Read the passage below carefully:
'For over a century, colonial historiography depicted the pre-colonial polities of the Niger Delta strictly as decentralized, fragmented trading houses lacking centralized political vision or overarching ideological structures. Recent archival re-examinations and oral historiographical syntheses, however, reveal that these water-bound city-states operated under a sophisticated, unified diplomatic framework known as the House System, which regulated inter-state commerce, maritime security, and judicial arbitration across vast riverine networks. Far from being mere economic conduits for European merchant capital, the House System functioned primarily as an integrative civic institution that reshaped kinship ties into dynamic political alliances, asserting regional sovereignty against external mercantile encroachment. While individual trading houses managed localized palm oil concessions and canoe fleets, their operational authority remained strictly subordinate to the collective assembly of house heads who adjudicated territorial disputes and maintained navigational treaties. Consequently, economic accumulation served not as an end in itself, but as a supporting mechanism for preserving indigenous geopolitical autonomy.'
Evaluate the truth value of the following statement regarding the passage:
The central thesis of the passage is that pre-colonial Niger Delta polities utilized the House System primarily as an integrative political institution to safeguard indigenous autonomy rather than as mere commercial agents for European trade.
Cevap: Cevap