ALIVE AND WELL: PROFILES OF TRADITIONAL

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 05 NIAMEY 000742

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

DEPT. FOR AF/W AND INR/AA; PARIS FOR AFRICA WATCHER

E.O. 12958: N/A
TAGS: PGOV KDEM PHUM SOCI NG
SUBJECT: ALIVE AND WELL: PROFILES OF TRADITIONAL
CHIEFTAINCY IN RURAL NIGER

REF: A. NIAMEY 128

B. 06 NIAMEY 1190

C. NIAMEY 739

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SUMMARY
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1. During recent travel Poloff examined the role of
traditional chiefs in Niger. Characterized since colonialism
by a highly-centralized state that often undercut traditional
rulers, Niger has recently embraced a system of political
decentralization based on democratically elected local
governments. While on paper, these "commune" governments have
taken over some of the functions of the chiefs and the
central government administrators, the reality is more
complex. While chiefs are agents of the state, government
control over the chiefs varies in practice, as do chiefs'
conceptions of their role. Chiefs often dominate the locally
elected commune governments, and are in a position to dictate
their success or failure. Chiefs usually enjoy more popular
support than local or national politicians. Their presence
can make local democracy awkward in practice. Their role
vis-a-vis modern judicial and governmental institutions
invites criticism from the secular civil society. Yet, in the
world's least developed country, where better than eighty
percent of the people live in rural areas, traditional chiefs
remain a major source of authority for most Nigeriens. While
some chiefs complicate efforts to promote democracy and the
rule of law, the institution serves as a break on radical
Islam, a viable mechanism for cross-border and local conflict
resolution, and an essential -- if often un-tapped -- partner
and guide for development interventions. END SUMMARY

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"DIRECT RULE" AND CHIEFS' LEGITIMACY
IN COLONIAL AND POST-COLONIAL NIGER
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2. Colonial resistance to the French was organized by chiefs
(like Amadou Kourandaga, Sultan of Damagaram) and noblemen
(like Kaocin of Agadez),who are still heroes in contemporary
Niger. Unlike the British in Nigeria, the French followed
conquest with a system of direct rule that reduced
traditional rulers to implementing agents of the state. The
French also developed clear lines of authority (and physical
borders) between chiefs via a cascading system of
responsibility. At the summit of Nigerien chieftaincy are the
Sultans of Damagaram (Zinder) and the Air (pronounced
"aye-air"),or Agadez. In Maradi and Dosso Regions, the
highest chiefs are the Provincial chiefs of Gobir and Katsina
(Maradi),and Dosso. Below Sultans and Province Chiefs are
Canton Chiefs. At the lowest level are village and urban
"neighborhood" chiefs (reftel A). Under French rule, Nigerien
chiefs collected taxes and meted out local justice, but at
the behest of French Prefects and Governors. The French
policy of subordinating chiefs to civil administrators,
changing boundaries between traditional kingdoms and cantons,
and deposing resistant chiefs in favor of docile or
French-speaking candidates weakened chieftaincy as an
institution and lessened popular reverence for it.


3. In an important departure from colonial policy,
independent Niger has largely allowed local communities and
noblemen to select chiefs for themselves via a
quasi-democratic mechanism described reftel (A).
Consequently, the quality of individual chiefs is often high,
and the institution's legitimacy has re-bounded since the
colonial period. Otherwise, the Nigerien state has retained
the centralized character of its colonial predecessor, and
seems to allow traditional rulers less autonomy, on paper,
than neighboring Nigeria does. Niger's chiefs answer to the
Ministry of the Interior, which supervises their election and
provides them with a modest subsidy. Their role in tax
collection, dispute resolution, Islamic civil law disputes,
and the local administration of justice is governed by the
law and by the local Prefect. Since the election of new
commune councils in 2004, many chiefs have surrendered their
tax collection authority to municipal tax assessors and
collectors know as receveurs, though in communities without
receveurs, chiefs still perform this role. Represented on
local councils by ex-officio members (usually close relatives
or other members of the court) Niger's chiefs have a modest
formal voice in local governance, tax policy, and development
planning. While chiefs' formal authorities are circumscribed
by law, their informal role is often much greater in
practice, and gives them authority over many of the most
important issues facing ordinary Nigeriens.

NIAMEY 00000742 002 OF 005



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THE SULTAN OF ZINDER AND CONFLICT
RESOLUTION
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4. In rural Niger, farmer / herder disputes are the principal
source of deadly conflict. Since 2004, more than seventy
Nigeriens have been killed in such conflicts, more than in
any other type of civil disturbance. While these disputes
often assume an ethnic dimension (Hausa or Djerma farmers vs.
Fulani herders) they also divide farmers and pastoralists of
the same community. Most Nigerien farmers live within 100
miles of the Nigeria border, and these conflicts often pit
nationals of one state against the other. Instances of farmer
/ herder conflict are among the most important issues facing
Niger's chiefs, and one which they are uniquely equipped to
resolve.


