Emir Sanusi receiving his subjects in Kano, northern Nigeria. Emir Sanusi is a reformist who believes girls should be educated, women’s rights should be respected and poor men shouldn’t marry multiple wives. — ©2024 The New York Times Company
ONE king has been barricaded in the palace, protected from potential usurpers by hundreds of subjects armed with sticks and machetes. Another king, evicted from the same palace in May, is living in an annex down the road, dispatching lawyers to courthouses in a bid to regain the throne.
The battle unfolding for the emirate of Kano – one of West Africa’s oldest and most revered kingdoms – is not just a struggle for an ancient throne, but also part of a wider contest for control over the most populous state in Africa’s most populous country.The emirs of Kano once had absolute power, ruling over their subjects from the intricately decorated palace in the city of Kano, an ancient commercial hub just south of the Sahara.
