Certificates of Claim

Last updated

Certificates of Claim were a form of legal instrument by which the colonial administration of the British Central Africa Protectorate granted legal property titles to individuals, companies and others who claimed to have acquired land within the protectorate by grant or purchase. The proclamation of the British Central Africa Protectorate was endorsed by the British Foreign Office in May 1891, and Harry Johnston as Commissioner and Consul-General examined and adjudicated on all claims to the ownership of land said to have been acquired before or immediately after that date. Between late 1892 and March 1894, Johnston issued 59 Certificates of Claim for land, each of which was equivalent to a freehold title to the land claimed. Very few claims were disallowed or reduced in extent, and around 3.7 million acres, or 15% of the land area of the protectorate, was alienated, mainly to European settlers. No Certificates of Claim were issued after 1894, but this form of land title was never abolished, and some land in Malawi is still held under those certificates.

Contents

Background to the land issue

In pre-colonial times, the right of land ownership in much of Malawi belonged under the rules of customary law to the African communities that occupied it. Community leaders could allocate the use of communal land to its members, but usually declined to grant it to outsiders, follow established custom. Neither the leaders nor the current members of a community could alienate its land, which they held in trust for future generations. Customary law had little legal status in the early colonial period, as in 1902 the Parliament of the United Kingdom enacted the British Central Africa Order, which provided that English Law would generally apply in the British Central Africa Protectorate and that the Crown had sovereignty over all the land in the protectorate, which others held as its tenants. [1]

In the period after 1860, southern Malawi suffered insecurity through warfare and slave raiding: this led to the widespread abandonment fertile land. Local chiefs tried to gain protection from European companies, settlers or missionaries who entered the area from the 1860s by granting them the right to cultivate vacant, insecure land. The African Lakes Company was formed in 1877 to cooperate with the missions established in central Africa by combating the slave trade, introducing legitimate trade and developing European influence there. Despite its benevolent aims, its local agents claimed to have made treaties or agreements with several chiefs, although there was little documentation for its large claims. Some of these treaties claimed to a transfer of sovereignty to the company, which may have had the ambition to become a Chartered company. [2] Three others individuals claimed to have purchased large areas of land. Eugene Sharrer claimed to have acquired 363,034 acres, and he had attempted to induce chiefs to give up their sovereign rights: he may also have intended to form his own Chartered company. Alexander Low Bruce, the son-in-law of David Livingstone and a director of the African Lakes Company, claimed 176,000 acres, and John Buchanan and his brothers claimed a further 167,823 acres. These lands were purchased for trivial quantities of goods under agreements signed by chiefs with no understanding of English concepts of land tenure. [3] [4]

Johnston's review of land claims

The British government appointed Harry Johnston, later Sir Harry, as Commissioner and Consul-General of the protectorate from 1891. Johnston rejected the suggestion that it could have any treatsἑ made before the protectorate was established could transfer sovereignty to individuals or companies. However, he did accept that these treaties and other agreements might be evidence of sales of land. Before the British Central Africa Protectorate was proclaimed in June 1891, Johnston had only made treaties of friendship with local chiefs, which did not surrender sovereignty to the Crown, and he did not consider that the Crown had a general claim to sovereign ownership of any land unless this had been expressly transferred by cession. Without sovereignty, the Crown had no right to alienate that land. The treaties that he made from July 1891 did cede sovereignty over land, but granted the chiefs and people involved the right to retain the land that they actually occupied, leaving all the unoccupied land free for the Crown to dispose of. Although the protectorate had been proclaimed on the understanding that British South Africa Company would contribute to the costs of its administration, Johnson, refused to act as the company's agent and resisted its demand that the Crown lands forming about 20% of the protectorate should be transferred to company control and that Johnson should also facilitate the transfer of African lands, about 40% of total land, to it [5]

