Nyasaland

Native residents of Nyasaland, 1911

All 75 European residents of Blantyre, 1897

The 1911 census was the first after the protectorate was renamed as Nyasaland. The population according to this census was: Africans, classed as "natives": 969,183, Europeans 766, Asians 481. In March 1920 Europeans numbered 1,015 and Asians 515. The number of Africans was estimated (1919) at 561,600 males and 664,400 females, a total of 1,226,000.[3] Blantyre, the chief town, had some 300 European residents.[3] The number of resident Europeans was always small, only 1,948 in 1945. By 1960 their numbers rose to about 9,500, but they declined afterward following the struggle for independence. The number of ethnic Asian residents, many of whom were traders and merchants, was also small.[4]

The category of 'native' was large, but there was no general definition of the term. In a Nyasaland court case of 1929, the judge opined that, "A native means a native of Africa who is not of European or Asiatic race or origin; all others are non-natives. A person's race or origin does not depend on where he or she is born. Race depends on the blood in one's veins ...".[5] Unlike Europeans of British origin, Nyasaland natives did not hold British citizenship under British nationality law, but had the lesser status of British protected person.[6] The term 'native' was used in all colonial censuses up to and including 1945.

Census data from colonial censuses and the first census after independence in the table below show a population that increased quite rapidly. The de facto populations count those who are resident; the de jure populations include absent migrant workers who gave addresses in Malawi as their permanent home.

@derived from the de jure population by subtraction of those known to be abroad.

+derived from the de facto population by addition of those known to be abroad.

Source: Final Report of the 1966 Census of Malawi, Zomba, 1968.

The colonial censuses were imprecise: those of 1901 and 1911 estimated the African population based on hut tax records, and adult male tax defaulters (up to 10% of the total) went unrecorded. The censuses of 1921, 1926 and 1931 did not make individual counts of the African population, probably under-estimated absentees, and under-counted in remote areas.[7] The census of 1945 was better, but still not a true record of the African population. The censuses of 1921, 1931 and 1945 all recorded the numbers of Mozambique immigrants. Those conducted before 1945 may have substantially under-recorded the number of Africans and also the full extent of labour emigration out of Nyasaland.[8]

Throughout the colonial period and up to the present, the rural population density of Nyasaland/Malawi has been among the highest in sub-Saharan Africa. Although the population increased quite rapidly, doubling between 1901 and 1931, high infant mortality and deaths from tropical diseases restricted the natural increase to no more than 1 to 2 percent a year. The rest of the increase seems to have resulted from immigration from Mozambique. From 1931 to 1945, natural increase doubled, probably through improved medical services, and infant mortality gradually decreased. Although immigration continued throughout the colonial period, it was a less significant factor.[9]

The 1921 census listed 108,204 "Anguru" (Lomwe-speaking immigrants from Mozambique). It is likely that a large number of those listed under other tribal names had crossed the border from Mozambique as well. It is also likely that the numbers of immigrants from tribal groups believed to belong to surrounding territories, mainly Mozambique and Northern Rhodesia, had doubled between 1921 and 1931. Most of this large migratory movement took place after 1926. The Anguru population further increased by more than 60 percent between 1931 and 1945. The 1966 census recorded 283,854 foreign-born Africans, of whom about 70 percent were born in Mozambique.[10]

This inward immigration of families was somewhat balanced by outward labour emigration, mainly by men, to Southern Rhodesia and South Africa. The development of Nyasaland was likely adversely affected by the drain of workers to other countries. The Nyasaland government estimated that 58,000 adult males were working outside Nyasaland in 1935. The Southern Rhodesian census of 1931 alone recorded 54,000 male Nyasaland Africans there, so the former estimate was probably undercounting the total number of workers in other countries. In 1937, it was estimated that over 90,000 adult males were migrant workers: of these a quarter was thought not to have been in touch with their families for more than five years.[11]

By 1945 almost 124,000 adult males and almost 9,500 adult females were known to be absent, excluding those who were not in touch with their families.[12] The great bulk of migrant workers came from the rural Northern and Central regions: in 1937, out of 91,000 Africans recorded as absent, fewer than 11,000 were from districts in the south, where there were more jobs available.[13] Labour migration continued up to and after independence. It was estimated that in 1963, some 170,000 men were absent and working abroad: 120,000 in Southern Rhodesia, 30,000 in South Africa, and 20,000 in Zambia.[14]

