"This book examines German participation in the colonial contest for Nigeria during the scramble for and partition of Africa at the end of the nineteenth Century. It focuses on the activities of some German individuals and organizations that were actively engaged in the struggle to acquire the Nigerian region as a colony for Germany. There are two reasons for this failure: one, lack of consistent colonial policy during Bismarck's era and two, the Opposition of the Royal Niger Company. The only success recorded in Nigeria was in Adamawa and Borno. Germany got some parts of these emirates as a result of the determination of the Royal Niger Company, supported by the British government, to deny the French any access to the navigable part of the two major rivers. Germany retained control of this region until the outbreak of the first World War."--Book jacket.