Although Johnston accepted that the land belonged to its African communities, so their chiefs had no right to alienate it to anyone, he put forward the legal fiction that each chief's people had tacitly accepted he could assume such a right. Although under this interpretation chiefs could cede land to the Crown or sell or grant land not currently being used by the community to Europeans, Johnston claimed that, as Commissioner, he was entitled to investigate whether these sales were valid and, if they were, to issue a Certificate of Claim (in effect a registration of freehold title) in the land to the new owners. [6] [7] Johnston had no legal training and the protectorate has no law officers until 1896. However, when the legality of the Certificates of Claim system was challenged in 1903 on the basis that the agreements made by the chiefs breached the rights of their community members, the Appeals Court upheld the validity of the certificates, ruling that that title arose from a grant by the Crown's representative, not from any agreements made by the chiefs. The court did however judge that many aspects of the agreements were unfair and one-sided. [8]

Johnston recorded that his review of land claims begun in late 1892 was necessary because the proclamation of the protectorate had been followed by a wholesale land grab, with huge areas of land being bought for trivial sums and many claims overlapping or requiring adjustment. He regarded long occupation and improvement of the land as the best way to justify a claim, but it was rare. Failing this, he or an assistant sought confirmation that the chiefs named in agreements had agreed to sell the land and had received a fair return for the sale. However, his estimates of land value were very low, from a halfpenny an acre for indifferent land up to a maximum of threepence an acre for fertile land in the most favoured districts. The existing African villages and farms were exempted from these sales, and the villagers were told that their homes and fields were not being alienated. Initially, the exact boundaries in many of Johnston's land grants were unclear, but in 1895 government surveyors were appointed and to record these boundaries on official plans [9]

Non-disturbance clauses

In addition, most Certificates of Claim included a non-disturbance clause providing that existing African villages and planted areas were not to be disturbed without consent from the protectorate government. [10] The non-disturbance clauses were largely ineffective, firstly because the landowners routinely ignored them with impunity, secondly because the land occupied by Africans at the date of the certificate was not recorded and thirdly, the practice of shifting cultivation meant that much of what Johnston thought was unoccupied or waste land near villages was land that was temporarily out of use and resting under local variants of the Chitemene system that is still employed in parts of Zambia. [11] [12]

In the early years of the protectorate, the owners usually did not object to Africans resident on their estates practising shifting cultivation and moving their fields every few years, as they wanted to retain existing residents and attract new ones as a workforce. However, any new residents, many of which were migrants from Mozambique, were obliged to provide unpaid labour in lieu of rent for the land they occupied, under the system of thangata. Although original residents were, at least in theory, exempt from this form of labour rent, once cotton started to be grown commercially after 1901, followed by widespread planting of tobacco from 1905, this exemption came under attack. [13] Both crops needed a great deal of labour during their growing seasons, and owners attempted to reduce all residents to the status of insecure labour tenants, who could be evicted at will. This was resisted, and some original residents or their descendants moved to land outside the estates rather than remain as labour tenants. [14] The situation was not finally resolved until the colonial administration's Natives on Private Estates Ordinance 1928 removed the distinction between descendants of original residents and others by abolishing non-disturbance clauses. [15]

Certificates of Claim granted

Johnston received and reviewed 66 claims related to land and seven for mineral rights. Of the land claims, five related to land in German East Africa or North-Eastern Rhodesia so Johnston only had jurisdiction over 61 claims. Only two of these claims were rejected outright, with a handful reduced in size, and Johnston issued 59 Certificates of Claim for land in British Central Africa. Only one certificate was issued to an African in his own right; this was for 37,947 acres granted to Kuntaja. Kuntaja had bought this land from various chiefs between 1888 and 1891 and he did so acting not as a community leader or representative but as an entrepreneur in his own right. His claim to the Chilingani Estate, Blantyre, was granted in 1893 and the land was disposed of at a profit in the same year to three European buyers, including 26,537 acres sold to Joseph Booth of the Zambezi Industrial Mission. [16] The largest certificate granted related to land in what is now the Northern Region of Malawi but almost all the others were for land in the Southern Region, particularly the Shire Highlands, a largely fertile area with reasonable transport links to the east coast. [17]

