TSATSA CALIPHATE: The Sokoto Caliphate Was a Nupe Emirate! One of the major paradoxes of West African history today is the fact that the Nupe origins of the Sokoto Caliphate has been conveniently hidden from the eyes of the general public by those stakeholders whose interests are better protected through this deception. But the truth can never be hidden forever and the fact is that the truth is now coming to light amidst rigorous research efforts by independent research workers to unravel the truth of the Nupe origin behind the real history of the Sokoto Caliphate. The beginning and origin of the Sokoto Caliphate is so strongly and intimately tied to its origin in Nupe and the KinNupe general area that it is really perplexing to realize how this vital fact has been conveniently hidden from the eyes of the general public for so long without most people realizing or discovering the truth. What we are being told today by conventional history is that the Sokoto Caliphate was founded by Shehu Usmanu Dan Fodiyo together with his siblings including Shehu Abdullahi Fodiyo and his children including Sultan Bello and Nana Asmau. We are also made to believe that the story of the Sokoto Caliphate is the story of the so- called ‘Fulani Uprising’ in the Central Sudan which led to the establishment of the vast Sokoto Caliphate over a major section of ancient Nigeria with its daughter Islamic emirates throughout the length and breadth of this vast empire. Well, the truth is that there is far more to this conventional story than meets the eyes. The first, and a most important, point to note and correct with regard to this conventional story of the rise and spread of Sokoto Caliphate is the fact that the so- called ‘Fulani Uprising’ or ‘Fulani Jihad’ was not the first to introduce Islam to ancient Nigeria in particular or the Central Sudan in general. It is the wont of half-baked scholars of West African history to repeat the rote that it was the Fulani Jihadists, or even Shehu Usmanu Dan Fodiyo alone, who first introduce Islam to ancient Nigeria or the Central Sudan in general. But the truth is that Islam was introduced into ancient Nigeria in the 11th century and that is some seven hundred years, yes almost a millennium, before the birth of Shehu Usmanu Dan Fodiyo. Islam was first introduced to West Africa by the Wangarawa long distance traders almost a millennium before the birth of Shehu Usmanu Dan Fodiyo. So, it was not Shehu Usmanu Dan Fodiyo or even the Sokoto Jihadists for that matter that first introduced Islam to ancient Nigeria or the Central Sudan as we are being wrongly informed by reconstructioni st or propagandist historians today. But, and more importantly, is the fact that these long distance Wanagarawa traders who first introduced Islam to ancient Nigeria in the 11th century were actually Nupencizhi. In those days it was the Nupe people who were known as the Wangara and it was this Nupe Wanagarawa long distance traders who were shuttling as long distance traders and merchants between KinNupe and the West end of the Guinea Coast when the ancient Ghana empire suddenly emerged as the first Islamic power in the entire West African region. Actually, as we can see from a historical map, this ancient Ghana empire was located in-between North and West Africa. But, and in any case, it was the conversion of the ancient Ghana empire to Islam that led to the introduction of Islam to ancient Nigeria by the Wangara Nupe long distance traders. It was a simple and straightforward scenario, namely, these long distance Nupe Wanagaraw a traders who were shuttling between KinNupe and ancient Ghana simply became Muslims and introduced Islam to their people back home here in KinNupe when they arrived back home. And so was it that KinNupe was the first place, in the whole of ancient Nigeria, to become Islamised. Yes, the Nupe people were the first people to become Muslims in the whole of ancient Nigeria. And it wsa from KinNupe that Islam then subsequently spread to all other parts of ancient Nigeria and the Central Sudan. Today they wrongly, and rather mischievously, tell us that Islam was in other parts of Nigeria before it got to KinNupe. But that is arrant nonsense. Hausaland, for instance, did not see or know Islam until a century or so after Islam has been in KinNupe. While Islam got to KinNupe as early as the 11th century even conventional Western scholarship admits the fact that Islam did not get to Hausaland until long after the 15th century – that is almost half a millennium after Islam was first introduced to KinNupe. KinNupe was the first place to become Islamised