with the simple fact of location of birth or membership of a linguistic or cultural group. Residents of territory annexed by a European state were considered under international law to become nationals of that state. Each colonial power then had almost total discretion to determine the rules by which nationality was granted within the territories it controlled.5 The West African countries now members of ECOWAS, with the exception of Liberia, were prior to independence governed by the nationality laws of three colonial powers: France, Great Britain, and Portugal. Germany had been the original colonial power in Togo, but with the defeat of Germany in the First World War, the territory was “mandated” to French and British control by the League of Nations (after the Second World War its “mandated” status transformed into that of a “trust territory” under the United Nations); British-administered Togo was administered from the Gold Coast and, following a referendum on its status, became part of Ghana at the time of Ghana’s independence in 1957. The territories of the British empire in Africa belonged to one of two main categories. First established were the “colonies” (which in West Africa included the Gambia, the Gold Coast, Lagos and Sierra Leone/Freetown). The remaining territories, including all those added in the late 19th century “Scramble for Africa”, were designated “protectorates”. Colonies and dominions were “within the crown’s dominion”; while “protectorates”, including most other British-controlled territories in Africa, were nominally foreign territory managed by local government structures established under British protection. Until 1948, the single status of “British subject” was applied to all those born within the crown’s dominion (including the United Kingdom itself).6 However, rights of British subjects within any particular territory could vary; in particular, there were distinctions between “natives” (defined in various statutes applying to particular territories) and others. During the 19th century, the term “British protected person” emerged to cover the people indigenous to a protectorate. British protected persons and other “natives” were in general governed by customary law, as modified by statute and British interpretation. The term British protected person was used also for the residents of British mandated territories, though they had a separate legal status.7 The British Nationality Act of 1948, the first comprehensive attempt to organise nationality law by statute, established the new status of “citizen of the United Kingdom and colonies” (a status abolished in 1981). Citizenship of the UK and colonies continued to be granted on a jus soli basis to all those born in the UK or in one of the colonies. The status of “British protected person” was codified by the new law, and continued to apply to persons born in a protectorate who were not citizens of the UK and colonies. French territories in West Africa formed part of the collectivity known as Afrique occidentale française (AOF). From the late nineteenth century, France divided nationals of its overseas territories into two categories: French citizens (citoyens français), who were of European stock or (in some circumstances) of mixed race; and French subjects (sujets français), who included black Africans and other natives (indigènes) of French-controlled territories. The Code de l’indigénat, a collection of legal provisions 5 See Paul Weis Nationality and Statelessness in International Law (2nd Ed.), Kluwer, 1979. The British Nationality and Status of Aliens Act 1914 was the first statute intended to apply throughout the empire, and retained the principal nationality category of “British subject status” previously developed through common law and a patchwork of other statutes. 7 See Laurie Fransman, Fransman’s British Nationality Law, Third Edition, Bloomsbury Professional, 2011, for a chronology of British nationality law and exhaustive discussion of the very complex distinctions. 6 7