The largest grant under a Certificate of Claim was of over 2.7 million acres, amounting to almost all of what was then the North Nyasa District (covering all of today's Karonga, Chitipa and Rumphi districts). The African Lakes Corporation made, or claimed to have made, treaties between 1884 and 1886 with local chiefs in the area northwest of Lake Nyasa near Karonga, where it had a trading station. However, a report in 1929 questioned the validity of the claims, and investigation showed that many of the supposed treaties were spurious and lacked credible documentation. [18] Some supposed treaties had never been made at all, others with people who were in no sense chiefs or agents authorised by legitimate chiefs, and some others did not relate to the areas claimed or were obtained by deception. The African Lakes Company had made almost no effort to develop its land and had not imposed any obligations on the local Africans to work for it or to pay rent. The company had, however, sold off some of the land it claimed to plantations which did impose these obligations, and local people were concerned that there would be further sales. [19] By the time of this report, the African Lakes Company had been taken over by the British South Africa Company, which agreed in 1930 to the cancellation of the Certificate of Claim in exchange for the grant of mineral rights over the same area. The African Lakes Company also received seven other certificates covering almost 45,000 acres. Three were for small bases at ports by the Shire or Lake Nyasa, the others were for moderately-sized estates in the Shire Highlands. However, African Lakes failed to substantiate two other claims. The first was a large claim in the South Nyasa District, now Mangochi District comprising all the land south of Lake Nyasa and west of the Shire, which was said to have been purchased for £5. The other was in Mlanje District, where the company tried to occupy land without any semblance of buying it. The company was also awarded mineral rights in five areas. [20]

Each of the three next-largest claims had been purchased by individuals but later transferred to companies. Eugene Sharrer acquired 363,034 acres in three large and two smaller estates; about half his land was in the Shire valley, where he grew cotton from 1901. He had earlier experimented with coffee, and by 1891 he planted the greatest area of coffee in the protectorate, and he also farmed tobacco. In 1902, Sharrer formed The British Central Africa Company Ltd to consolidate his business and land interests, and became a director and the principal shareholder of that company. [21] John Buchanan in partnership with his brothers claimed 167,823 acres in three large and four smaller estates, all in the Shire Highlands. Buchanan was originally a gardener and was the first planter to grow coffee and Virginia tobacco commercially in British Central Africa. He died in 1896 and the estates of the Buchanan Brothers partnership were taken over by a group of largely Scottish landowners who became the shareholders of Blantyre and East Africa Ltd, a company formed in 1901. [22] Alexander Low Bruce received 176,000 acres, almost all of which were in the large Magomero estate. On his death on 1893, this land passed to the A L Bruce Trust, whose main beneficiaries were his two sons. In 1913, these sons purchased the assets of the A L Bruce Trust and incorporated A L Bruce Estates Ltd. [23] The four companies (including African Lakes) together held 22 of the 59 Certificates of Claim issued relating to land: these comprised around 95% of all the land alienated by these certificates. Of the remaining Certificates of Claim, 18 were granted to missions, generally for small areas of land although the largest was for the islands of Likoma District. The remaining 19 Certificates of Claim were for a number of estates: 17 were in the medium size range (2,000 to 12,000 acres). The two larger estates were both soon broken up by sales into a number of medium-sized estates. [11] [24]

Later history of Certificates of Claim

No Certificates of Claim were issued after March 1894, when it was calculated that 3,705,255 acres has been alienated, although later, more accurate, surveys reduced the total to 3,691,767 acres. When further areas of Crown land were alienated, or where parts of any estate that had been comprised in a Certificate of Claim was sold, the owner was granted a freehold title. [25] When land comprised in such a certificate came into the ownership of the protectorate through purchase or forfeiture, it became Crown land. Most unalienated Crown land became Native Trust Land in 1936 by virtue of the Nyasaland Protectorate (Native Trust Lands) Order, 1936. [26]

