170 AFRICAN AFFAIRS

The Fulani - A Nomadic Tribe in

Northern Nigeria
By Mustafa B. Ibrahim

p EXISTS in Northern Nigeria—a country dependent on its

I agriculture—a nomadic, believed to be alien tribe, whose grazing habits
present serious problems to the country's agricultural and forestry
practices. This tribe is known by the Hausa name Fulani (singular Bafilatani)
but they call themselves Fulbe (ningnlnr Fullo).
Although the main purpose of this article is to appraise the land—use
problems which are raited by their grazing habits, a background history of
the Fulani will not be out of place.
The origin of the Fulani seems to be somewhat obscure. Some writers have
endeavoured to assign to them an Egyptian origin while others trace them
to Fezzan. M. Delafosse, whose studies in West African languages give
special weight to his opinions, holds the view that the Fulani may have owed
their origin to the downfall of the Hyksos, or Shepherd Kings, who were
driven from Egypt about the year 1630 B.C. He likens the Fulani to the
gypsies of Europe, and as a result of some slight study of his own of the
gypsy language he says, " I think I may say that of all African, Asiatic,
Oceanian, and European tongues which I have compared with the language
of the Fulani, the language of the gypsies is that which appears to me to
possess the greatest point of resemblance ".
Lady Lugard (1) in support of the theory of the descent of the Fulani
from the Hyksos, speaks of the great similarity observed by her husband to
exist between the Wahuma of Eastern Africa and the Fulani of the Western
Sudan. Both were pastoral nomads who, in the endeavour to secure fresh
grazing ground, became invaders and conquerors. In Buganda, Bunyoro,
Karagwe, and other eastern states the Wahuma founded the royal dynasties,
while their tribesmen, corresponding in position to the Cow Fulani, tended
the cattle of the negroids. The Wahuma, who have a great physical likeness
to the Fulani, are often strikingly handsome and extremely intelligent That
the Wahuma should have descended upon East Africa from the valley of the
Nile is not surprising. Of both races, Fulani and Wahuma alike, it can at
least be said that they so far support the theory of a common origin in the
Hyksos, as to have n^m'titimed through all their history, in the diverse countries
in which they are to be found, the ancient position of Shepherd Rings.
The one point upon which all scientific investigation is agreed is that the
language of the Fulani is not African, and that this people, which has main-
tained in the Sudan an individuality no less marked and persistent than that
maintained by the Jews in Europe, was originally wholly foreign to the
environment in which we now find it.

Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/afraf/article-abstract/65/259/170/147971

by Durham University Library user
on 27 March 2018
 171

Assuming the Fulani to have descended upon the Sudan from Egypt, we
have still the fact that within historic times die movement of the Fulani in
the Western Sudan has been from west to east, not from east to west.
Settling first in the country now known as Senegal they spread eastward in
search of pasturage for their cattle. Many of their tribes having embraced
Islam as early as the twelfth century, their movement eastward seems to have
carried with it the spread of Islam. Although there were a few learned men
among them, they seem during the period fourteenth to eighteenth century,
to have led the life of wandering herdsmen drifting gradually from west to
east, reaching Hausa-land about the TnJHHl^ of the thirteenth century. In
their movements they neither married with the local population nor formed
permanent settlements of their own.
By the end of the eighteenth century many of their clans had become devout
mnfrVfTm, and in 1804 the leader of one of these dans, Usman Dan Fodio,
proclaimed a Holy War against the pagan tribes and the nominally Moslem
States of Hausaland. All the Moslem Fulani clans thereupon rose against
the chiefs of the territories in which they were pasturing at the time, with
such success that within thirty years the greater part of Northern Nigeria was
in their ^"idg, parcelled out among the clan—leaden who had received
commissions from the " Shehu" Usman and became his Emirs (Deputies)
for the domains which they had conquered.
Since then the tribe has become split into two distinct sections, the
members of which today show very little in common, both as regard physical
features and culture. One section followed their new found political fortune,
and intermarrying with the Hausas as well as enjoying the luxury of pagan
concubines, has become completely swallowed up by the Hausas in physical
features and culture. These men now form the members of the upper strata
of society in the country and are generally found in positions of importance
and responsibility.
The other section chose to continue with its pastoral life and has mnninni
as such up to the present day. Its members have kept the original features of
the tribe by refusing to intermarry with other tribes, not even with their
frimmiti who have become settled and whom they regard to be degenerate.
This latter section of the tribe is now distinguished by the name " Bororo "
(Bush or Cow Fulani). It is now almost a race apart from the aristocratic
Fulani who form the ruling caste throughout Hausaland.
It is with the latter section of the tribe, ix. Bororo that this article is
concerned, and henceforth the tribe will be refcited to as such.
So much for history. As we know them today the Boron are handsome,
slim and blue-eyed with finely cut arqiriiinc features, soft silky hair and tawny
or ivory skin. They are brave, war-like and very enduring, but these qualities
are often concealed by their emaciated features and high cheek bones. These
nomads present the greatest possible contrast to the indigenous tribes. There is
no trace of black blood in the true Bororo.
Now that tribal warfare is but a thing of history, the Boron show their

Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/afraf/article-abstract/65/259/170/147971

by Durham University Library user
on 27 March 2018
 172 AFRICAN AFFAIRS

bravery in " Sharo " (flogging contest). In this contest young men of two
opposing clans take turns to flog each other in an open place in a main town
during the Lesser and Greater Beiram festivals. The man to be flogged
stands erect with his hands up and his opponent strikes with all his force.
The flogged man takes his turn to strike at the same or another meeting.
The women folk stand by singing and cheering their sweethearts. Cruel
though this may sound the Bororo considers it an essential part of his life,
for no young man who does not participate in " sharo " can ever hope to
win a lady.
In spite of their reputation as conquerors, the Boron are perhaps the most
easily excited and timid people in Nigeria. They are extremely reserved and
their behaviour can be as unpredictable as the English weather. Very often
the Bororo, if he talks at all, will say the exact opposite of what he means.
Tbii fact is so widely known amongst the Hausas and other tribes that the
word " FOlanchi" means the expressing of the exact opposite of one's feeling,
or the ability to suffer without complaint. The Bororo can be very shrewd and
intriguing.
Their gullibility and ignorance make the Boron an easy prey for the
Hausas. A very well known story says that a party of ten Boron went to bathe
in a river and when they emerged from the water their leader tried to make
sure no one was left in the water. He counted the nine others but failed to
count himself. In the belief that one of them was missing every man took
his turn to count the lot, but it did not occur to any of them to include
himself in the count. Having made sure in their minds that one of their party
was still in the water, they sat down to brood over their calamity. When a
Hausa man appeared on the scene he was promised a cow to fish out the
missing man from the water. After counting the party and making absolutely
sure there were ten men in it, the Hausa man asked them to go into the
water again and come out after a little while, which they did. The Hausa man
then asked diem to group up in pairs, and it was only by seeing the five
pairs that they realised they were still ten in number. To the reader who
does not know the Bororo this may sound incredible, but the Bororo could
be as simple as that, if not simpler.
The Borori are suspicious of every one else's words and actions. Thus they
try to avoid contact with people generally and government officials in
particular. Meek (2) in a report on population census, 1921 remarks " The
majority of pastoralists are Fulani, and it is possible that many of the class
have escaped inclusion in the census ".
As a result of their very long association with bush and animals the Borori
are very superstitious and subject to mythological and animistic beliefs. Not
long ago they used to ascribe the death of their cattle in large numbers to
bad spirits haunting the grazing ground. The breakthrough to get them to
accept free veterinary services meant to improve their cattle was only made
in 1935 when epidemics of the various cattle diseases, more especially
rinderpest, decimated their herds.

Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/afraf/article-abstract/65/259/170/147971

