The Yoruba Party in the UK (YPUK), political voice of the UK Yoruba community, has gone to court by way of judicial review to seek a mandatory order to compel the British government to act in accordance with promises it made in a non-cession treaty of friendship and preferential trade that it concluded with the Yoruba on 23 July 1888. In the 1888 Britain -Yorubaland Treaty, the British government recognised Yorubaland as an independent sovereign state and treated the Yoruba territory as sacrosanct and inalienable.
The treaty was so important to Britain that Queen Victoria requested for it on 23 May 1888, and Queen Victoria ratified it on 16 June 1890. In the treaty, Britain committed itself to eternal obligations from which it could not lawfully resile as a unilateral act. Yet, Britain did acts, including assassination of the Alaafin in 1895 and amalgamation of Nigeria in 1914, to frustrate the legitimate expectations arising from the treaty. Britain’s frustration of the treaty has caused immense damage to the Yoruba in terms of loss of their sovereignty and loss of their territory in the 1914 amalgamation.
A court case became necessary when the British government, when asked, refused to give account of its performance of the treaty obligations. Furthermore, the British government refused to engage in dispute resolution or arbitration as provided for in the treaty. The 1888 Britain-Yorubaland Treaty, which hitherto has been in a state of neglect, stands out as arguably the most consequential pre-colonial treaty that Britain concluded in West Africa, and thus worthy of this court action.