<![CDATA[The evolution of contemporary Kalabari society reflects the contour of a historical progression of a people who struggled to manage the competing forces of unity and disunity in their existence. As a polity, it evolved from a fishing village to a city-state, to an empire, and to a republic or confederacy. This work examines the role of Oruwari-Briggs House in this evolutionary trajectory from the precolonial through the colonial to the post-colonial period. Methodologically, the work adopts the political economy approach. From oral and archival sources, published and unpublished works, the study demonstrates that the Oruwari-Briggs House played a strategic role in the inter-house rivalry, the formation of groups, and political alliances that culminated in the disintegration of Elem Kalabari, movement of populations to new settlements, the transformation of traditional political institutions, and the emergence of multiple centers of power symbolized by the existence of Amayanapu in contemporary Kalabari as against an Amayanabo for the entire polity in the pre-colonial period.]]>
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