Although Nyasaland has some mineral resources, particularly coal, these were not exploited in colonial times.[63] Without economic mineral resources, the protectorate's economy had to be based on agriculture, but in 1907 most of its people were subsistence farmers. In the mid-to-late 19th century, cassava, rice, beans and millet were grown in the Shire Valley, maize, cassava, sweet potatoes and sorghum in the Shire Highlands, and cassava, millet and groundnuts along the shores of Lake Nyasa (now Lake Malawi). These crops continued to be staple foods throughout the colonial period, although with less millet and more maize. Tobacco and a local variety of cotton were grown widely.[64]

Throughout the protectorate, the colonial Department of Agriculture favoured European planter interests. Its negative opinion of African agriculture, which it failed to promote, helped to prevent the creation of a properly functioning peasant economy.[65][66] It criticised the practice of shifting cultivation in which trees on the land to be cultivated were cut down and burnt and their ashes dug into the soil to fertilise it. The land was used for a few years after another section of land was cleared.[67]

Compared with European, North American and Asian soils many sub-Saharan African soils are low in natural fertility, being poor in nutrients, low in organic matter and liable to erosion. The best cultivation technique for such soils involves 10 to 15 years of fallow between 2 or 3 years of cultivation, the system of shifting cultivation and fallowing that was common in Nyasaland as long as there was sufficient land to practice it. As more intensive agricultural use began in the 1930s, the amounts and duration of fallow were progressively reduced in more populous areas, which placed soil fertility under gradually increasing pressure.[68][69] The Department of Agriculture's prediction that soil fertility would decline at a rapid rate is contradicted by recent research. This showed that the majority of soils in Malawi were adequate for smallholders to produce maize. Most have sufficient (if barely so) organic material and nutrients, although their low nitrogen and phosphorus favours the use of chemical fertilisers and manure.[70]

Although in the early years of the 20th century European estates produced the bulk of exportable cash crops directly, by the 1930s, a large proportion of many of these crops (particularly tobacco) was produced by Africans, either as smallholders on Crown land or as tenants on the estates. The first estate crop was coffee, grown commercially in quantity from around 1895, but competition from Brazil which flooded the world markets by 1905 and droughts led to its decline in favour of tobacco and cotton. Both these crops had previously been grown in small quantities, but the decline of coffee prompted planters to turn to tobacco in the Shire Highlands and cotton in the Shire Valley.[71]

Tea was also first planted commercially in 1905 in the Shire Highlands, with significant development of tobacco and tea growing taking place after the opening of the Shire Highlands Railway in 1908. During the 56 years that the protectorate existed, tobacco, tea and cotton were the main export crops, and tea was the only one that remained an estate crop throughout.[71] The main barriers to increasing exports were the high costs of transport from Nyasaland to the coast, the poor quality of much of the produce and, for African farmers, the planters' opposition to them growing cotton or tobacco in competition with the estates.[72]

The SS Chauncy Maples on Lake Nyasa

From the time of Livingstone's expedition in 1859, the Zambesi, Shire River, and Lake Nyasa waterways were seen as the most convenient method of transport for Nyasaland. The Zambesi-Lower Shire and Upper Shire-Lake Nyasa systems were separated by 80 kilometres (50 mi) of impassable falls and rapids in the Middle Shire which prevented continuous navigation. The main economic centres of the protectorate at Blantyre and in the Shire Highlands were 40 km (25 mi) from the Shire, and transport of goods from that river was by inefficient and costly head porterage or ox-cart. Until 1914, small river steamers carrying 100 tons or less operated between the British concession of Chinde at the mouth of the Zambezi and the Lower Shire, about 290 km (180 mi). The British government had obtained a 99-year lease of a site for an ocean port at Chinde at which passengers transferred to river steamers from Union-Castle Line and German East Africa Line ships up to 1914, when the service was suspended. The Union-Castle service was resumed between 1918 and 1922 when the port at Chinde was damaged by a cyclone.[93]

Until the opening of the railway in 1907, passengers and goods were transferred to smaller boats at Chiromo to go a further 80 kilometres (50 mi) upstream to Chikwawa, where porters carried goods up the escarpment and passengers continued on foot. Low water levels in Lake Nyasa reduced the Shire River's flow from 1896 to 1934; this and the changing sandbanks made navigation difficult in the dry season. The main port moved downriver from Chiromo to Port Herald in 1908, but by 1912 it was difficult and often impossible to use Port Herald, so a Zambezi port was needed. The extension of the railway to the Zambezi in 1914 effectively ended significant water transport on the Lower Shire, and low water levels ended it on the Upper Shire, but it has continued on Lake Nyasa up to the present.[94][95]

