National Council of Nigeria and the Cameroons

The National Council of Nigeria and the Cameroons ( NCNC , National Council of Nigeria and Cameroon) was a Nigerian political party 1944 - 1966 .

In colonial times

The party was founded in 1944 by Nnamdi Azikiwe and Herbert Macaulay . The fact that it appealed to Nigeria and Cameroon at the same time is derived from the fact that the former German colony of Cameroon was ceded to Great Britain and France after the First World War . North Cameroon was incorporated into the British colony of Nigeria, but remained an independent administrative district there. The NCNC was a reservoir for nationalist parties, cultural associations and workers' organizations. After the so-called Macphershon Constitution of 1950 made it possible for the Nigerians to be represented in parliament under British colonial sovereignty at the regional level, the NCNC became a ruling party in eastern Nigeria. With the independence of Nigeria, Azikiwe rose from Prime Minister of Eastern Nigeria to Governor General of the entire country. When Nigeria became a republic in 1963 , Azikiwe became president.

As a ruling party

The governing coalition of NCNC and NPC (Northern People's Congress) was exposed to strong tensions from the beginning, which led to serious confrontations, especially in the regional parliaments. The NPC was Muslim and regionalist oriented and was supported by the old aristocracy of the north, while the NCNC was more Christian, nationalist and populist oriented. However, although the NCNC claimed to bring all of Nigeria together and to stand up for ethnic minorities in particular, its opponents accused it of representing the interests of the Igbo population in the southeast. In the rapidly brutalizing political climate of the First Republic, opponents of the NCNC launched brutal campaigns of intimidation against individual supporters of the party in the western region. The end came for the NCNC when the military came to power in 1966.