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Abstract

Making use of previously unused Colonial Office records at the National Archives in Kew, including newspaper reports, interviews with staff of the Nigerian Railway, and debates in the Federal House of Representatives, this study examines the forces that dictated the establishment of the Nigerian Railway Corporation. It argues that the primary reason why the British colonial government established the corporation was to assist foreign interests in Nigeria by distancing itself from the direct management of labor relations between the Nigerian colonial state and the militant trade unions in the Nigerian Railway and other commercially oriented government departments. By placing the day-to-day management of these departments beyond the immediate reach of ambitious Nigerian nationalists who were anxious to quickly take over the control of the colonial state, the colonial government undermined the ability of local elite to build their weak economic base.

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