5. While traditional rulers may refer any case to civil
courts, the courts' poor reputation among ordinary Nigeriens
(who are also inhibited by a sense of shame from bringing a
personal or village level dispute before a formal court)
means that most seek the chief's intervention first. In
Zinder Region judges have to travel widely in rural areas to
resolve property and land conflicts but the GON does not
provide them with gas money. Judges either seek gas money and
other support from litigants or refrain from "riding circuit"
at all. Aside from his legitimacy in the eyes of ordinary
people, the chief offers expeditious, free justice based on a
code derived from Islam and African tradition that most
people can intuitively understand and accept.
Misapprehensions about modern law and courts, the expense and
difficulty of hiring a lawyer (none maintain a permanent
presence outside of Niamey; notwithstanding the presence of a
Court of Appeals in Zinder, the city has no lawyers),and
habit all support the traditional system of chiefly justice.


6. The Sultan of Zinder's docket is an especially prominent
and busy venue for conflict resolution. On any given day the
Sultan may hear five cases. Excluding farmer / herder
conflicts, these include land-tenure disputes (often the
most difficult to untangle),inheritance, marriage and
divorce issues, and disputes between neighbors. Such are the
daily conflicts of most Nigeriens. Sultan Mahamadou Moustapha
of Zinder, a former gendarme, has recently mediated some
sensitive disputes. In a May 9 meeting with the Sultan's
court, Emboffs heard details of a dispute between nomadic
Arabs and Toubous. Both groups need to be handled with care.
Nomadic Arabs faced expulsion from Niger in 2006, as the GON
sought to respond to local aggravation over their assertion
of grazing rights (reftel B). Toubous conducted a rebellion
against the GON in the 1990s. Both groups have reason to be
wary of Nigerien justice, but both were willing to accept
mediation by the Sultan.


7. The Sultan brought chiefs from the two communities
together and negotiated a solution over time. All signed off
with a Koranic oath, and conflict between the two groups has
since been averted. The Sultan's court described his
jurisprudence as a blend of Shari'a, Koranic insights, and
common sense. While such an informal system may not yield
consistent rulings, it has the advantage of flexibility and
community acceptance.


8. As part of his response to cross-border farmer / herder
conflicts, the Sultan of Zinder has revived traditional
relationships with royal neighbors to the south. The Sultan
maintains "ambassadors" at the royal courts of Kano and
Daura. These contacts enable traditional rulers to mediate
cross-border disputes informally, without a time-consuming
process of referral to their countries' respective capitals.
Locals seek and accept this form of organic justice. The
Nigerien state, which authorizes traditional rulers to
maintain such "foreign relations" seems to agree.


9. The Sultan of Zinder goes on the radio once a week with a
broadcast that addresses conflict resolution and avoidance.
Targeting the Hausas of southern Zinder region (the
historical region of "Damagaram," where the Zinder Sultans
ruled),the program is supported by the GON's rural radio
network. It therefore takes its place alongside other content
that the GON regards as essential for rural audiences:
Koranic readings, proceedings of local commune councils,
weather and crop information, and health messages.
Recognizing the Sultan's hold on the popular imagination, the
GON gives him the space to address community conflict issues
as only he can.

NIAMEY 00000742 003 OF 005



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PARTY POLITICS AND THE CHIEF:
CASE OF THE TOUNTOUMA OF KANTCHE
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10. Chiefs' power to resolve conflicts and manage civil
disputes derives from their legitimacy among ordinary
Nigeriens, but there are factors that undercut that
legitimacy. Aside from the institutional constraints imposed
on chiefs by the GON, which have largely been assimilated and
diffused over time, political discord over the manner of
chiefs' selection and allegations of corruption taint some
chiefs' rule.


11. After the 2004 death of Amadaou Issaka, Canton Chief of
Kantche since 1954, two of his sons were among the candidates
to the throne. Abdoul Kadre, a twenty-something, and his
older brother were both contenders, though the latter had
overwhelming popular support and was seen as the prospective
chief. Abdoul Kadre, however, was supported by his uncle Alma
Oumarou, a rich businessman and ruling party heavyweight in
Niamey. Alma allegedly used his political influence on behalf
of Abdoul Kadre. He was said to have purchased the votes of
most of the village chiefs that made up the electoral college
to secure his nephew's victory. The "Kantche street" erupted
after Abdoul Kadre was proclaimed chief. It took several
weeks and intervention by GON security forces to restore
order. Apparently, due to a lack of popular support, the
chief has difficulties in asserting his authority over the
collection of taxes and vis-a-vis the local council. During a
May 12 meeting with Poloff, the young chief complained about
the "politicization" of the local population, in an audience
chamber strangely devoid of courtiers. The controversy in
Kantche underscores the importance of the chieftaincy to both
ordinary and elite Nigeriens, but also the ways in which this
venerated institution can be corrupted.

