Repugnant Customs and Alien Courts

Abstract This chapter examines the ambivalent place of African customary law in the colonial legal system, the tensions arising from conflicting systems of laws and the role of the JCPC and the regional Courts of Appeal in interpreting and applying African customary laws. Focusing on debates over ‘native assessors’ in the colonial courts, native tribunals and the ‘doctrine of repugnancy’, it explores how the tension between imperial universalism and local exceptionalism played out in contested judicial discourse over the role of customary law in imperial justice. It investigates how Imperial Appeal Courts, in dealing with questions of African customary law sought to uphold two frequently conflicting agendas: maintaining fundamental principles of British justice thought to be crucial to legitimizing the Empire, while simultaneously accommodating African customary law considered indispensable to achieving imperial justice