The amount of land held under Certificates of Claim was still in excess of 600,000 acres in 1948, when a Land Planning Commission reviewed landownership, but the future of many estates was in doubt by then, and at independence in 1964 only 422,000 acres of European-owned estates remained, mainly tea estates, not all held under Certificates of Claim. [27] From 1962, landless peasants began to occupy significant amounts of unused land on the remaining estates, principally areas of land in the tea estates in Mulanje and Thyolo districts that had not been planted with tea bushes. These encroachments were organised by officials of the Malawi Congress Party and, although not sanctioned by the party's national leaders, were not challenged until after independence in 1965, after Cabinet Crisis of 1964 in Malawi led to the resignation or sacking of ministers favourable to such direct action. President Hastings Banda introduced the Land Act of 1965, which gave greater legal security to landowners holding land under Certificates of Claim and ensured that the police evicted squatters. [28] Section 2 of the Land Act of 1965 defines private land in Malawi as, “All land which is owned, held or occupied under a freehold title, or a leasehold title, or a Certificate of Claim or which is registered as private land under the Registered Land Act”. This legislation made no attempt to question the legal validity of Certificates of Claim, and as several estates are still owned by descendants of, or companies formed by, their original owners, Certificate of Claim still form the basis for their ownership today. [29]

Economic effects

John Buchanan, and possibly others among the major landowners, intended to sell off parts of their holdings to later settlers as medium-sized estates. However, although Johnston registered most of the land acquisitions made before 1891 and soon after, his policies had the effect of freezing the situation as it existed in the early 1890s. Firstly, he discouraged further large alienations by making unalienated land Crown Land available to its African communities. This prevented the growth of an indigenous landless proletariat forced to work on European-owned estates, as in much of South Africa or Southern Rhodesia, although it did permit the migration of Mozambican migrants, who formed much of the early estate workforces. Secondly, Johnston discouraged resale of estate land by fixing high prices of five shillings an acre in settled areas and two shillings and sixpence an acre elsewhere. This left the large estates unable to raise capital by selling surplus land. The undercapitalised estates could only farm a fraction of their land, and as a result the economy of Nyasaland stagnated. [30]

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Nyasaland</span> British protectorate from 1907 to 1964

<span class="mw-page-title-main">British Central Africa Protectorate</span> British protectorate from 1893 to 1907

The British Central Africa Protectorate (BCA) was a British protectorate proclaimed in 1889 and ratified in 1891 that occupied the same area as present-day Malawi: it was renamed Nyasaland in 1907. British interest in the area arose from visits made by David Livingstone from 1858 onward during his exploration of the Zambezi area. This encouraged missionary activity that started in the 1860s, undertaken by the Universities' Mission to Central Africa, the Church of Scotland and the Free Church of Scotland, and which was followed by a small number of settlers. The Portuguese government attempted to claim much of the area in which the missionaries and settlers operated, but this was disputed by the British government. To forestall a Portuguese expedition claiming effective occupation, a protectorate was proclaimed, first over the south of this area, then over the whole of it in 1889. After negotiations with the Portuguese and German governments on its boundaries, the protectorate was formally ratified by the British government in May 1891.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Harry Johnston</span> British explorer (1858–1927)

Sir Henry Hamilton Johnston was a British explorer, botanist, artist, colonial administrator, and linguist who travelled widely across Africa and spoke some of the languages spoken by people on that continent. He published 40 books on subjects related to the continent of Africa and was one of the key players in the Scramble for Africa that occurred at the end of the 19th century.

The African Lakes Corporation plc was a British company originally set-up in 1877 by Scottish businessmen to co-operate with Presbyterian missions in what is now Malawi. Despite its original connections with the Free Church of Scotland, it operated its businesses in Africa on a commercial rather than a philanthropic basis. It had political ambitions in the 1880s to control part of Central Africa and engaged in armed conflict with Swahili traders. Its businesses in the colonial era included water transport on the lakes and rivers of Central Africa, wholesale and retail trading including the operation of general stores, labour recruitment, landowning and later an automotive business. The company later diversified, but suffered an economic decline in the 1990s and was liquidated in 2007. One of the last directors of the company kindly bought the records of the company and donated them to Glasgow University Archive Services, where they are still available for research.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Chilembwe uprising</span> Rebellion against colonial rule (1915)

The Chilembwe uprising was a rebellion against British colonial rule in Nyasaland which took place in January 1915. It was led by John Chilembwe, an American-educated Baptist minister. Based around his Church in the village of Mbombwe in the south-east of the protectorate, the leaders of the revolt were mainly from an emerging black middle class. They were motivated by grievances against the colonial system including forced labour, racial discrimination, and new demands imposed on the indigenous population following the outbreak of World War I.

