Hostname: page-component-76fb5796d-x4r87 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-30T04:50:16.228Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Land policies in Malawi: an examination of the colonial legacy*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 January 2009

Bridglal Pachai
Bridglal Pachai
Affiliation:
University of Malawi
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

The colonial bequest in the history of land matters in Malawi began with the alienation of the best agricultural lands in the country to a few large estate owners. The promised security of tenure to the original inhabitants of the estates was never observed in full measure, and the colonial government itself attempted to remedy the original error by beginning to re-acquire land for African settlement as well as to attempt to offer some security of tenure to the African residents. These two efforts were accelerated and refined by the African government, and new related areas of relief were also introduced for the benefit of the African masses. The masses are, by nature, conservative, and the African government, forward-looking and attempting to redress the balance of unequal opportunities while at the same time formulating plans to get rid of the shackles of budgetary deficits, has to plan carefully and influence persuasively. Many of the changes introduced have yet to be tried over a number of years in different situations. For example, there is little public demand, as in Kenya, for individual title to land. ‘So although there is land pressure, the people do not want to split the family, and they do not yet appreciate the freedom of transfer provided by the Registered Land Act.’ There is, too, what is described as the disadvantages of the matrilineal system: ‘The men are a floating population and it is the women who are tied to the land. Family life is unstable and there is no solid ground on which to build a modern form of land tenure.’

Type
Research Article
Information
The Journal of African History , Volume 14 , Issue 4 , October 1973 , pp. 681 - 698
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1973

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1 Nyasaland Times, 4 Nov. 1940. Chief Mpama to Governor Sir Donald Mackenzie- Kennedy at Chiradzulu baraza.Google Scholar

2 Zambia has approximately 300,000 square miles of land; Rhodesia has about 150,000 square miles and Malawi some 45,000 square miles of which Lake Malawi alone accounts for almost 9,000 square miles.Google Scholar

3 See, for example, Agnew, Swanzie, ‘Environment and History: the Malawian setting’ in Pachai, B. (ed.), The Early History of Malawi, Longman (London, 1972), 32–3.Google Scholar

4 Until the early 1960s Malawi led the way in population figures in the former British Central Africa and it was only towards the end of that decade that Rhodesia just crept ahead. The estiniated figures for 1969 were: Malawi, 4,398,583; Zambia, 4,056,995 and Rhodesia, 4,846,930. See United Nations Demographic Yearbook, 1970, 106–7. Zambia's first reliable census was in 1963 when the figure was 3,408,500, of whom 86,900 or 2.5 per cent of the total were non-Africans. Malawi's census of 1966 gave a figure of 4,042,422 of whom 17,926 or about .5 per cent svere non-African.Google Scholar

5 COM-F. 4/I/I. Evidence of Chief Kadewere, 24 June 1915 to the Commission of Enquiry into the Chilembwe Rising, National Archives, Zomba.Google Scholar

6 C.T. I/II/3/19, Despatch by Sir Harry Johnston to British South Africa Company, 31 Mar. 1893, National Archives, Salisbury.Google Scholar

7 Johnston wrote: ‘The tenure of the land in reality was tribal; that is to say theoretically the chief had no right to alienate the land, but he had assumed such right and his assumption was tacitly accepted by his people.’ Johnston, H. H., British Central Africa (London, 1898), 113.Google Scholar

8 Ibid. 113.

9 SI/385/23, Acting Commissioner Pearce to the Marquess of Lansdowne, 7 July 1903, Inclosure 2 in No. 75. National Archives, Zomba.Google Scholar

10 C.O. 525/160. File 44001, 1936, despatch to Governor Sir Harold Kittermaster, 27 Apr. 1936, Public Record Office, London. This discovery caused the Colonial Office to scrutinize the old records during which it came across a Foreign Office despatch which stated that Johnston had omitted the non-disturbance clause only when he was satisfied that there were no Africans resident on the land for which a certificate of claim was being issued. In this particular instance there were Africans on the land and yet the clause was omitted, hence the doubts cast on Johnston's so-called thoroughness.Google Scholar

11 Information obtained from Deeds Registry, Lands Office, Blantyre, 1972.Google Scholar

12 Report of a Commission to enquire into and report upon certain matters connected with the occupation of land in the Nyasaland Protectorate, 1920, I. This is cited hereafter as Jackson Commission Report, 1920.Google Scholar

