Oba Ovonramwen loses control of the kingdom

The hapless Oba Ovonramwen lost control altogether in 1896. At his trial in 1897, witnesses agreed that Ovonramwen had tried unsuccessfully to prevent certain chiefs attacking and killing Phillips and his party. The breakdown of trade with Europeans and neighbouring states had hastened isolation: wars in the Nupe country had destroyed trading links to the north; the growth of the Royal Niger Company severed the routes to the east; in the west the arms traffic was shut off in the 1870s by the closing of the Oke Igbo route.