Amodu Tijani v. The Secretary, Southern Nigeria (1921) stands as one of the most enduring and authoritative decisions in African jurisprudence on land tenure. Decided by the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council on appeal from the Supreme Court of Nigeria (Southern Province), the case arose from the compulsory acquisition of land at Apapa, Lagos, by the colonial government under the Public Lands Ordinance of 1903. The appellant, Amodu Tijani, was an Idejo White Cap Chief and head of the Oluwa family, claiming compensation on the basis that the land belonged to his community under native law and custom. The Nigerian courts had limited his entitlement to compensation for mere control and management, rejecting full ownership. This narrow view of native title prompted the appeal to the Privy Council.
CENTRAL LEGAL ISSUE AMODU TIJANI V. THE SECRETARY, SOUTHERN NIGERIA (1921)
The core question before the Privy Council was whether land held under native law by a chief on behalf of his community amounted merely to a managerial or “seigneurial” interest, or whether it constituted a full usufructuary title deserving compensation as ownership when acquired by the Crown for public purposes. Embedded within this issue was a deeper inquiry into the nature of land ownership in African customary systems and the effect of British sovereignty and colonial ordinances on such systems.
Native Land Tenure and African Jurisprudence AMODU TIJANI V. THE SECRETARY, SOUTHERN NIGERIA (1921)
The Privy Council approached the matter with deliberate caution, emphasising that African systems of land tenure must not be interpreted through rigid English property concepts. Viscount Haldane, delivering the judgment, stressed that the division of land into estates familiar to English law was largely alien to African customary jurisprudence. In much of West Africa, land was not owned by individuals but by communities families, villages, or larger social units whose members enjoyed equal rights of use. The chief or headman, though often loosely described as the “owner,” functioned in a representative and fiduciary capacity, holding and administering land for the benefit of the community.
Communal Ownership and the Role of the Chief
A defining contribution of the case lies in its authoritative articulation of communal land ownership. The Privy Council adopted and endorsed the description given by Rayner C.J. in his Report on Land Tenure in West Africa, holding that individual ownership was foreign to native ideas. Land belonged to the community, while the chief acted much like a trustee, exercising control, allotting land for use, and safeguarding communal interests. Crucially, any significant alienation of land required the consent of elders or the community, reinforcing the collective nature of ownership. This recognition placed African customary land tenure on its own juridical footing, rather than treating it as an imperfect or inferior form of English ownership.
Radical Title of the Crown and Usufructuary Rights.
The Privy Council clarified that while the radical title to land in Lagos vested in the British Crown following the cession of 1861, this did not extinguish native usufructuary rights. Those rights survived the change in sovereignty and continued to burden the Crown’s radical title. The Crown grants introduced thereafter were seen primarily as instruments of conveyancing and record-keeping, not as mechanisms for altering substantive native rights. Thus, the community’s beneficial interest in land remained legally real and enforceable.
Enduring Significance in African Land Law
Amodu Tijani v. Secretary, Southern Nigeria stands tall as a foundational authority affirming the legitimacy and dignity of African customary land tenure. It established that communal ownership and usufructuary rights are true legal interests, not mere concessions or privileges. The case continues to influence land jurisprudence across Africa, shaping doctrines on radical title, compulsory acquisition, compensation, and the interaction between customary law and received English law. Above all, it remains a powerful judicial affirmation that African legal systems must be understood on their own terms, not distorted through foreign conceptual frameworks.
The privy council,per lord VISCOUNT HALDANE said something on African state land ownership what pointing at.
“The next fact which it is important to bear in mind in order to understand the native land law is that the notion of individual ownership is quite foreign to native ideas.. Land belongs to the community, the village or the family, never to the individual. All the members of the community, village or family have an equal right to the land, but in every case the Chief or Headman of the community or village, or head of the family, has charge of the land, and in loose mode of speech is sometimes called the owner.
He is to some extent in the position of a trustee, and as such holds the land for the use of the community family. He has control of it, and any member who wants a piece of it to cultivate or build a house upon, goes to him for it. But the land so given still remains the property AMODU of the community or family.
He cannot make any important IvAN disposition of the land without consulting the elders of the community or family, and their consent must in all cases in NIGERIA. be given before a grant can be made to a stranger. This is a pure native custom along the whole length of this coast, and wherever we find, as in Lagos, individual owners, this is again due to the introduction of English ideas. But the native idea still has a firm hold on the people, and in most cases, even in Lagos, land is held by the family.
IDUNDUN v. OKUMAGBA (1976)Definitive Guide to Proof of Land Ownership in Nigeria