Volume 47, Issue 3, January 2026, Pages 264–270
Opeyemi Anthony Iroju1
1 Department of History, Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, Osun State, Nigeria
Original language: English
Copyright © 2026 ISSR Journals. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Nigeria is a data intensive country because the socio-economic system of the nation relies on the use of large volumes of data generated across diverse sectors which include oil and gas, banking, health and education. These data are used for policy formulation, budgeting, security and resource allocation. Nevertheless, Nigeria has long been vulnerable to data colonisation since the advent of the British administrators who collected, controlled and exploited data in Nigeria for administrative control, imperial socio-economic interest and classification of Nigerians into various ethnic groups. The consequences of data colonisation in Nigeria during the British rule were quite extensive. These include the distortion of historical narratives, resource exploitation, inter-ethnic rivalry as well as difficulty in accessing the data collected by the British administrators. Unfortunately, data colonialism in Nigeria spanned through the digital era where data collected from Nigerians are controlled by foreign Information and Communication Technology (ICT) platforms with or without consent and fair compensation, thereby further threatening the data sovereignty of the nation. It is against this background that this study provides an in-depth study of data colonisation in Nigeria from the colonial period to the digital era. This is with the view to revealing the struggle of Nigeria in achieving data sovereignty.
Author Keywords: colonial period, data colonialism, data sovereignty, digital era, Nigeria.
Opeyemi Anthony Iroju1
1 Department of History, Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, Osun State, Nigeria
Original language: English
Copyright © 2026 ISSR Journals. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Abstract
Nigeria is a data intensive country because the socio-economic system of the nation relies on the use of large volumes of data generated across diverse sectors which include oil and gas, banking, health and education. These data are used for policy formulation, budgeting, security and resource allocation. Nevertheless, Nigeria has long been vulnerable to data colonisation since the advent of the British administrators who collected, controlled and exploited data in Nigeria for administrative control, imperial socio-economic interest and classification of Nigerians into various ethnic groups. The consequences of data colonisation in Nigeria during the British rule were quite extensive. These include the distortion of historical narratives, resource exploitation, inter-ethnic rivalry as well as difficulty in accessing the data collected by the British administrators. Unfortunately, data colonialism in Nigeria spanned through the digital era where data collected from Nigerians are controlled by foreign Information and Communication Technology (ICT) platforms with or without consent and fair compensation, thereby further threatening the data sovereignty of the nation. It is against this background that this study provides an in-depth study of data colonisation in Nigeria from the colonial period to the digital era. This is with the view to revealing the struggle of Nigeria in achieving data sovereignty.
Author Keywords: colonial period, data colonialism, data sovereignty, digital era, Nigeria.
How to Cite this Article
Opeyemi Anthony Iroju, “Data Colonialism: A Historian’s Perspective on the Struggle for Nigeria’s Data Sovereignty,” International Journal of Innovation and Applied Studies, vol. 47, no. 3, pp. 264–270, January 2026.
