Ibrahim Imam (1916 – April 1980) was a Kanuri politician from Borno, Nigeria who was the secretary of the Northern People's Congress and later became a patron of the

Borno Youth Movement Borno Youth Movement (BYM) was a Nigerian political party A political party is an organization that coordinates candidates to compete in a particular country's elections. It is common for the members of a party to hold similar ideas about po ...

. He was elected into the Northern House of Assembly in 1961, representing a Tiv district. Prior to his election in 1961, he had represented his district of Yerwa in 1951 after supporting a strike of Native Administration workers.

Early life and education

Imam was a Kanuri man from the Yerwa district of Borno. He was born in 1916 into an aristocratic family and his half-brother was the district head of Yerwa. He attended Katsina College and after completing his studies joined the Borno Native Administration as an assistant and later became the supervisor of works in 1950.

Political career

While working as an engineering assistant for the Borno

Native Authority Since 1933, various traditional chiefs in Nyasaland have been designated as Native Authorities, initially by the colonial administration, and they numbered 105 in 1949. . They represented a form of the Indirect rule which had become popular in Briti ...

, he entered the political arena as the founder of the Borno Youth Improvement Association in 1949.Billy J. Dudley. Parties and Politics in Northern Nigeria, Routledge, 1968. p 88-90. In 1951, he contested and won a seat to the House of Assembly defeating the Waziri Mohammed. A year later at the inception of the Northern People's Congress, which later became the dominant party in the region, he was nominated as the party's secretary-general; he joined a large number of his colleagues from the regional house who enlisted on the

political platform A political party platform (US English), party program, or party manifesto (preferential term in British & often Commonwealth English) is a formal set of principle goals which are supported by a political party or individual candidate, in order ...

of the new NPC. As the general secretary of NPC, he became one of the party's prominent campaigners and was involved in political tours, traveling for thousands of miles while providing support for the extension of the party through the establishment of branches in various towns and cities in the region. After leaving the Native Authority, he became a building

contractor A contractor is a person or company that performs work on a contract basis. The term may refer to: Business roles * Defense contractor, arms industry which provides weapons or military goods to a government * General contractor, an individual o ...

to supplement his income as an honourable member of the House.

Borno Youth Movement

In 1954, however, Imam resigned his position from NPC and left the party, citing the lack of a

revolutionary A revolutionary is a person who either participates in, or advocates a revolution. The term ''revolutionary'' can also be used as an adjective, to refer to something that has a major, sudden impact on society or on some aspect of human endeavor. ...

platform for political reform of the local government in the northK. W. J. Post, The Nigerian Federal Election of 1959: Politics and Administration in a Developing Political System, Oxford University Press, 1963. and also NPC's movement towards a

reactionary In political science, a reactionary or a reactionist is a person who holds political views that favor a return to the ''status quo ante'', the previous political state of society, which that person believes possessed positive characteristics abse ...

and imperialistic political union. A year later, he joined Aminu Kano's Northern Elements Progressive Union and in 1956, he became the patron of the

, a young organization that had grown out of its members disappointment with the native authority in Borno and the scandal of the Waziri, Mohammed. In 1956, he encouraged a fruitful alliance of the movement with NEPU particularly in Borno where the alliance later won two regional seats. But in a few years, Imam an ambitious politician was in need of resources to organize the alliance in Bornu and in the Northern region left the merger due to the inability of NEPU to contribute enough resources to strengthen the party in the region. He left NEPU and established an alliance with the Action Group and later became the leader of opposition in the regional House of Assembly.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Imam, Ibrahim People from Borno State Borno Youth Movement politicians Northern People's Congress politicians 1916 births 1980 deaths 20th-century Nigerian politicians Kanuri people