Thangata is a word deriving from the Chewa language of Malawi which has changed its meaning several times, although all meanings relate to agriculture. Its original, pre-colonial usage related to reciprocal help given in neighbours' fields or freely-given agricultural labour as thanks for a benefit. In colonial times, between 1891 and 1962, it generally meant agricultural labour given in lieu of a cash rent, and generally without any payment, by a tenant on an estate owned by a European. Thangata was often exploited, and tenants could be forced to work on the owners' crops for four to six months annually when they could have cultivated their own crops. From the 1920s, the name thangata was extended to situations where tenants were given seeds to grow set quotas of designated crops instead of providing cash or labour. Both forms of thangata were abolished in 1962, but both before and after independence and up to the present, the term has been used for short-term rural casual work, often on tobacco estates, which is considered by workers to be exploitative.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Alfred Sharpe</span>

Sir Alfred Sharpe was Commissioner and Consul-General for the British Central Africa Protectorate and first Governor of Nyasaland.

A. L. Bruce Estates was one of three largest owners of agricultural estates in colonial Nyasaland. Alexander Low Bruce, the son-in-law of David Livingstone, acquired a large estate at Magomero in the Shire Highlands of Nyasaland in 1893, together with two smaller ones. On his death, these estates were to operate as a trust to bring Christianity and Commerce to Central Africa. However his two sons later formed a commercial company which bought the estates from the trust. The company gained a reputation for the harsh exploitation and ill-treatment of its tenants under a labour system known by the African term "thangata", which operated in the plantation cultivation of cotton and tobacco. This exploitation was one of the causes of the 1915 uprising led by John Chilembwe, which resulted in the deaths of three of the company's European employees. After the failure of its own cotton and tobacco plantations, the company forced its tenants to grow tobacco rather than food on their own land and significantly underpaid them. Following almost three decades of losses, the Magomero estate was in poor condition, but the company was able to sell it at a profit between 1949 and 1952 because the government needed land for resettlement of African former tenants evicted from private estates. The company was liquidated in 1959.

The Natives on Private Estates Ordinance, 1928 was a colonial ordinance passed by the Legislative Council of the Nyasaland Protectorate. The body was composed mainly of senior colonial officials, with a minority of nominated members, to represent European residents. The ordinance regulated the conditions under which land could be farmed by African tenants on estates owned by European settlers within that protectorate. The legislation corrected some of the worst abuses of the system of thangata under which tenants were required to work for the estate owner in lieu of paying rent.

Eugene Charles Albert Sharrer was a British subject by naturalisation but of German descent, who was a leading entrepreneur in what is now Malawi for around fifteen years between his arrival in 1888 and his departure. He rapidly built-up commercial operations including wholesale and retail trading, considerable holdings of land, cotton and coffee plantations and a fleet of steamers on the Zambezi and Shire rivers. Sharrer was prominent in pressure groups that represented the interests of European planters and their businesses to the colonial authorities, and was responsible for the development of the first railway in what had become the British Central Africa Protectorate, whose construction was agreed in 1902. In 1902, Sharrer consolidate all his business interests into the British Central Africa Company Ltd and became its principal shareholder Shortly after this he left British Central Africa permanently for London, although he retained his financial interests in the territory. Very little is known of his history before he arrived in Central Africa but he died in London during the First World War.