13 S.I./385/23 Enclosure I in No. 75, Pearce to Lansdowne, 7 July 1903 and S.I./519/29, ‘Particulars of Land Alienation’, 23 Feb. 1929, National Archives, Zomba.Google Scholar

14 Land Commission 1946. Report by the Rt. Hon. Sir Abrahams, Sidney, 5.Google ScholarThis is cited hereafter as Abrahams Commission Report, 1946.Google Scholar

15 Jackson Commission Report, 1920, 12, stated that quarter of the African population in the Zomba district and half in the Blantyre district resided on private estates.Google Scholar

16 Johnston, H. H., British Central Africa, 113.Google Scholar

17 Notice in the Government Gazette, 30 Apr. 1900.Google Scholar

18 Pachai, B., ed., The Memoirs of Lewis Mataka Bandwe, M.B.E. (Christian Literature Association of Malawi, Blantyre, 1971), 43–9, for Lomwe immigration.Google Scholar

19 S.I./385/25. Case No. 2 of 1903–4. Supervisor of Native Affairs versus Blantyre and East Africa Company, judgment dated 28 Apr. 1903. National Archives, Zomba.Google Scholar

20 S.I./385/25. Land Commission to Acting Commissioner Pearce, 6 May 1903. National Archives, Zomba.Google Scholar

21 C.O. 525/5. Sharpe to Major Wemyss, 22 Dec. 1903. Public Record Office, London.Google Scholar

22 Jackson Commission Report, 1920, 13;Google ScholarS.I./385/23, 3 Oct. 1924 and C.O. 626/6, fol. 7 for various reasons why the Lands Ordinance, 1904 was not enforced.Google Scholar

23 Shepperson, G. and Price, T., Independent African: John Chilembwe and the Origins, Setting and Significance of the Nyasaland Native Rising of 1915 (Edinburgh, 1963), 199.Google Scholar

24 The Native Rents (Private Estates) Ordinance No. 16 of 1917.Google Scholar

25 C.O. 525/107. Governor Sir Charles Bowring to Colonial Office, 14 May 1924.Google Scholar

26 C.O. 525/109. Bowring to Secretary of State for Colonies, 10 Nov. 1924.Google Scholar

27 Natives on Private Estates Ordinance, 15/16/1928.Google Scholar

28 Abrahams Commission Report, 1946, para. 33, p. 11.Google Scholar

29 S.I. 727/26 Rex versus Jeremiya and Solomon, 28 May to 1 July 1930, National Archives, Zomba.Google Scholar

30 Ibid. District Commissioner to Chief Secretary, 26 July 1932 and Provincial Secretary to Chief Secretary, 28 July 1932.

31 Mumba, L. Z., ‘Notes on Native Administration’, 1940. He was at the time the Secretary of the Representative Committee of the Northern Provinces Native Associations and was later, in 1944, to become the first president of the Nyasaland African Congress.Google Scholar

32 Abrahams Commission Report, 1946, 14–15.Google Scholar

33 The Nyasaland Times, 17 May 1943.Google Scholar

34 Abrahams Commission Report, 1946, 15.Google Scholar

35 Ibid. 17.

36 Acquisition of Land for Public Purposes Ordinance, 18/1948.Google Scholar

37 The Nyasaland Times, 17 Oct 1940.Google Scholar

38 Mr J. Kaye-Nicol, General Manager of the B.C.A. Company.Google Scholar

39 Pencilo in The Nyasaland Times, 23 Aug. 1948.Google Scholar

40 The Nyasaland Times, 4 June 1954.Google Scholar

41 No. 8/1952 which replaced the Natives on Private Estates Ordinance 15 and 16/1928.Google Scholar

42 Johnston, British Central Africa, 582–3.Google Scholar

43 Pachai, B., Malawi: The History of the Nation (Longman London, 1973), 120–1.Google Scholar

44 Ibid. 165.

45 Chanock, M. L., ‘The Political Economy of Independent Agriculture in Colonial Malawi: The Great War to the Great Depression’, in Journal of Social Science, I (University of Malawi, 1972), 115.Google Scholar

