Introduction

The decade ending in 1964 was the most dramatic in the twentieth century history of Malawi. At one level, the key feature was the transformation of Congress from the weak, divided movement of 1953 into the infinitely larger, more united, more powerful Malawi Congress Party that was to dominate Malawian politics in the early 1960s. As modern research has demonstrated, in many parts of Africa the rhetoric of nationalist ‘struggle’ disguised the reality that political independence was the outcome of a negotiated settlement achieved as much through the input of colonial planners in Europe as it was through the agitation of African nationalists. In Malawi, by contrast, the impact of the nationalist movement brought about a fundamental reassessment of British decolonisation strategies. Widespread popular participation, however, went side by side with a growing intolerance of dissent. Surface unity masked the emergence of increasing ethnic, regional and generational tensions. Alternative models of political mobilisation were marginalised and then eliminated. Independence for Malawi involved not just the formal ending of British rule on 5 July 1964. It also involved the eruption of the cabinet crisis five weeks later and the birth of the Banda dictatorship.

From apathy to agitation, 1953–56

The period from 1953 to 1956 has generally been described as one that marked a low point in the fortunes of the Nyasaland African Congress, although, as Power has demonstrated, disruption at the centre did not mean the ending of all political activity. Sangala did his best to retain contact with the fifteen or so branches still in operation.