Blantyre and East Africa Ltd is a company that was incorporated in Scotland in 1898 and is still in existence. Its main activity was the ownership of estates in the south of what is now Malawi. The main estate crops it grew were tobacco until the 1950s and tea, which it continued to grow until the company’s tea estates were sold. Blantyre and East Africa Ltd was one of four large estate-owning companies in colonial Nyasaland which together owned over 3.4 million acres of land, including the majority of the fertile land in the Shire Highlands. The company acquired most of its landholdings between 1898 and 1901 from several early European settlers, whose title to this land had been recognised by Certificates of Claim issued by the administration of the British Central Africa Protectorate. After the boom for Europeans growing tobacco ended in about 1927, the company retained one large estate in Zomba District where its tenants were encouraged to grow tobacco and others where it grew tea. It was also left with a scattering of small estates that it neither operated nor effectively managed but obtained cash rents from African tenants on crowded and unsupervised estates. Many of its estates, excluding the tea estates which it continued to manage directly, were sold to the colonial administration of Nyasaland between 1950 and 1955.

The British Central Africa Company Ltd was one of the four largest European-owned companies that operated in colonial Nyasaland, now Malawi. The company was incorporated in 1902 to acquire the business interests that Eugene Sharrer, an early settler and entrepreneur, had developed in the British Central Africa Protectorate. Sharrer became the majority shareholder of the company on its foundation. The company initially had trading and transport interests, but these were sold by the 1930s. For most of the colonial period, its extensive estates produced cotton, tobacco or tea but the British Central Africa Company Ltd developed the reputation of being a harsh and exploitative landlord whose relations with its tenants were poor. In 1962, shortly before independence, the company sold most of its undeveloped land to the Nyasaland government, but it retained some plantations and two tea factories. It changed its name to The Central Africa Company Ltd and was acquired by the Lonrho group, both in 1964.

The Abrahams Commission was a commission appointed by the Nyasaland government in 1946 to inquire into land issues in Nyasaland. This followed riots and disturbances by tenants on European-owned estates in Blantyre and Cholo districts in 1943 and 1945. The commission had only one member, Sir Sidney Abrahams, a Privy Counsellor and lawyer, the former Attorney General of the Gold Coast, Zanzibar and Uganda, and the former Chief Justice, first of Uganda and then Ceylon. There had been previous reviews to consider the uneven distribution of land between Africans and European, the shortage of land for subsistence farming and the position of tenants on private estates. These included the Jackson Land Commission in 1920, the Ormsby-Gore Commission on East Africa in 1924 and, most recently, the Bell Commission on the Financial Position and Development of Nyasaland in 1938, but none of these had provided a permanent solution. Abrahams proposed that the Nyasaland government should purchase all unused or under-utilised freehold land on European-owned estates, which would then become Crown land, available to African farmers. The Africans on estates were to be offered the choice of remaining on their current estate as paid workers or tenants, or of moving to Crown land. These proposals were not implemented in full until 1952. The report of the Abrahams Commission divided opinion. Africans were generally in favour of its proposals, as were both the governors in post from 1942 to 1947, Edmund Richards, and the incoming governor, Geoffrey Colby. Estate owners and managers were strongly against it, and many European settlers bitterly attacked it.

William Jervis Livingstone (1865–1915) was the manager of the Magomero Estate in Nyasaland owned by A L Bruce Estates Ltd and was killed in 1915 during the uprising against colonial rule led by John Chilembwe. Livingstone, from the Isle of Lismore in Argyllshire, Scotland, was born in 1865 and appointed as manager of Magomero in 1893.

John Buchanan (1855–1896), was a Scottish horticulturist who went to Central Africa, now Malawi, in 1876 as a lay member of the missionary party that established Blantyre Mission. Buchanan came to Central Africa as an ambitious artisan: his character was described as dour and devout but also as restlessly ambitious, and he saw in Central Africa a gateway to personal achievement. He started a mission farm on the site of Zomba, Malawi but was dismissed from the mission in 1881 for brutality. From being a disgraced missionary, Buchanan first became a very influential planter owning, with his brothers, extensive estates in Zomba District. He then achieved the highest position he could in the British administration as Acting British Consul to Central Africa from 1887 to 1891. In that capacity declared a protectorate over the Shire Highlands in 1889 to pre-empt a Portuguese expedition that intended to claim sovereignty over that region. In 1891, the Shire Highlands became part of the British Central Africa Protectorate. John Buchanan died at Chinde in Mozambique in March 1896 on his way to visit Scotland, and his estates were later acquired by the Blantyre and East Africa Ltd.

