specifically, it means movement of people or a population across a specific boundary for the purpose of abiding. The United Nations multi-lingual demographic wordbook defines migration as “ a form of spatial mobility between one geographic unit and another involving a endless change of hearthstone. ” 14 This description excludes wandering of gadabouts, seasonal migration and the movement of persons with further than one hearthstone. In other words, the movement of gadabouts isn’t migration; movement of persons with further than one hearthstone is also no migration.

Migration generally speaking, means the movement of people, more specifically, it means movement of people or a population across a specific boundary for the purpose of residing. The United Nations multi-lingual demographic dictionary defines migration as “a form of spatial mobility between one geographic unit and another involving a permanent change of residence.” 14 This definition excludes wandering of nomads, seasonal migration and the movement of persons with more than one residence. In other words, the movement of nomads is not migration; movement of persons with more than one residence is also no migration.

There are two types of migrations, internal migration and external migration, internal migration is defined as the movement of persons within the political boundaries of the nation being considered as a country. Any movement between different towns or cities within Nigeria is internal migration. Therefore, movements between Doma and Obi, Keana and Agwatashi, Assakio and Obi as well as Lafia are all internal migrations. External migration (though not part of the study) is the movement of persons across ethnic, national and state boundaries of one country to another. Every migration process involves two places, that is the origin and the place of destination. There are four varieties of internal migration (i) Rural-rural (ii) Urban-Rural (iii) Urban and (iv) Rural-Urban migration. Urban-rural is movement from urban to rural areas. Urban-urban involves movement from one urban area to another while rural-urban migration is movement from rural to urban area 9.

Sociological approach to the study of human migrations sees the term migration as a concept embedded in the plurality of people such that the action of one group determines the action of the other. Marx Weber drew a criterion specifying that there should be at least a minimum of mutual orientation of the action of each to that of the other. He viewed conflict, hostility, sexual attraction, friendship, loyalty or economic opportunities, which propelled a free escape factor principle of human migration.

The promotion of schools in the rural areas have also stimulated migration of rural youths who have received primary/secondary education. Some migrate to improve their skills while others become dissatisfied with the prospect of like particularly in terms of social amenities in the rural areas. They now move to acquire higher education and to also avoid themselves of the facilities in their new area of destinations

Though, scholars have attempted to propound theories that explain migration which according to them account for migration, particularly internal migration. Notable among scholars are: Ravenstein (Law of migration), Lee (theory of migration), Sjaastad (Human investment Theory), and Todaro (Model of Rural-Urban migration). According to Ravenstein, (1880s), migration move from areas of low opportunity to areas of high opportunity.

The choice of destination is regulated by distance with migrants from the rural areas often moving towards nearly town before moving towards larger cities 11. Lee linked the forces that impact a implicit emigrant to either resettle or not. He divides these forces into pluses and in commodities. The positive or else forces pull individual towards them, and the negative or minus forces tend to drive existent down 12.

piecemeal from the plus and disadvantage forces, there are also zero forces to which the existent is indifferent. In other words, the zero forces neither pull the emigrant nor drive him away13. These forces are associated with the area of origin and the area of destination. They’re governed by particular factors which may either grease or slacken migration.

Tadaro’s Model of pastoral-civic migration suggests that the implicit emigrant’s decision to resettle involves a perception of the anticipated sluice of income that will accrue to him her. This anticipated sluice of income is a function of both the prevailing pay envelope structure in the civic area and a private probability of carrying employment in the civic area. This according to Todaro four main features was supposed

Migration is stimulated primarily by rational profitable considerations of relative costs and benefits which are substantially fiscal but are also cerebral.

The decision to resettle depends on the anticipated differentials between civic and pastoral areas and not the factual differentials. The decision to resettle also depends on the probability of successfully carrying employment in the civic areas.

The probability of carrying an civic job is equally related to the civic severance rate. This is to say the advanced the chances carrying an civic job, the lower the civic severance rate.

