New Karshi is a town in Karu Local Government Area of Nasarawa State, Nigeria, founded in the 1980s by Muhammadu Bako II. It is a semi-autonomous local government created out of Karu LGA as Karshi Development area with the administrative secretariat in Uke. Karshi has a local government chairman as its administrative head and a seat in the Nasarawa State House of Assembly. Emir of Karshi Emirate, Alhaji (Dr) Muhammadu Sani Bako III, a first class chief is the traditional head of New Karshi. It has a population of about 30,000 people. The predominant tribes are Gwandara, Gbagyi, Gade, Bassa and Hausa.
New Karshi is 30 kilometers or about 50 minutes drive to Abuja city center on a traffic free period and 25 kilometers or 35 minutes drive to Keffi. It is bounded by Nasarawa Local Government to the South, Keffi Local Government to the East, the city of Abuja to the West.
Geography
Climate
New Karshi has almost same climate with Abuja, and under Köppen climate classification features a tropical wet and dry climate. It experiences three weather conditions annually. This includes a warm, humid rainy season and a blistering dry season. In between the two, there is a brief interlude of harmattan occasioned by the northeast trade wind, with the main feature of dust haze and dryness.
The rainy season begins from April and ends in October, when daytime temperatures reach 28 °C (82.4 °F) to 30 °C (86.0 °F) and nighttime lows hover around 22 °C (71.6 °F) to 23 °C (73.4 °F). In the dry season, daytime temperatures can soar as high as 40 °C (104.0 °F) and nighttime temperatures can dip to 12 °C (53.6 °F). Even the chilliest nights can be followed by daytime temperatures well above 30 °C (86.0 °F). The high altitudes and undulating terrain of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) act as a moderating influence on the weather of the territory. The city's inland location causes the diurnal temperature variation to be much larger than coastal cities with similar climates such as Lagos.
Rainfall in the FCT reflects the territory's location on the windward side of the Jos Plateau and the zone of rising air masses with the city receiving frequent rainfall during the rainy season from April to October every year.
History
New Karshi in Nasarawa State was founded by Alhaji (Dr) Muhammadu Bako II and approved as a resettlement town for the inhabitants of Karshi Abuja in the Nigeria federal capital in 1980 by the former civilian Governor of Plateau State, chief Solomon Daushep Lar. The native inhabitants of Karshi in Abuja were ordered to vacate their native land as a result of the movement of Nigeria capital from Lagos to Abuja to solve the problem of over crowding and heavy traffic jam around the seat of power then in Dodan Barrackas, in the city of Lagos. The military government of general Murtala Mohammed in 1976 promulgated Decree No.6 creating Abuja as new Federal Capital Territory of Nigeria. The Decree ceded ownership of Abuja land to federal government declaring it a neutral territory where no individuals, or ethnic groups who had inhabited the area for centuries could claim ownership of the land. The decree ordered immediate vacation of the territory of those that had been living there. Consequently, the Decree created funds for relocation and settlement of the natives in places of their choice outside the area mapped for the federal capital territory, preferably their home states.
However, the movement of Nigeria seat of power was delayed because of the assassination of General Murtala Mohammed in a military coup just months after he commenced work for the relocation of the federal capital territory from Lagos to Abuja. His second-in-command General Olusegun Obasanjo took over power and commenced the implementation of the master plan for the new capital part of which was resettlement and compensation of the natives of the land. But General Obasanjo could not complete the process of transfer of seat of power from Lagos to Abuja before handing over power to democratically elected President Shehu Shagari in 1989.