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CIVIL SOCIETY CRITICISM OF
CHIEFS
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12. Situations like the one in Kantche fuel a critique of
chieftaincy by Niger's small but vocal secular civil society.
In meetings with the Zinder and Maradi representatives of
Nigerien human rights NGO ANDDH, Poloff heard some
representative civil society critiques of traditional
leadership.


13. Citing a "culture of impunity" around traditional
authorities, a Zinder ANDDH contact stressed the potential
for legal abuses by chiefs. Traditional chiefs, he alleged,
do as they please and meet out traditional justice without
any legal oversight, even going so far as to throw people in
jail for sorcery in towns like Magaria and Goure. Chiefs, he
alleged, will often respond to local farmers' demands by
kicking nomads out of grazing areas. Some chiefs still act
like independent rulers rather than agents of the state. They
expropriate land and take a percentage of the tax revenues
that they are charged with collecting. When chiefs make
decisions at variance with the law, Prefects and the Ministry
of the Interior often fail to correct them.


14. In Magaria, a border town south of Zinder, Poloff met
three rural commune mayors. They noted that early on in the
process of decentralization the local chiefs had caused real
problems for the newly elected council. Interpreting the
process as an assault on their traditional prerogatives the
chiefs withheld the revenue they collected (as is often the
case for rural communes, these communities lacked receveurs)
and mobilized popular resistance to the council. Once the
Prefect of Magaria intervened, things changed. The Prefect
helped the chiefs to understand the process, their new role
in it, and the GON's commitment to it. All three mayors
argued that this intervention had helped. The village chiefs
have learned to cooperate with the councils and are
surrendering the tax money. In some other cases, things have
not worked out so well. In the city of Agadez, an elected
mayor was removed from power by the council after he incurred
the wrath of the Sultan. Significantly, that mayor had also
lost the support of his regional Governor.


15. In Maradi, an ANDDH contact spoke of chiefs' chauvinism
and their tendency to ignore the GON's rural code in favor of
traditional judgment. He claimed that even highly educated
and modern "intellectual" among the chiefs routinely
dispensed whatever justice they saw fit, using Islamic

NIAMEY 00000742 004 OF 005


jurisprudence and their own discretion. Their conciliation
efforts, while successful, likewise ignored the stipulations
of the rural code. In many cases, the ANDDH rep argued,
chiefs were well aware of what the code said, but simply
declined to implement it. He criticized a prominent local
chief -- the Province Chief of Gobir -- for refusing to
accept the extension of Maradi's public water system to his
suburban seat. The chief's refusal was allegedly based on his
"province's" historical rivalry with the traditional province
from which the water would come.

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THE UN-RECONSTRUCTED CHIEF:
HISTORY AND POLITICS WITH THE
SERKIN GOBIR
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16. If there is one chief in Poloff's experience who ascribes
to the traditionalist world-view that elicits the ire of
civil society activists, it is the Serkin Gobir of Maradi
region -- he of the municipal water rivalry. A well-educated
Francophone and former sales manager for Niamey's Toyota
dealership, the Honorable Abdou Bala Marafa appears a
"modern" Nigerien. Yet, even though he has only been on the
throne since 1998, he speaks with as much traditionalist
conviction as someone who never left the sanctum of the
chief's palace. The Serkin Gobir is one of Niger's three
"Province" chiefs; the prominence of his house is suggested
by the fact that its seat is a village known only as "Serkin
Hausa," (Hausa king). His status affords him suzerainty over
a number of subsidiary canton and village chiefs in Maradi
and Tahoua regions.


17. At the outset of his meeting with Poloff on May 13, the
Serkin Gobir launched into a long recitation of the history
of Ousmane Dan Fodio, the early 19th century Fulani cleric
and "jihadist" who founded the Sokoto Caliphate. Two-hundred
years on, this chief still expressed indignation that Dan
Fodio, who had grown up in Gobir, had launched a crusade
against its royal house and those of surrounding kingdoms.
"He didn't have the right to call his political war a
'jihad'," argued Marafa, "it was fraud, lies!" He criticized
Dan Fodio's efforts to impose a strict, textualist version of
the faith on Hausaland. The chief noted that Hausas had
always favored moderate Islam, and that his province was
still a bastion of tolerance. "We were pushed around by Dan
Fodio and that is why we are secular today; secular and
tolerant." The chief noted that different Islamic orders were
competing for the right to place their Imam in a large new
mosque near the chief's palace. Asserting that he alone had
the right to choose who would preach there, the chief said
that he would never consent to an Izala Imam (a
fundamentalist sect common in Maradi and northern Nigeria).
As both a temporal and spiritual leader, Marafa views his
role as the preservation of Nigerien Islamic moderation in
the face of Nigerian fundamentalism.


