Aminu Kano

==== Bauchi General Improvement Union ====
In 1943, Aminu, alongside Zungur, Balewa and Gusau, formed the Bauchi General Improvement Union (BGIU), where they held discussions critiquing British colonial policies and the Native Authority.<ref name=":6" />{{Rp|page=100}}<ref name=":2" /><ref>{{Cite book|last=Awa|first=Eme O.|title=Federal Government in Nigeria|publisher=University of California Press|year=1964|location=Berkeley and Los Angeles|pages=99}}</ref> This organisation was likely influenced by a similar organisation Zungur had founded while in Zaria, the Northern Provinces General Improvement Union (NPGIU).<ref name=":7">{{Cite web |last1=Al-Sadique |first1=Abubakar Sufyan |last2=Ahmed |first2=Abubakar |date=2021-09-25 |title=Bauchi Discussion Circle: The Circle of Northern Nigerian Politics and Nigeria's Independence {{!}} Wikkitimes |url=https://wikkitimes.com/bauchi-discussion-circle-the-circle-of-northern-nigerian-politics-and-nigerias-independence/ |access-date=2023-12-23 |language=en-US}}</ref> Aminu and Zungur wrote letters and articles attacking the British 'directed labour' policy, which they saw as a disguised form of [[conscription]]. With Britain requiring significant quantities of food, tin, and soldiers for [[British Empire in World War II|World War II]], colonial officials exerted pressure on Native Authorities to 'direct' specified quotas of food and manpower. Britain extensively used unregulated forced conscription in Northern Nigeria to support its war effort after [[Fall of Singapore|its military misfortunes in the Far East]] in 1942.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Ekoko |first=A. E. |date=1982 |title=Conscript Labour and Tin Mining in Nigeria During the Second World War |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/41857118 |journal=Journal of the Historical Society of Nigeria |volume=11 |issue=3/4 |pages=66–85 |jstor=41857118 |issn=0018-2540}}</ref> One of Aminu's unsigned articles was read by the senior District Officer, A J Knott, in the [[West African Pilot]], who traced it back to the BGIU. This discovery led to the dissolution of the union and its replacement with the Bauchi Discussion Circle (BDC) or ''Majalisar Tadi ta Bauchi'', sponsored by colonial authorities. The BDC was designed as a sanctioned platform for open debate encompassing 'any and all ideas'.<ref name=":1" />{{Rp|page=89}}<ref name=":6" />{{Rp|page=89}}<ref name=":7" /><ref name=":8">{{Cite book |last=Barber |first=Karin |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=7n2-fYwvtKIC |title=Africa's Hidden Histories: Everyday Literacy and Making the Self |date=2006 |publisher=Indiana University Press |isbn=978-0-253-34729-9 |language=en}}</ref>{{Rp|page=423}}