History of Accounting Thought: A Perspective of Taxation in West Africa

Abstract:

This study examines the tax and accounting systems in the Asante Kingdom, Yoruba/Oyo kingdoms, and Hausa/Fulani emirates, and identifies their contributions to the historical development of accounting in the region. The study uses qualitative historical research method with secondary data in the form of historical accounts and literature from scholars. These findings demonstrate that there were unique practices for generating income and managing finances in these societies that were influenced by their political, economic, and cultural environments. In the Asante Kingdom methods of recording data were by oral means, gold measure, market tolls, and tribute. The Yoruba/Oyo kingdoms used market taxes, tributes, cowry trading and palace officials as a way of collecting revenue. Hausa/Fulani emirates, meanwhile, adopted Islamic tax and accounting methods, Arabic script and writing, and Arabic-trained scribes and treasury officers to their fiscal systems. These findings reveal the presence of a variety of organised accounting and taxing systems prior to colonialism. The study concludes that the recognition of those indigenous systems can be done to give an expanded and more inclusive knowledge of accounting history and contribute to the decolonisation of accounting knowledge by granting historical recognition to West Africa.