International records / OpenAlex research

Economy within an Economy: the Manilla Currency, Exchange Rate Instability and Social Conditions in South-Eastern Nigeria, 1900–48

This paper studies the effects of the coexistence of the manilla currency and British currency in south-eastern Nigeria, and the way in which this monetary situation created political tensions which eventually led to the redemption of the manilla. When British control of Southern Nigeria was formalized in 1900 and British currency introduced in the south-east in the following year, the inability of the colonial authorities to put into circulation adequate supplies of British coins, coupled with historically entrenched use of traditional currencies, compelled the colonial state to recognize the…