Custom is known as urf in Arabic. In Islam the sources of law are the Holy Koran, the Sunna, the ijma’a, the qiyas and possibly urf Customary law existed before the advent of the Condominium Rule in the Sudan. But the origins of the customs and their nature have not yet been studied seriously. According to section 9 of the Civil Justice Ordinance, 1929, the civil courts of the Sudan may have resort to customary law to reach a decision if there is no express enactment covering a certain situation by applying the formula of equity, justice and good conscience of section 9. Moreover, the law to be administered in personal matters in any suit or other proceeding in a civil court shall be any custom applicable to the parties concerned which is not contrary to justice, equity and good conscience, and has not been altered or abolished and has not been declared void by the decision of a competent court.

L’évolution politique des Etats d’Afrique noire semble caractérisée par la succession de mouvements qui affectent, presque en même temps, la plupart d’entre eux. Au moment de leur accession à l’indépendance, les Etats d’Afrique noire adoptérent le modèle de la démocratie pluraliste. Les constitutions établissaient les conditions de la concurrence pacifique pour 1’exercice du pouvoir politique et l’existence de plusieurs partis permettait, apparemment, la mise en oeuvre des règies constitutionnelles. Les nouveaux Etats étaient généralement gouvernés par des hommes qui avaient mené leur peuple vers l’indépendance par l’action politique partisane et la négotiation avec la puissance coloniale. La plupart de ces gouvernants étaient des intellectuels ou des syndicalistes. A partir de 1963, un changement important se produit. La révolte de quelques sous-officiers togolais aboutit à l’assassinat du Président de la République. Ces militaires étaient mécontents mais ils n’aspiraient pas à la conquête du pouvoir. Depuis lors, les coups d’Etat organisés par des militaires se sont multipliés et dix sept pays sont actuellement dirigés par des gouvernements militaires ou issus d’un putsch militaire. Il ne parait pas excessif de parler de “l’Afrique des militaires” après “l’Afrique des instituteurs et des médecins”.

This case, as will be seen from the facts, was between the Itsekiri2 tribe sub-tribe in Warri Division of the Midwestern State of Nigeria, who were plaintiffs, and the defendants, a family from another tribe in Eastern Urhobo Division of the Midwestern State who had founded a home in Okere,3 Warri. It was about the “ownership” of a piece or parcel of land in Okere. The plaintiffs claimed, inter alia, a declaration that in accordance with Itsekiri customary law the piece or parcel of land in dispute at Okere, Warri, was the property of the Ogitsi Family of Okere subject only to the overlordship of the Olu (King) of Warri, now vested in and exercisable by Itsekiri Communal Lands Trustees by virtue of the Communal Land Rights (Vesting in Trustees) Law, 1958, and the Warri Division (Itsekiri Communal Lands) Trust Instrument, 1959.

During the academic year 1975–76 I carried out research in the Ghana National Archives to collect information on the history of the Hausaphone Muslim communities in the Gold Coast. In the course of it a number of documents came to light from the administrative files of the colonial period that showed how the Gold Coast Marriage of Mohammedans Ordinance had worked—or failed to work—and the kinds of problems it had given rise to in a typical Muslim Hausaphone zongo, that is Muslim quarter, of the southern Gold Coast.