Nigeria is building a coastal highway between Lagos and Calabar
Construction of a coastal highway between Lagos and Calabar is underway in Nigeria. Columnist Eric Teniola believes the project has not only economic and political, but also historical significance, as it draws attention to Calabar's role in the country's history.
As Premium Times Nigeria writes, Calabar was not included in the early railway network, whose construction the British colonial authorities began between Lagos and Ibadan in 1891. Later, Port Harcourt, Maiduguri, Minna, Zaria, Jos, Kano and other cities received railway connections. According to the author, the Lagos–Calabar railway project was approved during Goodluck Jonathan's presidency in 2014, but has still not been implemented.
Calabar's colonial role
Teniola notes that after a treaty of British protection was concluded with the chiefs of Old Calabar in 1884, the city was the administrative center of the Oil Rivers and Niger Coast protectorates. In 1914, following the merger of the Northern and Southern protectorates, Lagos was declared Nigeria's administrative center.
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Calabar, known in the Efik language as Akwa Akpa, was an important trading port for centuries. Palm oil was exported through it, while during the transatlantic slave trade enslaved Africans were transported from the port to the Americas. The author separately mentions Old Calabar and Creek Town as important locations in this trade.
Education and sport
Calabar is home to the Hope Waddell Training Institution, founded in 1846. According to the column, Nigeria's first recorded organized football match took place there on June 15, 1904: students of the institution played against sailors from a British warship.
Teniola also mentions Scottish missionary Mary Slessor, who arrived in Nigeria in 1878 and opposed the killing of twins and their mothers. In the author's view, the construction of the Lagos–Calabar highway is recognition of the historical contribution of Calabar and the country's South-South region.