Migration rates in excess of civic job openings growth rates aren’t only possible but also rational and probable in the face of continued positive civic- pastoral anticipated income differentials. High rate of civic severance are thus ineluctable issues of the serious imbalances of profitable openings between civic and pastoral areas 14. This means that the rate of migration generally exceeds the rate at which civic job openings grow, this is because of the anticipated differences in stipend between civic and pastoral areas, and the anticipated difference is generally in favour of the civic areas.

These are some of the propositions that explain migration particularly pastoral-civic migration.

These are propositions upon which experimenters have grounded their explanations of migration. They also laid the foundation for migration studies. For the purpose of this study thus, there’s the need to identify and defined some crucial generalities and words in the work for illustration

Alago An ethnical nation( group) which has settled for centuries around what used to be Lafia Native Authority, Nasarawa State, Nigeria.

Origin Starting point of a place or movement at which commodity begins to live and or the country, race, or social situation that someone comes from.

Migration The act of moving from one position, region and or country to another. Or a fairly endless movement of people either collectively or largely with the purpose of changing their place of hearthstone.

agreement A place where people have come to make their homes or a place where people have come to live permanently.

Native Authority(N.A) A particular area or a country with the power to make opinions and make people do commodity or observe laws, or an association or institution that control a public service 15.

Literature Review

Generally, since Nigeria came an object of interest to the Western world, a wide range of scholarly workshop have been done on some aspects of the profitable, social and political history of the people. As attention came more and more focused on the history of different corridor of Nigeria, a admixture of erudite workshop have been rolled out by different scholars both from within and outside the props of the land. still, the case of the Alago people can not be said to have enjoyed the same interest and attention of scholars. While quite a many studies have been done, the treatment of the entire Alago is still veritably supplemental and superficial. utmost of the early workshop on Nigerian history, concentrated substantially on the large fiefdoms and conglomerates that was prominently before the arrival of colonialism. Accordingly, Alago were treated as bare supplements of these fiefdoms. This explains their limited compass of content in nearly all being literature.

The available published and unpublished workshop by Alago pupil and other scholars display a considerable degree of ignorance on the exact origin, migration routes and agreements patterns of the people. This is so because the explanatory attempts by early anthropologists of social birth and original pens all appear replete with common crimes. This is putatively manifest in their frequent treatment of the Alago as an adjunctment of the Jukun Empire.

It’s intriguing that nearly all of the published literature on the Alago people uncritically accept the account of social disquisition attributing their strain from the east. For case, writing on political and executive system in Plateau State,Sen. Luka Gwom alludes to the tradition that Alago people legendarily migrated from the east together with the Jukun, the Igala, the Goemai and others to form the notorious Kwararafa conglomerate. 16 where precisely is meant by “ cast ” isn’t clear. This is veritably apparent in his work, Plateau State political and executive Systems A literal Analysis, in which he maintained that, “ The decomposition of the Kwararafa Empire saw the movement of the Alago people to Wukari and later to Idah through Ogoja. counting largely on early social sources, Gwom agrees that it’s from Idah that Alago people formed a recognizable part of the Igala area until their migration northwards in hunt of new settlements17.

Ade Adefuye writing on “ The Alago fiefdoms a Political History ”, states that Alago traditions point to nearly in the east as their ancestral home, which they were said to have been impelled to leave following their asseveration on keeping to their traditional religious practices as against the new religion also, Islam. 18 clearly, oral accounts of the people also subscribe to this literal view on the origin of the people in focus. There’s still veritably thin or no substantiation at all to support such a spurious claim.

Meek and Charles Temple are among some of the foreign pens who also traced the origin of Alago to the Jukun Empire north of the Middle Benue straight. While in his, A Sudanese Kingdom, demure sees the Alago as participating the same culture and tradition with the Jukun, Temple in his Notes on lines, businesses, Emirates and State of Northern Nigeria, believes that though the Alago origin in uncertain, the artistic similarity of the Alago and Jukun arose only as a result of inter marriages between the two groups. To him, the Alago are presumably further of Igala strain that left Atagara near Idah in the first half of the 13th century( 1232AD).19

Ade Obayemi is antipathetic to the argument that the Alago migrated from Idah as a result of Chieftaincy dissensions . In his work, “ States and people of the Niger- Benue convergence ” in the Groundwork of Nigeria History, Obayemi dismissed any trace of imagined relation between the Alago and Igala( Idah) royal class or any substantiation of a new language learnt there from. Rather, as an archeologist using verbal and other artistic studies, Obayemi stressed that the Idoma, Yoruba, Igala, Tiv, Nupe and Jukun as well as Goemai all fall under the Kwa language family who moved into the Niger- Benue convergence to do constant warfares. 21 As an archeologist, Obayemi could be excused for inaptly making reference to Keana as large Kingdom( but not the aged area of Doma) as being more directly related to the Jukun.