Alexander Livingstone Bruce was a capitalist of Scottish origin, a director and major shareholder of A L Bruce Estates Ltd, one of the largest property owning companies in colonial Nyasaland. His father, Alexander Low Bruce, was a son-in-law of David Livingstone and urged his two sons to use the landholding he had acquired for philanthropic purposes. However, during over 40 years residence in Africa, Bruce represented the interests of European landowners and opposed the political, educational and social advancement of Africans. After the death of his elder brother in 1915, Alexander Livingstone Bruce had sole control of the company estates: his management was harsh and exploitative, and one of the main causes of the uprising of John Chilembwe in 1915. During the uprising, three of Bruce's European employees were killed and one of them, William Jervis Livingstone was held partly to blame for the revolt. Although Livingstone was carrying out Bruce's orders, Bruce, as a leading landowner and member of the governor's Legislative Council, escaped censure. Despite Bruce's striving for profits, A L Bruce Estates lost money but was saved from insolvency by the colonial government's need for land for resettlement following a famine in 1949. Shortly before his death in 1954, Bruce was able to sell the company's Nyasaland estates, repay its debts and realise a surplus.

Native Trust Land in colonial Nyasaland was a category of land held in trust by the Secretary of State for the Colonies and administered by the colonial governor for the benefit of African communities. In pre-colonial times, land belonged to the African communities that occupied it, and their members were free to use it in accordance with local customary law. In the late 19th century, large areas of fertile land were acquired by European settlers, and the remainder became Crown land, which the colonial government could alienate without the consent of the resident communities. To give a measure of protection to those communities, in 1916 land in Native Reserves, which then amounted to about a quarter of the land in the protectorate, was designated as Native Trust Land, to be held in trust for the benefit of African communities. Later, in 1936, all Crown Land except game or forest reserves or that used for public purposes became Native Trust Land, and Native Authorities were authorised to allocate Trust Land to their communities in accordance with customary law. After 1936, Native Trust Land constituted over 80% of the land in Nyasaland and most African farmers farmed Native Trust Land from then until Nyasaland gained independence as Malawi in 1964 and after.

The name Karonga War is given to a number of armed clashes that took place between mid-1887 and mid-1889 near Karonga at the northern end of Lake Malawi in what is now Malawi between a Scottish trading concern called the African Lakes Company Limited and elements of the Ngonde people on one side and Swahili traders and their Henga allies on the other. In the 19th century, it was referred to as the “Arab War”, despite few actual Arabs being involved. Although these conflicts predate formal endorsement of a British Central Africa Protectorate west of Lake Malawi in 1891, European involvement, both by the African Lakes Company and by Germans attempting to prevent Swahili slave trading around Lake Tanganyika in German East Africa, had upset the previous balance between the Ngonde and their neighbours and created the conditions for this conflict. It was between the Tumbuka and Nyakyusa-Ngonde ethnic groups.

Since 1933, various traditional chiefs in Nyasaland have been designated as Native Authorities, initially by the colonial administration, and they numbered 105 in 1949.. They represented a form of the Indirect rule which had become popular in British African dependencies in the second quarter of the 20th century, although Nyasaland's Native Authorities had fewer powers and smaller incomes than similar institutions in other African colonies. The Native Authority system worked reasonably effectively until after the Second World War, when they were obliged to enforce unpopular government agricultural policies and, in some cases, their support for the Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland made Native Authorities unpopular with many of their people. After 1953, many of the powers of individual chiefs were transferred to councils which became the Native Authorities, although the chiefs sat on these councils. After independence, the authorities were renamed Traditional Authorities and continued to operate, and the status and influence of many of the chiefs revived through their cooperation with the Malawi government of Hastings Banda.

