Ali Walli

The German Colonial Handbook 1903 mentions "Ali Wali" as an Indian trader in Dar es Salaam in 1903.

The 1908 edition of the German Colonial Handbook confirms that he was still trading in Dar es Salaam in 1908.

The German Colonial Handbook 1908 mentions "Ali Walli & Co." as an Indian firm, represented in Lindi in 1908. Since it is not listed in 1904 version of the German Colonial Handbook, it would seem that he left Dar es Salaam and set up in Lindi between 1904 and 1908.

Upon his death on 28 June 1910, the list of creditors was almost three pages and the list of borrowers four and a half pages long. His debts amounted to a total of 88,179.32 rupees. He owed money to the German trading houses Hansing & Co. (13,229.14 rupees) and OSwald & Co. (10,949.52 rupees), but the majority of his debts were the sum of smaller amounts owed to Asian individuals. His debts also included a deposit of 600 rupees, which the local mosque had made to his store. While his debts were considerable, he was owed even more money by other people, namely a total of 139,325.63 rupees. Among his debtors were many people of Asian descent but also a lot of Europeans,30 and the amounts owed to him ranged from 1 to 798 rupees. The majority of the debtors were shopkeepers to whom Ali Wali forwarded goods like textiles on credit. His assets stood at 86,181.88 rupees, but they were not in form of cash but in ixed assets such as houses.31The case of Ali Wali and other Dar es Salaam inheritance cases from the German colonial period indicate that traders did not run their businesses based on cash transactions but on the basis of debts and credit. Successful traders goals were not to clear all the debts they had or to claim all the debt owed to them. On the contrary, owing to the suppliers and being owed to by customers was a permanent aspect of being a trader in Dar es Salaam.32"

Interweaving threads of credit and debt: Trading (through) textiles in colonial Dar es Salaam. By Benjamin Brauhwiler Department of History, University of Basel, Basel, Switzerland

German Colonial Manual Supplement 1904
Indian Merchants Dar es Salaam 1904
German Colonial Handbook 1908
Indian merchants Dar es Salaam 1908
German Colonial Handbook 1908
German Colonial Handbook, page 1 1908
Indian Traders Lindi 1908