in eastern Nigeria the Igbo peoples had no chiefs when the
British encountered them in the nineteenth century. The
British then created chiefs, the warrant chiefs. In Sierra
Leone, the British would base indirect rule on existing
indigenous institutions and systems of authority.
Nevertheless, regardless of the historical basis for the
individuals recognized as paramount chiefs in 1896,
indirect rule, and the powers that it invested in paramount
chiefs, completely changed the existing politics of Sierra
Leone. For one, it introduced a system of social
stratification—the ruling houses—where none had existed
previously. A hereditary aristocracy replaced a situation
that had been much more fluid and where chiefs had
required popular support. Instead what emerged was a
rigid system with chiefs holding office for life, beholden to
their patrons in Freetown or Britain, and far less
accountable to the people they ruled. The British were
happy to subvert the institutions in other ways, too, for
example, by replacing legitimate chiefs with people who
were more cooperative. Indeed, the Margai family, which
supplied the first two prime ministers of independent Sierra
Leone, came to power in the Lower Banta chieftaincy by
siding with the British in the Hut Tax Rebellion against the
reigning chief, Nyama. Nyama was deposed, and the
Margais became chiefs and held the position until 2010.
What is remarkable is the extent of continuity between
colonial and independent Sierra Leone. The British created
the marketing boards and used them to tax farmers.
Postcolonial governments did the same extracting at even
higher rates. The British created the system of indirect rule
through paramount chiefs. Governments that followed
independence didn’t reject this colonial institution; rather,
they used it to govern the countryside as well. The British
set up a diamond monopoly and tried to keep out African
miners. Postindependence governments did the same. It is
true that the British thought that building railways was a
good way to rule Mendeland, while Siaka Stevens thought
the opposite. The British could trust their army and knew it
could be sent to Mendeland if a rebellion arose. Stevens,
on the other hand, could not do so. As in many other African
nations, a strong army would have become a threat to
Stevens’s rule. It was for this reason that he emasculated