Nigeria has experimented with different systems of local government since the union of the northern and southern parts of the country in 1914. Islam came to Northern Nigeria as early as the 9th century CE, and was well established in the Kanem-Bornu Empire during the reign of Humme Jilmi. It had spread to the major cities of the northern part of the country by the 16th century, later moving into the countryside and towards the Middle Belt uplands. When Nigeria voted for independence it was in 1959; federal elections were held. On October 1, 1960, Nigeria gained independence from Britain. An all-Nigerian Executive Council was headed by a Prime Minister, Alhaji Sir Abu-Bakr Tafawa Balewa. Their previous type of government used was there was a rich colony. Nigeria is a Federal Republic composed of 36 States, and a Capital Territory, with an elected President and a Bi-cameral Legislature. Nigeria had many wars; The Nigerian Civil War was in 1967 – 1970, it was an ethnic and political conflict caused by the attempted secession of the South-eastern provinces of Nigeria as the self-proclaimed republic of Biafra. The war became notorious for the starvation in some of the besieged war-bound regions, and the consequent claims of genocide made by the largely Igbo people of those regions. When Islam gained independence in Nigeria in the wars that they suffered, Nigerians never gave up.