A number of lake steamers, at first based at Fort Johnston, served lakeside communities which had poor road connections. Their value was increased in 1935 when a northern extension of the railway from Blantyre reached Lake Nyasa, and a terminal for Lake Services was developed at Salima. Harbour facilities at several lake ports were inadequate and there were few good roads to most ports: some in the north had no road connection.[96][97]

Railways could supplement water transport and, as Nyasaland was nowhere closer than 320 km (200 mi) to a suitable Indian Ocean port, a short rail link to river ports that eliminated porterage was initially more practical than a line direct to the coast passing through low-population areas. The Shire Highlands Railway opened a line from Blantyre to Chiromo in 1907 and extended it to Port Herald, 182 km (113 mi) from Blantyre in 1908. After Port Herald became unsatisfactory, the British South Africa Company built the Central African Railway, mainly in Mozambique, of 98 km (61 mi) from Port Herald to Chindio on the north bank of the Zambezi in 1914. From here, goods went by river steamers to Chinde then by sea to Beira, involving three transhipments and delays. The Central African Railway was poorly built and soon needed extensive repairs.[98]

Chinde was severely damaged by a cyclone in 1922 and was unsuitable for larger ships. The alternative ports were Beira, which had developed as a major port in the early 20th century, and the small port of Quelimane. Beira was congested, but significant improvements were made to it in the 1920s: the route to Quelimane was shorter, but the port was underdeveloped. The Trans-Zambezia Railway, constructed between 1919 and 1922, ran 269 km (167 mi) from the south bank of the Zambezi to join the main line from Beira to Rhodesia. Its promoters had interests in Beira port, and they ignored its high cost and limited benefit to Nyasaland of a shorter alternative route.[99][100]

The Zambezi crossing ferry, using steamers to tow barges, had limited capacity and was a weak point in the link to Beira. For part of the year the river was too shallow and at other times it flooded. In 1935, the ferry was replaced by construction of the Zambezi Bridge, over three kilometres (2 mi) long, creating an uninterrupted rail link to the sea. In the same year, a northern extension from Blantyre to Lake Nyasa was completed.[101][102]

The Zambezi Bridge and northern extension generated less traffic than anticipated, and it was only in 1946 that traffic volumes predicted in 1937 were reached. The rail link was inadequate for heavy loads, being a single narrow-gauge track with sharp curves and steep gradients. Maintenance costs were high and freight volumes were low, so transport rates were up to three times Rhodesian and East African levels. Although costly and inefficient, the rail link to Beira remained Nyasaland's main transport link up to and beyond independence. A second rail link to the Mozambique port of Nacala was first proposed in 1964 and is the principal route for imports and exports today.[103][104]

Roads in the early protectorate were little more than trails, barely passable in the wet season. Roads suitable for motor vehicles were developed in the southern half of the protectorate in the 1920s and replaced head porterage, but few all-weather roads existed in the northern half until quite late in the 1930s, so motor transport was concentrated in the south. Road travel was becoming an alternative to rail, but government regulations designed to promote railway use hindered this development. When the northern railway extension was completed, proposals failed to be carried out to build a road traffic interchange at Salima and improve roads in the Central Province to help develop Central Nyasaland and Eastern Zambia. Road transport remained underdeveloped and, at independence, there were few tarmac roads.[105][106]

Air transport began modestly in 1934 with weekly Rhodesian and Nyasaland Airways service from an airstrip at Chileka to Salisbury, increased to twice weekly in 1937. Blantyre (Chileka) was also linked to Beira from 1935. All flights were discontinued in 1940 but in 1946 Central African Airways Corporation, backed by the governments of Southern Rhodesia, Northern Rhodesia and Nyasaland resumed services. Its Salisbury to Blantyre service was extended to Nairobi, a Blantyre-Lilongwe-Lusaka service was added and internal services ran to Salima and Karonga. The former Nyasaland arm of the corporation became Air Malawi in 1964.[107][108]

John Chilembwe's church, the Providence Industrial Mission, was captured and destroyed by government forces in 1915.

