Azaghvana E-Book 2003 - Flipbook - Page 267
To get leased land back could be difficult in the past, especially if the group outnumbered your
group. They just refused. Now such a case can be taken to court. In case of conflict, it would be
taken to the area court in Nghoshe [Kasa] or Gwoza. There is no interest rate involved. As soon as
somebody can reimburse the wealth he has received for the lease, he normally should get it back.
The wealth should be reimbursed straight after the harvest. It cannot be bought back during the
rainy season.
The general rule is that the same type of wealth should be reimbursed, meaning cow for cow,
money for money etc. If it is a cow that has already calved, the same type should be given back,
and size is rather secondary in the context of that. Also, a bull can be involved, for example, if the
woman you marry delivers a male child you settle the second half of your bridewealth with a bull.
However a cow is seen as a higher value because it can reproduce.
Trees could be leased out as well
Marriage as a reason to lease land is still a very common feature, but other reasons have come
about as well. Such a reason might be that somebody is building a house and he wants to roof it
and does not have enough money to buy zinc. Another reason might be that you do not have
enough foodstuffs stored in your house to take you through the year. Another reason is that
misfortune (illness or accident) can happen. Land to be leased is a valuable source (asset) to fall
back on.
It is not just land that can be leased. It can also be one or several trees. Trees that are most
commonly leased are fan palms to produce palm sprouts and also mahogany trees to produce oil,
or a maraki (Hausa) tree for roofing. Leasing out land or trees depends on times of need. In
general, nowadays there is more land for lease available in the mountains than in the plains.
People prefer to live in the adjacent plains and therefore more land is available for lease in the
mountains. Not everybody who wants to lease land wants to farm in the mountains since he would
have to go up there, which is why only people who live in the hills are theoretically interested in
leasing land there. However, most people own land in the mountains as well as in the plains.
Nevertheless land in the plains is rare. This leads us to the system of short-leasing land, which is
becoming very common in the plains, a development that also contributed to the decline of tree
cultivation in the hills.
A new system of short-leasing of land in the plains
The word for short-leasing a piece of land is wusa-waya (wusa = hoeing; waya = sunroof, hangar).
You lease land for only one season, meaning you cultivate it to only fill one hangar. In the past
there was no system of short-leasing land. If you had a surplus of land you might have given it out
for a year for free, to a brother or another relative, friend or neighbour. Now, because of the
shortage of land, the system of short-leasing has evolved. The payment for short-leasing in its
most recent development is only money. The money has to be handed over at the beginning and
not at the end. If the harvest did not turn out as expected it could cause a conflict.
There is increasing competition over the short-leasing of land. The shortage of land is at the origin
of this competition, and goes hand-in-hand with downhill migration and population growth. In the
latter context, the young age structure of the population needs to be considered. One reason might
be that a young man has gone to be a butcher (producing and selling firewood was rare) and
therefore he short-leases out his land, especially in the plain but also in the hills. Every year he
will get a sum of money from it.
Most of the short-leasing happens during a millet and beans year. The people on the hills shortlease out their land on the plains especially. The reason is that they restrict themselves to
producing beans on the hills, and they will short-lease out their land in the plains.
Talking about beans, another method of short-leasing land in the plains is to go to Lake Chad to
short-lease land during the dry season (December to May) and plant beans. Cash needs to be made
beforehand, to be capable of cash cropping beans at Lake Chad. A man might go with between 15
and up to 100 thousand Naira to hire land at Lake Chad, and to pay for living costs there. While
some buy beans there, others go with beans from home.
It is mostly people who do not have seasonal work in Maiduguri or even at home, who go to Lake
Chad. They build capital from selling their animals, from selling their farm products, leasing out
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