18. Turning to farmer herder conflict, Marafa questioned the
importance of ethnicity in such disputes. He noted that
conflicts in Gobir were just as likely to be between Hausas,
even Hausa farmers, than between nomadic Fulanis and
sedentary Hausas. He has seen many cases where a farmer's
livestock run across the field of another farmer. In an
ironic contrast to his tirade against Ousmane Dan Fodio some
minutes earlier, Marafa noted that "the Hausa / Fulani
tensions of Dan Fodio's period are over now." NOTE: Gobir, in
southern Maradi, is a comparatively rich and fertile region
in which many Hausa farmers are also significant livestock
owners -- minimizing the ethnic distinction that usually
colors relations between the two groups in Niger. END NOTE.


19. Marafa's views on political decentralization, democracy,
and the importance of chieftaincy all suggested how deeply
even a modern Nigerien could be invested in the concept of
chieftaincy and its prerogatives. Noting at the outset of our
meeting that he had not been informed of our coming by the
local mayor, he claimed cuttingly that communications between
his court and the commune government were "problematic."
Later, when the elected commune mayor entered the chief's
hall, he performed an elaborate sequence of bows and
honorifics before submitting to a dressing down by the chief
over the protocol slip. "What is decentralization,' asked
Marafa, 'since 1953 there has been a decentralized canton
here." Referring to his election by "the nine of Gobir," (a
hereditary group of elders believed to have magical powers of
divination who serve as an electoral college for the Serkin
Gobir),Marafa noted that "we have had democracy here for
centuries. It is organic, it works, why change it now." He

NIAMEY 00000742 005 OF 005


noted that at his election in 1998 there were 28 other
candidates, including some former GON ministers. He was
chosen over older, richer, and more politically powerful
candidates. Comparing the durability and desirability of
modern and chiefly forms of government, Marafa claimed that
even President Tandja would resign his office and move to
Gobir to take up the chieftaincy, were he chosen for it.

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THE CHIEF AS CIVIL SERVANT:
CASE OF THE SERKIN KATSINA
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20. Five miles away, at the palace of Marafa's traditional
antagonist, the Serkin Katsina, former diplomat turned chief
Ali Zaki presented a sharp contrast. He stressed his role as
an agent of the state, to the extent of reciting GON talking
points about the virtues of President Tandja's "special
program," for rural development. Unlike Marafa, Zaki did not
affirm a traditional right to regulate religion -- only that
actually afforded him by modern laws (reftel C). Above all,
he stressed the role that the GON, civil society, and
traditional rulers all seem to agree is most essential to the
chief -- that of a neutral conflict mediator for the
community. To that end, Zaki maintains an "ambassador" at the
court of Katsina, Nigeria (formerly part of his kingdom).


21. A devoted Francophone (for many years assigned to the
International Cultural and Technical Organization, and its
successor, the Francophonie, Zaki lived for eight years in
Paris) he attributed Niger's successes to the French colonial
legacy and system of government. Far from considering himself
the final arbiter in civil and religious affairs in his
community, he stressed his partnership with local GON
officials and support for religious freedom. Just as the
Serkin Gobir seems to have over-assimilated his role as a
traditional ruler, the Serkin Katsina still seems to relish
the role of civil-servant more than the turban and throne.

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COMMENT: RECONCILING TRADITIONAL RULE
AND MODERN TIMES; GETING CHIEFTAINCY
RIGHT IN 21st CENTURY NIGER
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22. With such divergent approaches to the role of chief, it
is difficult to generalize about the strengths or weaknesses
of traditional leadership in Niger. What is evident, however,
is the chiefs' importance in mitigating conflict and enabling
local government. Neither task can be easily performed
without them. While some appear to have little use for
decentralization, others have bought-in once the process and
its objectives were made clear to them. Uneven supervision by
the local faces of the GON -- the Prefects and Governors who
regulate the chiefs -- may be the cause of some of the
rulers' habits. While mission contacts argue that some
Prefects and Governors are themselves no fans of
decentralization, interventions by them have reconciled many
chiefs to decentralization, turning them from powerful
antagonists to powerful partners. Since French colonial
times, central authorities have called the shots for even the
most independent of chiefs. If the GON reins in some of the
outliers, while respecting ordinary people's belief in
traditional chieftaincy, it can help to make a venerated
institution work for 21st century Niger.
ALLEN