Yeomanry In Feudalist Economy

In modern context, a yeoman can be described as a loyal and obedient servant, in the service of an awesome over-lord, whose estate is vast and formidable. The culture of serving a feudal lord with total loyalty and devotion resulted in the rise of Yeomanry, as a vanguard in the protection of the interests of the feudal lords. Since loyalty would beget loyalty, the class of yeomen became a formidable cult, serving and protecting the wilms and caprices of their pay masters, in a parasitic, predatory economy.
Activities of the cult of yeomen soon developed into the constitution of a class of “spin-doctors”, as a cabal or ruthless gangsterist, faceless group. Since such group of faceless operators enjoyed the tacit protection of their pay masters, they would engage in acts of illegalities and cover-ups of illegalities of their pay masters. It would be difficult and often foolhardy to take on the foot-soldiers of the feudal lords in a combat, because they enjoy protection and immunity of official and unofficial nature.
Who constitute feudal lords in ancient and modern times? Feudalism is not synonymous with the Middle Ages, but a system of economy of land ownership and power derived from working on and protecting such land and resources therein. Land may be an ancestral inheritance, acquired by conquest, managed by a state via appropriate laws and policies, etc. Therefore feudal lords include powerful land owners, land merchants and grabbers and state officials who oversee policies and programmes connected with land and the management of resources in the land and sea.
Feudalist economy is not necessarily rural agriculture or labour connected with food production. Rather the clever intrigues and power-play connected with the monopoly and manipulation of land and resources therein constitute the themes of feudal economy. When the original owners of Matabele land in South Africa were dispossessed of their land by white intruders, the helpless indigenes were made to work as labourers for the white over-lords. This was the common feature of colonialism everywhere across the globe.
Between the powerful land grabbers and the dispossessed original owners, now employed as labourers, there emerged a middle class of yeomen, usually smart fellows among the original land owners. They owed maximum loyalty to their conquerors and constituted a formidable check on the possibility of the dispossessed indigenes organising any resistance. In Nigerian history such yeomen were known as warrant chiefs who often turned their power against their own people, in the service of foreign overlords.
In the history of the United States of America, when slave labour began to become unmanageable, class of yeomen in the service of feudal lords constituted what was known as Ku-Klux-Klan (KKK Cult). Officially, Ku-Klux-Klan was described as a secret American political organisation of protestant white men who opposed people of other races or religion, its activities were aimed at protecting some vested interests. Such vested interests included the protection of a feudalist economy and its Kingpins or patrons. Therefore the formation of protectionist gang-ups and cults had been a long-standing practice, both in ancient and modern times. Judiciary can serve as accomplices.
Even though Nigeria may not be described as a feudal society, yet its economic system took on the feudalist pattern. What is known as political economy can also be called historical materialism or bourgeois political economy. Without delving into its long history, let it suffice to say that it is a system of class struggles in the society, whereby survival demands ruthless but clever antics of monopoly of resources. Challenges of survival in a predatory economic system force people to become increasingly materialistic minded that ethical principles become undermined. From clever acquisition of land and resources therein, the strong in society usually prey on the weak, as a means of building up capital.
Land owners sell or give up their ancestral lands to those who have the capital to develop landed property, whereby an economy changes into another pattern, depending on the nature of productive activities. In the case of Nigeria there has been gradual changes from rural subsistence farming, to various degrees of productive activities and organised labour. So far, government has been the dominant employer of labour, while in the private sector, oil and gas industries have been the dominant employers of labour. Perhaps private schools at various levels count as vibrant ventures.
Modern version of yeomanry consists in ruthless and clever hustling for various political offices, of which the system is highly monetised, as an exclusive club of money-bags. But behind the ruthless struggles to hold political offices and wield political power, lies the enigma of the Nigerian political economy. Who are the feudal lords of the economy and how was the foundation or structure put in place? Clever intrigues since 1970!
The history of class struggles in various societies or nations has been an interesting field of academic study, whose significance give rise to serious questions. Current issues in Nigeria, particularly the scarcity of naira notes and petroleum products, bring to light the true nature of the Nigerian political economy. Many Nigerians have wondered why the currency is being re-designed at a critical time of elections, as well as what purposes and benefits that such step are meant to serve. There have been controversies regarding whose interests are paramount and who would benefit or be undermined by such monetary policy. So far the masses are the burden bearers.
The issue of removal of subsidy on petroleum products also brings to light the class division in Nigeria, as well as the predatory nature of feudalist economy. From the nationalisation of the oil and gas mineral resources of the Niger-Delta people during the Nigerian Civil War, to the Privatisation agenda via the Petroleum Industry Act, there is a glaring impression of the practice of a feudalist economy. Obviously the foundation of the toxic economy was planned and laid by the military administration.
Add all these shenanigans to a revelation by a top official in the oil and gas industry a few years ago that: “multinational oil companies are working for individual owners of oil fields, rather than for the government”, then other questions arise. Who are the owners of oil block allocations in Nigeria, and how were the allocations done? Who are the opponents of a restructured Nigerian political economy? Yeomanry at work! No, Cabal! No ideology or vision holding the nation together.

By: Bright Amirize
Dr Amirize is a retired lecturer from Rivers State University.