46 LAN I/8/7 Crown lands, letters exchanged between 13 Apr. 1920 and May 1920 by the Lands Officer, B. E. Lilley and the Director of Agriculture, J. S. J. McCall, National Archives, Zomba.Google Scholar

47 Certificate of Claim no. 24, dated I Apr. 1893, Chilingani Estate, Blantyre, 37,947 acres. Lands Office, Blantyre. This was disposed of in that same year to three European ‘buyers’: 6,410 acres to Scott of Michiru; 5,000 acres to Paolucci of Tumbulumbo and 26,537 acres to Joseph Booth of the Zambezi Industrial Mission, the last being in consideration for ‘seven trusses of calico measuring seventeen hundred and fifty yards’.Google Scholar

48 Land Register, vol. I, Blantyre, Deed No. 235, 11 Nov. 1895.Google Scholar

49 Land Register, vol. I. Various Deed numbers and dates.Google Scholar

50 Ibid.

51 Krishnamurthy, B.S., ‘Economic Policy, land and labour in Nyasaland, 1890–1914’ in Pachai, B. (ed.), The Early History of Malawi, 386.Google ScholarPachai, B., Malawi: History of the Nation, 167.Google Scholar

52 The Nyasaland Times, 27 Nov. 1952.Google Scholar

53 Nyasaland Legislative Council debates, 6–7 July 1954, 63–4.Google Scholar

54 African Wills and Succession Ordinance, 13/1960.Google Scholar

55 Africans on Private Estates Ordinance, 12/1962.Google Scholar

56 Legislative Council debates, 29 May – 1 June 1962, 315.Google Scholar

57 The Wills and Inheritance (Kamuzu's Mbumba Protection) Ordinance 36/1964.Google Scholar

58 Malawi Land Act, 25/1965.Google Scholar

59 No. 5/1967.Google Scholar

60 No. 6/1967.Google Scholar

61 No. 7/1967.Google Scholar

62 The first titles were given in the Citsimbe Development Section as follows:Google Scholar

Private land: agricultural family units 91

individual holdings I (Mrs N. K. Kalumba, wife of Chief Kalumba)

Total 92

Customary land: forest areas, 21; churches, 7; graveyards, 51; village residential, 100; dambos, 17, giving a total of 196. Public land: roads,–; schools, 5; existing business, 2; township, 1; dip tank area 1;others (court, boreholes, etc.) 21, making a total of 30. 92 individual titles were issued while the remaining 226 were issued in favour of the President of Malawi as the chief custodian of customary and public land.

63 The membership of the Local Land Board is as follows: chairman, the District Commissioner, and not less than nine members drawn from among the residents and from public officers.Google Scholar

64 A further consolidating measure was the Adjudication of Title Act, 18/1971 which brought together the registration of deeds and the registration of title covered separately by the Deeds Registration Act and the Registered Land Act respectively. By the first Act, the 37,000 deeds in Malawi dating back to the first certificates of claim were registered. This registration gave a record of transactions involving land but did not in itself give any legal validity to title. By the second Act which came into operation with the Liongwe Land Development Project the registration showed the relevant particulars affecting ownership. The process of converting all registration of deeds to include registration of titles would take many years, and in the meantime Act 18/1971 ensures that the dual process takes place at the same time in present and future development scheme areas.Google Scholar

65 Martin, Colin, ‘Land Registration in Malawi’, Chartered Surveyor, Feb. 1971, 375–6.Google Scholar

66 Pachai, B., ‘African-grown tea in Malawi: an experiment in agricultural small- holding’ in Rural African (Michigan State University, forthcoming, 1973).Google Scholar

67 Denquin, Horst, Agricultural Development in Malawi (Munchen, 1970);Google ScholarHall, J. M., The Chikwawa Cotton Development Project (Ministry of Agriculture, Malawi, 1971).Google Scholar

68 Martin, Colin, op. cit. 376.Google Scholar

69 Lamport-Stokes, H. J., ‘Land Tenure in Malawi’, The Society of Malawi Journal, XXIII, 2 (07 1970), 79.Google Scholar

70 See, for example, Norwood, H. C., ‘Ndirande, a squatter colony in Malawi’, Town Planning Review, XLIII, 2, 04 1972 (Liverpool University Press).Google Scholar