The first protests against colonial rule came from two sources. Firstly, independent African churches rejected European missionary control and, through Watch Tower and other groups, promoted Millennialism doctrines that the authorities considered seditious. Secondly, Africans educated by missions or abroad sought social, economic and political advancement through voluntary "Native Associations". Both movements were generally peaceful, but a violent uprising in 1915 by John Chilembwe expressed both religious radicalism and the frustration of educated Africans denied an effective voice, as well as anger over African casualties in the First World War.[109][110]

After Chilembwe's uprising, protests were muted until the early 1930s and concentrated on improving African education and agriculture. Political representation was a distant aspiration. A 1930 declaration by the British government that white settlers north of the Zambezi could not form minority governments dominating Africans stimulated the political awareness.[111]

Agitation by the government of Southern Rhodesia led to a Royal Commission on future association between Northern and Southern Rhodesia, Northern Rhodesia and Nyasaland, or all three territories. Despite almost unanimous African opposition to amalgamation with Southern Rhodesia, the Bledisloe Commission report of 1939 did not entirely rule out some form of association in the future, provided Southern Rhodesian forms of racial discrimination were not applied north of the Zambezi.[112][113]

The danger of Southern Rhodesian rule made African demands for political rights more urgent, and in 1944 various local Voluntary Associations united as the Nyasaland African Congress (NAC). One of its first demands was to have African representation on the Legislative Council, which was conceded in 1949.[114] From 1946, the NAC received financial and political support from Hastings Banda, then living in Britain. Despite this support, Congress lost momentum until the revival of amalgamation proposals in 1948 gave it new life.[115]

Post-war British governments were persuaded that closer association in Central Africa would cut costs, and they agreed to a federal solution, not the full amalgamation that the Southern Rhodesian government preferred. The main African objections to the Federation were summed up in a joint memorandum prepared by Hastings Banda for Nyasaland and Harry Nkumbula for Northern Rhodesia in 1951. These were that political domination by the white minority of Southern Rhodesia would prevent greater African political participation and that control by Southern Rhodesian politicians would lead to an extension of racial discrimination and segregation.[116][117]

The Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland was pushed through in 1953 against very strong African opposition including riots and deaths in Cholo District although there were also local land issues. In 1953, the NAC opposed federation and demanded independence. Its supporters demonstrated against taxes and pass laws. In early 1954, Congress abandoned its campaign and lost much of its support.[116][117] Shortly after its formation, the Federal government attempted to take control of African affairs from the British Colonial Office. It also scaled-back the fairly modest British post-war development proposals.[118][119]

In 1955, the Colonial Office agreed to the suggestion of the governor of Nyasaland that African representation on the Legislative Council should be increased from three to five members, and that the African members should no longer be appointed by the governor, but nominated by Provincial Councils. As these Provincial Councils were receptive to popular wishes, this allowed these Councils to nominate Congress members to the Legislative Council. This occurred in 1956 when Henry Chipembere and Kanyama Chiume, two young radical members of Congress, were nominated together with three moderates, including two Congress supporters. This success led to a rapid growth in Congress membership in 1956 and 1957.[120]

Several of the younger members of the Nyasaland African Congress had little faith in the ability of its leader, T D T Banda, who they also accused of dishonesty, and wished to replace him with Dr Hastings Banda, then living in the Gold Coast. Dr Banda announced he would only return if given the presidency of Congress. After this was agreed he returned to Nyasaland in July 1958 and T D T Banda was ousted.[121]

Banda and Congress Party leaders started a campaign of direct action against federation, for immediate constitutional change and eventual independence. As this included resistance to Federal directives on farming practices, protests were widespread and sometimes violent. In January 1958, Banda presented Congress proposals for constitutional reform to the governor, Sir Robert Armitage. These were for an African majority in the Legislative Council and at least parity with non-Africans in the Executive Council.[122][123]

The governor rejected the proposals, and this breakdown in constitutional talks led to demands within Congress for an escalation of anti-government protests and more violent action. As Congress supporters became more violent and Congress leaders made increasingly inflammatory statements, Armitage decided against offering concessions but prepared for mass arrests. On 21 February, European troops of the Rhodesia Regiment were flown into Nyasaland and, in the days immediately following, police or troops opened fire on rioters in several places, leading to four deaths.[122][123]

In deciding to make widespread arrests covering almost the whole Congress organisation, Armitage was influenced by a report received by the police from an informer of a meeting of Congress leaders at which, it was claimed by the Head of Special Branch that the indiscriminate killing of Europeans and Asians, and of those Africans opposed to Congress was planned, the so-called "murder plot". There is no evidence that any formal plan existed, and the Nyasaland government took no immediate action against Banda or other Congress leaders but continued to negotiate with them until late February.[124]

