This task is about reading the given passage and construct a question about the information present in the passage. Construct a question in such a way that (i) it is unambiguous, (ii) it is answerable from the passage, (iii) its answer is unique (iv) its answer is a continuous text span from the paragraph. Avoid creating questions that (i) can be answered correctly without actually understanding the paragraph and (ii) uses same words or phrases given in the passage.

Example input: Passage: The French and Indian War (1754–1763) was the North American theater of the worldwide Seven Years' War. The war was fought between the colonies of British America and New France, with both sides supported by military units from their parent countries of Great Britain and France, as well as Native American allies. At the start of the war, the French North American colonies had a population of roughly 60,000 European settlers, compared with 2 million in the British North American colonies. The outnumbered French particularly depended on the Indians. Long in conflict, the metropole nations declared war on each other in 1756, escalating the war from a regional affair into an intercontinental conflict.
Example output: When was the French and Indian War?
Example explanation: This question is based on the following sentence in the passage- The French and Indian War (1754–1763) was the North American theater of the worldwide Seven Years' War. It is a common convention to write (start year-end year) beside a historical event to understand when the event happened. You can ask questions like this one about dates, years, other numerals, persons, locations, noun phrases, verb phrases, adjectives, clauses etc. which exist in the paragraph.
Q: The major European powers laid claim to the areas of Africa where they could exhibit a sphere of influence over the area. These claims did not have to have any substantial land holdings or treaties to be legitimate. The European power that demonstrated its control over a territory accepted the mandate to rule that region as a national colony. The European nation that held the claim developed and benefited from their colony’s commercial interests without having to fear rival European competition. With the colonial claim came the underlying assumption that the European power that exerted control would use its mandate to offer protection and provide welfare for its colonial peoples, however, this principle remained more theory than practice. There were many documented instances of material and moral conditions deteriorating for native Africans in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries under European colonial rule, to the point where the colonial experience for them has been described as "hell on earth."
A:
Why did European powers lay claim to areas Africa?