Onitsha
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Onitsha is a city, commercial centre and river port of Anambra State, South eastern Nigeria. The city is estimated to have a population of more than 6 million, as of 2005. It lies at a major east-west crossing point of the Niger River, and occupies the northernmost point of the river regularly navigable by large vessels. These factors have historically made Onitsha a major centre for trade between the coastal regions and the north, as well as between eastern and western Nigeria. Onitsha possesses one of the very few road bridge crossings of the mile-wide Niger river.
Immigrants from the Kingdom of Benin are believed to have founded Onitsha in the 16th century. It soon became capital of an Igbo kingdom. In 1857 British traders in palm oil established a permanent station in the city, and Christian missionaries soon followed. In 1884 Onitsha became part of a British protectorate.
Modern day industrial products include textiles, beer, mineral water, shoes, lumber, tyres, nails and printed publications. Traditional occupations include fishing and canoe-building. Local agriculture produces palm oil, maize, nuts, vegetables, and fruit.
The city contains both Catholic and Anglican cathedrals. It is the residence of the traditional Igbo regional chieftain, the Obi of Onitsha. There is also a teacher training college for women and a famous leper colony. Onitsha is believed to have missed being named the state capital for a new state in the 1976 states creation. Thus, despite being one of the biggest commercial cities of west Africa, Onitsha remains congested from the over concentration of all her huge markets within the old city center and minimal expansion of the colonial roads infrastructure. The Federal and State governments have continued to deny the huge commercial city any significantly modern public hospital to cater for her huge population.
In February 2006 a Christian extremists here killed at least 24 Muslims and burned a few Muslim sites including two mosques. The riots were in responce to riots by Muslims in the city of Maiduguri days earlier where at least 18 Christian were killed.
External links
Onitsha is also the title of a novel by Jean-Marie Gustave Le Clézio.de:Onitsha pl:Onitsha pt:Onitsha