In the debate in the House of Commons on 3 March 1959, the day that the State of Emergency was declared, Alan Lennox-Boyd, the Colonial Secretary, stated that it was clear from information received that Congress had planned the widespread murder of Europeans, Asians and moderate Africans, "... in fact, a massacre was being planned". This was the first public mention of a murder plot and, later in the same debate, the Minister of State at the Colonial Office, Julian Amery, reinforced what Lennox-Boyd had said with talk of a "... conspiracy of murder" and "a massacre ... on a Kenyan scale".[125]

The strongest criticism later made by the Devlin Commission was over the "murder plot", whose existence it doubted, and it condemned the use made of it by both the Nyasaland and British governments in trying to justify the Emergency, while at the same time conceding that the declaration of a State of Emergency was "justified in any event". The commission also declared that Banda had no knowledge of the inflammatory talk of some Congress activists about attacking Europeans.[126][127]

On 3 March 1959 Sir Robert Armitage, as governor of Nyasaland, declared a State of Emergency over the whole of the protectorate and, in a police and military undertaking which it called Operation Sunrise arrested Dr. Hastings Banda its president and other members of its executive committee, as well as over a hundred local party officials. The Nyasaland African Congress was banned the next day. Those arrested were detained without trial, and the total number detained finally rose to over 1,300.[128] Over 2,000 more were imprisoned for offences related to the emergency, including rioting and criminal damage. The stated aim of these measures was to allow the Nyasaland government to restore law and order after the increasing lawlessness following Dr Banda's return. Rather than calming the situation immediately, in the emergency that followed fifty-one Africans were killed and many more were wounded.[128]

Of these, 20 were killed at Nkhata Bay where those detained in the Northern Region were being held prior to being transferred south. A local Congress leader encouraged a large crowd to gather, apparently to secure the release of the detainees. Troops who should have arrived in the town early on 3 March were delayed and, when they arrived, the District Commissioner, who felt the situation was out of control ordered them to open fire. Twelve more deaths occurred up to 19 March, mostly when soldiers of the Royal Rhodesia Regiment or Kings African Rifles opened fire on rioters. The remainder of the 51 officially recorded deaths were in military operations in the Northern Region. The NAC, which was banned in 1958 was re-formed as the Malawi Congress Party in 1959.[129][130]

After the emergency, a commission headed by Lord Devlin exposed the failings of the Nyasaland administration. The Commission found that the declaration of a State of Emergency was necessary to restore order and prevent a descent into anarchy, but it criticised instances of the illegal use of force by the police and troops, including burning houses, destroying property and beatings. It rejected the existence of any "murder plot", but noted:

We have found that violent action was to be adopted as a policy, that breaches of the law were to be committed and that attempts by the Government to enforce it were to be resisted with violence. We have found further that there was talk of beating and killing Europeans, but not of cold-blooded assassination or murder.

The report concluded that the Nyasaland administration had lost the support of Nyasaland's African people, noting their almost universal rejection of Federation. Finally, it suggested that the British government should negotiate with African leaders on the country's constitutional future.[126][127] The Devlin Commission's report is the only example of a British judge examining whether the actions of a colonial administration in suppressing dissent were appropriate. Devlin's conclusions that excessive force was used and that Nyasaland was a "police state" caused political uproar. His report was largely rejected and the state of emergency lasted until June 1960.[131]

At first, the British government tried to calm the situation by nominating additional African members (who were not Malawi Congress Party supporters) to the Legislative Council.[132] It soon decided that the Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland could not be maintained. It was formally dissolved on 31 December 1963 but had ceased to be relevant to Nyasaland sometime before this. It also decided that Nyasaland and Northern Rhodesia should be given responsible government under majority rule. Banda was released in April 1960 and invited to London to discuss proposals for responsible government.[133]

Following the Malawi Congress Party's overwhelming victory in August 1961 elections, Banda and four other Malawi Congress Party members or supporters joined the Executive Council as elected ministers alongside five officials. After a constitutional conference in London in 1962, Nyasaland achieved internal self-government with Banda as Prime Minister in February 1963. Full independence was achieved on 6 July 1964 with Banda as Prime Minister, and the country became the Republic of Malawi, a republic within the Commonwealth, on 6 July 1966, with Banda as president.[134]

[135]

Evolution of the Nyasaland Protectorate

From 1953 to 1964 Nyasaland was united with Northern Rhodesia and Southern Rhodesia in the Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland.

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• "British Central Africa" . Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 4 (11th ed.). 1911. pp. 595–598.
• Cana, Frank Richardson (1922). "Nyasaland Protectorate" . Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 31 (12th ed.). pp. 1165–1166.
• The British Empire – Nyasaland