in the whole of ancient Nigeria before all other places. And such was it that this KinNupe actually became the centre of Islamic activism and an Islamic Revolution long before other peoples and places in other parts of ancient Nigeria were even aware of what Islam is all about. The Nupe rulers and overlords were already converting to slam and thinking of how to use political Islam to their advantage long before other peoples in other parts of ancient Nigeria even knew what is Islam. We see the names of the Etsu Nupes, for instance, already fully Islamised as early as the beginning of the 16th and 17th centuries while other rulers and kings in other parts of Nigeria in those very days were still bearing non-Islamic names. The fall of Mali and the rise of Songhai demonstrated to the Etsu Nupes, in very unmistakable terms, the supreme powers of Islam as an international tool for the establishment of powerful Caliphates and new international dispensations all in the name of Jihad or Islamic proselytization . It was clear that in the name of Jihad and under the guise of the divine right to Islamization any Etsu Nupe could pick up the legitimate right to initiate religious wars, conquer and subjugate peoples and places into a new kingdom, empire or caliphate that he, the Etsu Nupe, can call his own. To cut the story short the various Etsu Nupes who were jostling for power between themselves in those days immediately realized that they could use political Islam to further their personal interests. The Etsu Nupes discovered, after seeing the role played by international Islam in the rise and fall of both Mali and Songhai empires, that they could use Islam to their great advantage in transforming themselves and the Nupe kingdom into international powers. So, the Etsu Nupes became fervent Islamists and begun to be obsessed with this idea of transforming the Nupe empire into an Islamic empire or the Nupe Caliphate. This was a serious matter and the Etsu Nupes were not joking about that. The Etsu Nupes then became patrons of Islamist and Jihadists who trooped in from all parts of the Islamic world particularly from North Africa and the Arabian Peninsula. The story of Muhammad Al-Maghili is a famous and apt one in this regard. Sheikh Al-Maghili came all the way from North Africa as a Islamic missionary who was the guest of the Etsu Nupes for the many years he resided in KinNupe and was used and sponsored by the Etsu Nupes to spread Islam to other parts of ancient Nigeria from KinNupe including Hausaland. The Etsu Nupes became the patrons of international Jihadists and Islamic missionaries – the Etsu Nupes transformed KinNupe into a magnate for international Jihadists who told the Etsu Nupes to transform KinNupe into an Islamic Caliphate. The Etsu Nupes then went about strategizing how they could transformed the Nupe empire into the first truly Islamic Caliphate, or Nupe Caliphate, in the Central Sudan or ancient Nigeria. That was how we came about the story of Etsu Jimada and Shehu Abdurrahmana Gbaji teaming up to form initiate a Jihad enterprise that was designed to transform KinNupe into a Nupe Caliphate. The plan was to transform KinNupe into an Islamic Caliphate with Etsu Jimada as the temporal or political head and Shehu Abdurrahman Gbaji as the spiritual head of the Caliphate. Shehu Abdurrahman Gbaji, the Nupe man, then initiated his Jihad enterprise with Mokwa as his capital city. With the full backing – political, financial, sociocultural and otherwise – of Etsu Jimada, we saw Shehu Abdurrahman Gbaji waging Jihad wars in all parts of KinNupe as he went round conquering parts of KinNupe and its neighbours into the fold of the nascent Nupe Caliphate that he and Etsu Jimada were building. Before long a Nupe Caliphate did emerged with Shehu Abdurrahman Gbaji as the spiritual head and Etsu Jimada as the temporal head of this Nupe Caliphate. And this new Nupe Caliphate became famous – the talk of the whole of the Central Sudan and beyond. This new Nupe Caliphate, the first of its type in ancient Nigeria, then became the rallying point for all other Jihadists and missionaries in all parts of the Central Sudan and West Africa. Other Jihadists and missionaries were coming down to Etsu Jimada and Shehu Abdurrahman Gbaji here in KinNupe to register their loyalty and seek for assistance in the execution of their own Jihad enterprises in their own localities. Other Jihadists were coming to collect flags of loyalty and affiliation from Etsu Jimada and Shehu Abdurrahman Gbaji to take to their own localities as satellite and daughter emirates and caliphates were established