Another scholar,T.N. Tamuno writing on, “ people of the Niger- Benue convergence, ” specifically bandied the Jukun, Tiv, Idoma, Igala and Nupes as the people that clustered along the Niger and benue gutters. Then as in numerous other workshop, the Alago groups are conspicuously missing. In the work published in A thousand times of west African history, edited by Ade Ajayi and Espie Ian, Tamuno, still, concedes to earlier submission to the Jukun, whose traditions of origin suggest that they migrated to their present territories from the ‘ East ’- presumably Yemen, East of Mecca, interestingly, still, after linking the Idoma explosively with the Jukun tradition, Tamuno placed Doma and Keana( both Alago fiefdoms) as two of the three most important clans of the Idoma. To him, the Idoma speaking peoples firstly enthralled an area extended from Idah in the South- west to Wukari in the east but who have been forced to shrink to a lower area owing to pressure from several neighbours. He tries to detect the missing link in this literal relationship to the fact as he puts it, that though the Idoma were united linguistically, they weren’t united into a single political state. 24 This argument sound only presumptive to the extent that the Idomas and Alagos are to a large extent, linguistically nearly affiliated. The acting contradiction then thus is, if the Alago weren’t part of the original clusters like he suggested, also the ethnical affinity and strong artistic link between the Alago and the Idoma on one hand, and between the Jukun and the two on the other still requires farther study or disquisition.

Is should be noted that contemporary migration and agreements of Alago people in Nasarawa State since 1960, according to the people oral tradition suggest that it was grounded purely on socio- profitable factors which forced the people to resettle indeed up to the time of our converse. tilling being the major conditioning of people makes them to move in hunt of rich land to ranch, as well, people engaged in trading and also in hunt of knowledge and other social amenities like seminaries, hospitals,etc.

Conclusion

This chapter attempts to define the term migration which is a endless movement of persons either in mass or on individual base. Though, there’s no respectable description of migration but scholars have tried to define migration as a fairly endless movement of people with the purpose changing their place of hearthstone. numerous reasons were stated which always compelled man to resettle; for case, people are motivated by the prevailing profitable openings of the time as well as religious partisanship and social and political dominance. But for the case of Alago, their tendency to resettle during the period under the study can be understood within the environment of conflict, hostility, fellowship, fidelity and profitable openings. There are two types of migrations and four process involved in migration independently that’s internal and transnational migration as well as pastoral- pastoral, civic- pastoral, civic and pastoral-civic migration.

The study is still confined to an examination and analysis of the significance of migration and agreement of Alago people Nasarawa State, with emphasis on Doma, Keana, Obi, Agwatashi, Assakio, Lafia and other lower agreements of Odobu, Aloshi, Ibi, Agaza, Alagye and numerous others.

The work has been divided into five chapters. The work starts from chapter one with a consideration of the general preface. It follows with the points and objects of the study, the compass and limitation of the study is also examined and an attempt at the description of conception and methodology was also made. To note also is the review of affiliated literature. The alternate chapter will give attention to the terrain of Nasarawa, major ethnical groups, socio- political associations and the profitable conditioning of the people of Nasarawa State. this is nearly followed by a chronological study of the origin of migrations and agreement of Alago people in Nasarawa State, with emphasis on Doma, Keana, Obi and other places. The fourth chapter named “ Focuses on the social relations that live between Alago and their immediate neighbours in Nasarawa State, similar as Jukun, Idoma, Tiv, Agatu, Kanuri, Eggon and others. The work is concluded by a summary and donation to knowledge for the benefit of history and succeeding generations of Alago people and other Nigerians generally.