The Question of Insurability and the Transformation of the West African Insurance Industry in Nigeria and the CICA Zone from 1945 to 1970

Abstract The history of commercial insurance in West Africa has been determined by the need to cover the risks of the colonial infrastructure and economy. This drove the expansion of European insurance companies in the 20 th century, first via agencies and later via branches. This article examines how the insurance industry in Nigeria and the CICA zone changed after the country’s declaration of independence from British rule. The analysis focuses not only on the companies’ so-called Africanisation strategies, but also on other challenges that shaped how insurance companies transformed their products, sales strategies, and target groups before and after independence. While multinational insurers and their technical expertise largely dominated these markets even after independence, their business prospects in the local markets had already changed in the course of the colonial infrastructure campaign. Nevertheless, even after independence, the insurance business in Nigeria and the CICA zone remained shaped by the colonial legacy and underlying elitist and Eurocentric ideas, some of which were accentuated after independence and came into conflict with changed sociopolitical realities. Some forms of international cooperation and state intervention aimed to make insurance products more accessible or even mandatory for the general population, but even such projects encountered substantial difficulties. Based on the sources from holdings of authorities, companies, and organisations, a picture emerges of a local insurance system in West Africa that only towards the end of the 20 th century strove to offer insurance products that were data-based and designed for the broad population, their needs, and economic realities. With these findings, the article aims to contribute to a better understanding of why this region has historically had one of the lowest insurance densities and penetration rates in the world.