in various parts of the Central Sudan all under the general umbrella of the overall Nupe Caliphate that Etsu Jimada and Shehu Abdurrahman Gbaji were building. And so was it that a group of Toronkawa Fulanis, headed by one Usmanu Dan Fodiyo, came down to Etsu Jimada here in KinNupe begging him to give them the flag of the Nupe Caliphate which they can take back to their base in the Rima Valleys to show that they are also under the aegis of the Nupe Caliphate being established by the almighty Etsu Jimada here in KinNupe. Shehu Usmanu Dan Fodiyo and his cohorts also asked Etsu Jimada to assist them with military support in order to prevent them from being eliminated by the Gobir and Hausa kings who they have been fighting in the Rima valleys for long without any element of success. Etsu Jimada simply saw this as an opportunity to firmly extend and establish the hold of the new Nupe Caliphate on the Rima Valleys. So, Etsu Jimada simply asked his Jihadist war general, Shehu Abdurrahman Gbaji, to extend his Jihad enterprises in the direction of the Rima Valleys in order to help and prevent Shehu Usmanu Dan Fodiyo and his Fulani cohorts from being eliminated by the Gobir and Hausa kings. That was how Shehu Abdurrahman Gbaji went northward with his Jihad enterprise as he conquered one town and settlement after the other into the fold of the nascent Nupe Caliphate until he got to the Rima Valleys where he immediately defeated the Gobir kings and their forces at the famous Battle of Tabkin Kwatto. It was Shehu Abdurrahman Gbaji’s, the Nupe man’s, remarkable success at Tabkin Kwatto that laid the foundations of what we call the Sokoto Caliphate today. After defeating the Gobirs at Tabkin Kwatto, Shehu Abdurrahman Gbaji the Nupe man went ahead to also sack Alkalawa the capital of the Gobir and he also went ahead to singlehandedly build and establish Sokoto as a new capital city for Shehu Usmanu Dan Fodiyo and his Fulani cohorts. In essence it was Shehu Abdurrahman Gbaji the Nupe man who fought the decisive battles that established the Sokoto Caliphate for the Fulanis and he was also the one who established the Sokoto as a new capital. As a matter of fact Shehu Abdurrahman Gbaji the Nupe man became so famous among the Fulani Jhadists that Shehu Usman Dan Fodiyo almost lost his name ad following among his own people. In fact Shehu Abdullahi Fodiyo, the brother to Shehu Usmanu Fodiyo first had his quarrel with and broke away from his brother Shehu Usmanu Dan Fodiyo on account of the fact that their Jihad enterprise lost its vigour and became subsumed into the overall Nupe Caliphate Jihad of Shehu Abdurrahman Gbaji. Shehu Abdurrahman Gbaji’s fame among the Fulanis became such that they were regarding him as the Promised Mahdi whom the Prophet Muhammad has said will come and deliver the world towards the end times. Shehu Abdurrahman Gbaji’s fame and reputation became a source of discomfit to Shehu Usmanu Dan Fodiyo who eventually have to convince Shehu Abdurrahman Gbaji to go back to KinNUpe. In any case it should be noted that Shehu Abdurrahman Gbaji was the one who almost singlehandedly founded and established the Sokoto Caliphate for the Fulani Jihadists. In those initial days the Sokoto Caliphate was not known or referred to as the Sokoto Caliphate – it was simply a small or minor emirate founded by for the Fulani Jihadists Shehu Abdurrahman Gbaji the Nupe man. Etsu Jimada and Shehu Abdurrahman Gbaji’s strategy in those days was to go about founding and establishing various emirates within and outside KinNupe with the view to at a time coalesce or merge all these minor emirates into one almighty Nupe Caliphate or Mokwa Caliphate at the right time when the Nupe Caliphate was ripe for such a consolidation of its various emirates into a central command at Mokwa or Zhima. But when Shehu Abdurrahman Gbaji got back to KinNupe he found out that Etsu Jimada had been killed by his archenemy Etsu Zubairu Majiya. The result was that Shehu Abdurrahman Gbaji himself became a powerless fugitive who was eventually assassinated by his own enemies – including the Mallam Dendo camp and Etsu majiya forces – at the village of Akere. The deaths of both Etsu Jimada and Shehu Abdurrahman Gbaji of course brought about the suddenly and untimely end of the Nupe Caliphate that initially began to gather some very serious momentum throughout the Central Sudan general area. When the Nupe Caliphate enterprise died such a sudden death, the daughter emirates it left behind – including the Sokoto emirate – immediately got the chance to grew up on their own. And of all these daughter emirates