The quality of liquor in Nigeria during the colonial era.

The Nigerian liquor trade provoked fierce debate: was it advancing development or fashioning an economy based on the unproductive consumption of alcohol? The liquor trade was caught between two prevailing colonial perspectives on African economic development: the Darwinian-based principle that Western civilisation had a duty to protect Africans from all bad external influences, and the civilise-through-trade concept seeking to modernise Africans by exploiting colonies to their fullest potential. Humanitarian concerns and economic interests were entangled. Positive views of the liquor trade claimed its necessity in developing the Nigerian economy. Some admitted that the trade formed a necessary evil, but did not fail to emphasise its role as a transitional currency, promoter of cash-crops-forexport, and a desirable commodity among those with money to spend. Merchants saw commerce as a great civilising agent, with the liquor trade as its most important constituent. On the other hand, liquor trade critics used the temperance equation to further their cause: drinking alcohol was bad, abstinence was good. Arguing that the imposition of 'a Rum and Gin Civilization' would be 'a hydra that devours the natives', halting useful commerce and hindering economic development, they agitated for Prohibition and a complete restructuring of the colonial economy along alcoholfree lines. A prime motivation for the critics' to stop the liquor trade came from what they saw as the damaging export of unhealthy alcohol to Nigeria. Was the liquor imported of such poor, even dangerous, quality? In the light of a recent article in this journal by Ayodeji Olukoju, titled Rotgut and Revenue, this paper re-examines the quality of liquor imported into Nigeria during the colonial era. Whereas Olukoju concludes with a damning indictment of the bad, even dangerous, quality of imported spirits, this paper argues a more positive line by analysing five areas of disputatious argument over liquor quality in the colonial era: the general quality of import liquor, the effect on liquor quality from the extensive practice of diluting spirits; the comparative quality of local liquors; unhealthy substitute alcoholic beverages; and domestically distilled spirits.