As ethnic competition gained momentum on the local level, similar developments occurred at the regional level. Decolonization in the postwar period involved constitutional reform and the slow development of African political parties. The British government used constitutional reform to ensure its political and economic interest to maintain the status quo, while emerging African political parties engaged constitutional reform to make various claims for self-determination. The British government insisted African political parties operate at the regional level and discouraged any efforts to form broad, multi-ethnic, cross-regional nationalist parties, such as the National Council of Nigeria and the Cameroons (NCNC) had aimed for. By 1952, broad nationalist sentiments had distilled into a regionally focused politics. In this context, ethnic majorities within each region had more power than their minority counterparts. The emerging regionalist politics informed the development of a minority consciousness among Niger Delta elites in the 1950s, and they engaged the constitutional reform process through their positions as minorities to claim the right to self-determination.