Sir George Smith was a British civil servant. He began his career in the War Office in 1878 but joined the office of the chief secretary of British Cyprus the following year. He was promoted to assistant chief secretary in 1883 and afterwards transferred to the crown colony of British Mauritius where he was acting receiver general and chief collector of customs from 1905 to 1909. He was colonial secretary of Mauritius from 1910 to 1913 when he was appointed governor of the protectorate of Nyasaland. He held this position for ten years which included the First World War and the Chilembwe uprising. Smith encountered difficulties in relations with the Ngoni people over the hut tax and had to deal with an influx of white ex-servicemen after the war. His governorship saw advances in the transport infrastructure in Nyasaland and the cultivation of many crops.

References

  1. ↑ B Pachai, (1973). "Land Policies in Malawi: An Examination of the Colonial Legacy", p. 685.
  2. ↑ B. Pachai, (1978). "Land and Politics in Malawi 1875-1975", pp. 36, 151-7.
  3. ↑ J McCracken, (2012). "A History of Malawi", 1859-1966, pp. 77-8.
  4. ↑ Sir Harry Johnston, (1897). "British Central Africa", p. 85.
  5. ↑ J S Galbraith, (1974). Crown and Charter: The early Years of the British South Africa Company, pp. 230-3.
  6. ↑ Sir Harry Johnston, (1897). "British Central Africa", pp. 112-13.
  7. ↑ B. Pachai, (1973). "Land Policies in Malawi: An Examination of the Colonial Legacy", pp. 682-3, 685.
  8. ↑ J G Pike, (1969). "Malawi: A Political and Economic History", p. 127.
  9. ↑ J McCracken, (2012). "A History of Malawi", 1859-1966, pp. 65-6.
  10. ↑ Sir Harry Johnston, (1897). "British Central Africa", pp. 107-8, 112-13.
  11. 1 2 B. Pachai, (1978). "Land and Politics in Malawi 1875-1975", p. 41.
  12. ↑ R M Moore and M. Vaughan, (1994). "Cutting Down Trees", pp. 22, 30-2.
  13. ↑ J McCracken, (2012). "A History of Malawi", 1859-1966, p. 78.
  14. ↑ J McCracken, (2012). "A History of Malawi", 1859-1966, p. 78.
  15. ↑ C Baker, (1993). “Seeds of Trouble: Government Policy and Land Rights in Nyasaland, 1946-1964” pp 11-13, 42-4.
  16. ↑ B Pachai, (1973). “Land Policies in Malawi: An Examination of the Colonial Legacy,” p. 693.
  17. ↑ B. Pachai, (1978). "Land and Politics in Malawi 1875-1975", pp. 38, 41.
  18. ↑ J McCracken, (2012). "A History of Malawi", 1859-1966, p. 77.
  19. ↑ Pachai, (1978). "Land and Politics in Malawi 1875-1975", p. 171.
  20. ↑ Pachai, (1978). "Land and Politics in Malawi 1875-1975", pp. 151-7.
  21. ↑ S.Tenney and N K Humphreys, (2011). "Historical Dictionary of the International Monetary Fund", p. 452.
  22. ↑ J McCracken, (2012). "A History of Malawi", 1859-1966, pp. 78-9.
  23. ↑ L White, (1987). “Magomero: Portrait of an African Village,” pp. 82, 110-11.
  24. ↑ Nyasaland Protectorate (1929) "Report of the Lands Officer on Land Alienations", pp. 7-11
  25. ↑ Nyasaland Protectorate (1929) "Report of the Lands Officer on Land Alienations", Schedules A, B and C.
  26. ↑ J Power, (1992). 'Individualism is the Antithesis of Indirect Rule': Cooperative Development and Indirect Rule in Colonial Malawi, Journal of Southern African Studies, Vol. 18, No. 2, p. 330.
  27. ↑ B. Pachai, (1978). "Land and Politics in Malawi 1875-1975", pp. 136-7.
  28. ↑ J McCracken, (2012). "A History of Malawi", 1859-1966, pp. 455-7.
  29. ↑ Malawi Legal Information Institute, the Laws of Malawi, Chapter 57:01, Land Act. "Land Act | Malawi Legal Information Institute". Archived from the original on 2013-06-23. Retrieved 2013-01-19.
  30. ↑ L. White, (1987). Magomero: Portrait of an African Village, pp. 81-2, 85.

Bibliography

This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.