by Durham University Library user
on 27 March 2018
 IBRAHIM 173

We now come to the Bororo grazing habits which is the main purpose of
this article. I have dwelt long on their history and general characteristics
specially in order to give an indication of their attitude towards cattle. Having
inherited the love of them from his ancestors, the Bororo regards cattle as the
all-in-all of his life. To him cattle rearing is a way of life rather than an
economic activity; cattle are an end in themselves as much as a means to
an end.
The average Bororo regards his cattle as a sort of capital which should
grow without any effort on his part other than driving them to the grazing
ground in the mornings and back to camp in the evenings. While this capital
is expected to be self-increasing, it provides very small or no income as
virtually no animals are sold for die sake of obtaining cash. The occasions
when the Bororo sells his animals are when they are too old to reproduce and
in cases of sickness. His only source of income is the proceeds of the sale
of milk and/or butter, which gives him enough money to satisfy his wants
which are few, even by African standards. The Bororo has no need for
elaborate clothes, nor does he require a house, let alone furniture.
Thus owners are reluctant to sell their cattle, preferring rather to accumulate
large herds by which their social standing is assessed. Herds of one thousand
heads are not uncommon. Even though in a large herd many of the cattle
may be mere bags of bones, nevertheless the owner is proud of it and enjoys
a high social standing; for it is the number which matters and quality does
not in die least count.
That is why the Bororo cannot take the trouble of stabling his animals,
much more the expense of concentrated feeds. Not even supplementary feeds
in the dry season appeals to him ; instead he finds it necessary to move from
one grazing ground to another as will be seen later.
The practice among the Boron is to graze their cattle in large herds often
in charge of small boys who are adepts in controlling the movements of the
animals by calls or whistles. Only die adults are allowed to go out to the
grazing grounds, the calves being kept in the camp. Half a dozen or even
fewer boys may be given charge of up to hundred animals and in most cases
the animals are quite safe in the hands of these youngsters. Every day the
animals are taken out to the grazing grounds which are more often than not
within easy reach from the temporary camp at which the families are based.
Also, the grazing grounds are dose to a watering point so that the animals
can be taken there for a drink at least once a day—at mid-day or before
returning to the camp.
These young shepherds, however, prove inadequate when, in the course of
their wandering and by any chance, the animals come across arable land which
is under crop. If the young shepherds fail to control the herd—they do in
the majority of cases—the owner is in for real trouble for any damage done
to the crop. This point will be dealt widi further on in this article.
At night the cattle are kept in the open, either tied together by a short
rope joining the foreleg of one to that of another or are put in a kraal of

Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/afraf/article-abstract/65/259/170/147971

by Durham University Library user
on 27 March 2018
 174 AFRICAN AFFAIRS

tbom bush or cut branches of trees; the latter method being the more usual.
A fire is usually kept burning in the middle of the kraal.
Having made temporary camp at a given place and provided pasturage
and water are available, the Bororo cattle graze the same grounds for weeks
but as soon as pasturage and water become scarce in the neighbourhood both
cattle and owners move to another locality.
No one can forecast the movements of the Borori. One month a given
district may be full of Bororo camps, come from where his fellow-man has
but the vaguest of notions. The next, not a single Bororo be seen within it.
But, as often as not, they return, the ensuing year to their old haunts. In this
way they keep on moving with their herds over large stretches of country and
following the seasonal variations in pasturage and water.
To the Hausa farmer the Borori are an invaluable asset, and he enters into
regular contracts with them for turning their cattle on to his fields; and he
buys milk from them. In their turn, the Borori who virtually do no farming,
buy com from the Hausa farmer.
The general drift of the Borori is in a southerly direction towards the banks
of the large rivers during the rainless months of the year (November - May),
followed by a return to the northern regions during the rains (June - October)
when pasturage and water are good and plentiful there.
Because they do not have to carry any camping equipment with them, the
Borori find no inconvenience in their movements. If and when they decide to
camp at a place, all they have to do is to erect huts of grass supported by
wooden poles, which they can procure easily from the surrounding bush.
Occasionally they use corn stalks instead of grass. When they decide to move
they simply gather their few cooking utensils and go on, leaving the huts,
standing.
It is of particular interest to note that nowadays the grazing grounds
available to the Borori are mostly within reserved forests ; the rest of the
land being under cultivation or fallow. Since there is nowhere else the Borori
can be accommodated, the Forest Department has found it necessary to
permit grazing, but not camping, in its reserved forests, most of which support
open woodland with a continuous ground cover of grasses. Obviously, this
is a policy which subjects the forest to rapid degradation.
Although it must be admitted that the free range grazing of Bororo cattle
does little damage to the forest, there is a very grave danger in fire being
set to bush deliberately by the Borori in an attempt to obtain new flush of
grass. To the danger which fire constitutes to the forest must be added the
threats being made by agriculture in its present form of shifting cultivation.
If the Bororo cattle are a boon to the farms out of cropping season, they
are equally a menace during the cropping season. There is thus a continual
struggle between Borori and farmers, and when a dispute goes to the Courts—
it does in the majority of cases—it invariably ends in the Bororo paying heavy
compensation for damage to crops. Likewise, the Bororo may be involved
in heavy court fines if convicted of allowing his cattle to camp over night in

Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/afraf/article-abstract/65/259/170/147971

by Durham University Library user
on 27 March 2018
 IBRAHIM 175

a forest reserve. To put h in plain words, the Bororo finds himself in the
position of the proverbial egg between two stones.
Bororo grazing provides the forest authorities with an additional object of
management for the comparatively unproductive savanna, but the area
available for grazing in future will diminish to the extent by which natural
woodland on better quality sites is converted to plantations. There is an
increasing trend towards replacement of low-yielding savanna by productive
plantations. The resultant loss of grazing grounds may lead to overgrazing of
the areas still open to cattle, with consequent soil erosion and general
deterioration of the she potential.
It is true that some reserved forests by their nature are more suitable for
grazing than for wood production, but in such areas efforts will have to be
made towards effective utilization by controlled rotational grazing. A few
pilot schemes of this nature are already in operation in Northern Nigeria.
It is unfortunate that there is as yet little integration between stock raising
and arable farming. As long as this situation continues, the best hope for
the graziers lies in the dual use of savanna forest reserves for grazing and wood
production.
Gordon (3) rightly sums up the situation when he says, " Unless the Fulani
can be induced to change their way of life, the timii must come when culti-
vation must stop short and at least leave to the Fulani the standing room for
their animals. This may well be the ultimate future of many Northern
Province forest reserves and future foresters may find themselves performing
a dual function as providers of fuel and managers of grazing ranges ". The
position has changed but little since Gordon made his observations in 1951.
This naturally leads us to die question ' Will the Borori change their way
of life ? ' It is the declared aim of government to assist this people to adopt
a settled life so that agriculture and cattle can benefit one another. It is the
firm belief of government that without cattle and some form of tree planting
agriculture cannot go on in the country for very long. One can therefore
venture to say yes, they will change in view of the following forces which
are at work: —

1. Mounting pressure on land

As already indicated, in many districts the stage has been reached when
nearly all land outside the forest estate is under cultivation or fallow and
grazing is virtually confined to forest reserves. The pressure on land is rapidly
increasing with the rise in population and increased size of holdings mads
possible by the spread of mmd funning
The aim of the Forestry Division is to convert part of the forest reserves
into plantations of value. This wQl lead to a reduction in the area available
for grazing.

2. Increased grassing facilities

Those portions of the forest estate which are more suitable for gracing than
for forestry purposes are being improved for controlled rotational grazing by

Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/afraf/article-abstract/65/259/170/147971

by Durham University Library user
on 27 March 2018
 176 AFRICAN AFFAIRS

the provision of all-season watering points, seeding with grass and planting of
forage and fodder trees to provide the supplementary feeds badly needed in
the dry season. In addition to these forest cum grazing areas the Veterinary
Department is constituting its own grazing areas out of the remaining waste
land.
Private farmers who own cattle have, out of sheer necessity, learnt to grow
on their holdings forage and fodder trees from which they get the dry season
supplementary feed required by their animals. The Bororo will have to take
a leaf from such fanners if he is to survive.

3. Rising sale value of cattle

Increased demands for meat, milk and butter have of late stepped up the
sale value of cattle. A local meat industry (for export to Lagos and the south)
recently established at four principal towns will in course of time show the
Boron the advantage in stabling animals Although they may not publicly
admit the fact, some of them at least have seen the difference between a well
bred cattle worth £30 and two lean ones worth £10 each.

4. Education and cultural contact

With the younger generation now attending schools and literacy spreading
among the adults as a result of the government mass literacy campaign, the
Boron will sooner or later come to learn the proper and economic way of
cattle rearing.
As the increase in population and improved communications have forced
the Borori to be in contact with other tribes now, they are themselves begin-
ning to appreciate the need for clothes and a house to live in. In fact, a few
of them are beginning to feel frustrated with their way of life which, they
believe is a sort of starving in the midst of plenty.
The women folk, who through sale of milk and buying of things from
markets, come into contact with townspeople more than the men folk, seem
to be doing better in adapting themselves to town life. They openly admit
that they envy the lot of the average housewife. And it is not very long since
the Borori have abandoned the practice of living by themselves in the forest
for weeks in the attempt to evade cattle tax.
Apart from the above forces working to induce the Borori to change their
way of life, there is not the likelihood of their finding another home in a
neighbouring territory. To the north and north-west is the Niger Republic,
which is drier than N. Nigeria and cannot support more cattle than it has
at present; and to the east and south-east are respectively the Chad and
Cameroons Republics, both of which are full of cattle. One can therefore
venture to rule out the possibility of a Borori permanent migration to any
of these territories.
REFERENCES
1. Lugard, Lady (Flora L. Shaw). A Tropical Dependency (1906).
2. Meek, C. K. The Tribes of Northern Nigeria (1921).
3. Gordon, W. A. The Law of the Forest (1955).

Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/afraf/article-abstract/65/259/170/147971

by Durham University Library user
on 27 March 2018