founded and established by the combined team of Etsu Jimada and Shehu Abdurrahman Gbaji the Nupe man, it was the Sokoto emirate that immediately grew into a powerful caliphate due to many historical factors we may not be able to dwelt on right away. Well, the Sokoto emirate originally founded and established by a Nupe man, Shehu Abdurrahman Gbaji, then grew up into a Sokoto Caliphate that eventually, and paradoxically enough, came to subjugate and incorporate within itself the petty Nupe emirates formed by people like Mallam Dendo, Mallam Babba of Agaie, Mallam Maliki of Lafiagi. The Sokoto emirate founded by a Nupe man grew into a Sokoto Caliphate that incorporated Nupe emirates within itself. Well, and in the context of the theme of this present writeup, the Nupe genesis and origin of the Sokoto Caliphate is being deliberately hidden from the eyes of the general public. But as our narrations so far have shown it was the Nupe king Etsu Jimada and the Nupe Jihadist Shehu Abdurrahman Gbaji who founded and established the Sokoto Caliphate for the Fulani Jihadists. It was when the Fulani Jihadists, under the head of Shehu Usman Dan Fodiyo, came down to KinNupe begging Etsu Jimada to help them against the Sarkis of the Gobir and the Hausa that Shehu Abdurrahman Gbaji went up north and defeated the Gobirs and Hausas for the Fulani Jihadists and he also founded and established Sokoto as a city for the Fulanis. That the Sokoto Calipahte was founded and established by the Nupes used to be a common knowledge known to all and sundry in the past. What came to complicate the issue was when the Bida Emirate, the Lapai Emirate, the Lafiagi Emirate and other Nupe emirates of latter times all rushed to Sokoto or Gwandu to collect Jihad Flags from the same Fulan Jihadists who had earlier on came down to KinNupe to collect Jihad Flag from Estu Jimada and Shehu Abdurrahman Gbaji. If the Nupe Caliphate enterprise of Etsu Jimada and Shehu Abdurrahman Gbaji had succeeded without both Etsu Jimada and Shehu Abdurrahman Gabji not being killed, the Sokoto emirate would have remained an emirate under Shehu Abdurrahman Gbaji’s Nupe Caliphate and no Nupe emirate would have gone to Sokoto or Gwandu asking for Jihad Flag. The Sokoto Caliphate was initially a Nupe caliphate founded and established by Etsu Jimada and Shehu Abdurrahman Gbaji the Nupe man for the Fulani Jihadists in the Rima Valleys. But today we are not being told the truth. Today they are reversing the facts and turning history on its head by telling us that the Sokoto Caliphate is a purely Fulani phenomenon and that it was the Fulanis who brought Islam to KinNupe. This trend at reversing the truth and hiding the fact was abetted by the colonial authorities in the days of Frederick Lugard who used colonial historians to rewrite ancient Nigerian history in a manner that will favour their administrative system of Indirect Rule. Under the system of Indirect Rule the people of Nigeria are divided along racial and class lines the way the English society was structured back in the England of those days. In this racist classification typical of the White colonial historian of those days the ancient people of Nigeria were assumed to be of originally different races with the Whiter races, that is the Fulanis, at the top and the blacker races, that is the Negroes like the Ibibio, at the bottom. So, it served the colonial historian working under the Indirect Rule Colonial Government authorities, to rewrite history in such a manner as to say that the Sokoto Caliphate was initiated and executed singlehandedly by the Fulanis without the help or assistance of the Negroid Nupes whom they deemed to be racially inferior to the Fulanis. And so is it that the White man came and made things worse by mischievously popularizing the wrong claim that the Sokoto Caliphate was founded and established by the Fulani people and not by the Nupe people. The truth of the matter is that it was Nupencizhi who first brought Islam to the Fulanis and it was Nupencizhi who founded and established the Sokoto Caliphate. [This article that you just read is actually a summary of my book title ‘Tsatsa Caliphate: The Sokoto Caliphate Was a Nupe Emirate. It s in that book that you will get all the reference materials and data you may need in prove of the fact that the Sokoto Caliphate was initially a Nupe emirate founded and established by the duo of Etsu Jimada and Shehu Abdurrahman Gbaji the Nupe man. Please get and read the book for the details and the references.]
Posted on: Wed, 16 Oct 2013 06:43:39 +0000
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