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Agricultural Improvement and Political Protest on the Tonga Plateau, Northern Rhodesia*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 January 2009

Mac Dixon-Fyle
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Extract

In Northern Rhodesia under colonial rule, much land was alienated from the Plateau Tonga for occupation by European settlers who were mainly maize farmers. The expansion of African farming from the late 1920s, aided by the growing use of the plough and draught oxen, caused such settlers to demand the imposition of marketing controls. The government sought to introduce conservation measures to protect the lands of African farmers from wanton misuse, and in 1946 it introduced an Improved Farming Scheme (I.F.S.) to check overcultivation among the Plateau Tonga. The I.F.S., while nurturing a small group of privileged farmers, was to antagonize most African producers and gave rise to charges of collaboration with the colonial administration. The non-political activities of the Farmers' Associations formed by the Improved Farmers lent substance to these charges which in the 1950s emanated largely from the ranks of local supporters of the African National Congress (A.N.C.). By 1959, the I.F.S. had failed to meet the expectations of its members, thereby bearing out the doubts and fears of its critics. This was to throw into the lap of the local A.N.C. movement several wealthy and educated farmers who had hitherto taken no active interest in protest politics but who were now convinced they had been misled.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Journal of African History , Volume 18 , Issue 4 , October 1977 , pp. 579 - 596
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1977

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References

1 The need for such research was noted by Henderson, Ian in ‘Origins of Nationalism in East and Central Africa: The Zambian case’, J. Afr. Hist., xi, 4 (1970), 601Google Scholar. There are a few useful passages in Gann, L. H., A History of Northern Rhodesia (London, 1964), 165–6, 222–6Google Scholar, 265–6, 287–9, 306–7, 374–6, and 424–5; while there is an account of Tonga commercial farming in the 1940s and 1950s by a former Director of Agriculture in Northern Rhodesia: see Allan, W., The African Husbandman (Edinburgh, 1965), 413–22.Google Scholar

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4 Hellen has aptly described the government's policy of widespread alienation of land, in the hope that sometime in the future there would be a large settler influx, as a ‘Settler dream': Hellen, J. A., Rural Economic Development in Zambia, 1890–1964, (London, 1968), 135.Google Scholar

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10 KTC 1/1/2/1, ZNA: Native Commissioner, Magoye, to Magistrate, Livingstone, 26 June 1913; also ZA 2/2, ZNA: District Circular no. 2, 1921.

11 For further details of this aspect of land alienation see Dixon-Fyle, M. R., ‘Politics and agrarian change among the Plateau Tonga of Northern Rhodesia, 1924–1963’ (Ph.D. thesis, London, 1976), 42–9, 66–72.Google Scholar

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15 Interviews on the plateau, 1973–4. The cost of a plough appears to have ranged between £1 and £2 10s. up to the early 1950s. By the early 1930s, some farmers were asking as much as £1 a day for the use of one plough and a span of oxen: see Native Affairs Report (1932), 18.Google Scholar

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19 C.O. 795/71, Public Records Office (P.R.O.), London: Report on the Problems of Agricultural Development among the Batonga of reserve XI, 31 Jan. 1934.

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23 Sec/AG/47, ZNA: Secretary of State's despatch no. 489, 23 Sept. 1937.

24 Sec/AG/47, ZNA: Memorandum on the work of the Agriculture Department, 25 Jan. 1938.

25 Ibid.

26 Agriculture Department, Annual Report (1938), 13.Google Scholar

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32 Various interviews in these chieftaincies, 1973–4. In the Siamaundu area, the enthusiasm of chief Jakras Mondeh Siamaundu and the impact of the Kanchomba system ensured the scheme's success.

33 Interviews with Amos Walubita (12 Nov. 1973), Sibanda, Samuel (18 Nov. 1973)Google Scholar and Milambo, Ellison (10 Feb. 1974).Google Scholar

34 KSB 3/1 ZNA: District Notebook, Tour Report, no. 4, 1951.

35 Ibid.

36 Ibid.

37 Interview with Nyiimba, John Hauma, 19 Nov. 1973Google Scholar. This response was encountered in several interviews with Catholic and S.D.A. informants.

38 Native Affairs Report (1960), 66.Google Scholar

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45 See Howard, R., ‘Report on Improved Farmers in the Monze area, Jan. 1952’, Mount Makulu Research Station Library, Lusaka.Google Scholar

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47 Sec/Nat/66 f. N/0006/3, vol. iii, ZNA: District Office Report, 1950.

48 KSB 3/1, ZNA: Tour Report no. 4, 1951. Seven of the area's 145 farmers were to join Sixpence in the scheme in 1951. See Sec/Nat/366, ZNA: Tour Report no. 7. 1951.

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51 Interviews with Sibanda, Samuel (18 Nov. 1973)Google Scholar, Liyanda, Nelson (9 Dec. 1973)Google Scholar and Chiabi, Lazarus (14 May 1974)Google Scholar, who had held key positions in local Farmers' Associations and provided most of the material on which this section is based. Their accounts were later checked against those of less prominent Association members.

52 This proviso was included mainly because the Association was designed to bring advanced cultivators together and its organizers believed it would be in a stronger bargaining position if its membership was thus restricted.

53 Interview with Liyanda, Nelson (9 Dec. 1973)Google Scholar who for a number of years (about eight in all) was leader of the Monze Association.

54 The Natural Resources Board was set up ‘to exercise general supervision over natural resources, to stimulate public interest in conservation, to recommend appropriate legislation, and to ensure coordination between the various bodies concerned’. See Makings, S. M., Agricultural Change in Northern Rhodesia/Zambia, 1945–65, (Stanford, 1966), 223.Google Scholar

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56 The money that had accumulated in the Maize pool's stabilization fund was transferred into this new fund in 1949 and was used for conservation purposes.

57 Native Affairs Report (1948), 59.Google Scholar

58 KSB 3/1, ZNA: Tour Report, no. 4, 1951.

59 Interview with Milambo, Ellison (10 Feb. 1974).Google Scholar

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62 See Rotberg, R. I., The Rise of Nationalism in Central Africa: the making of Malawi and Zambia, 1873–1964, (Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1965), 235–316Google Scholar, for details of this and other general political developments.

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66 Keemba Hill was also to produce Job Mayanda, the A.N.C.'s first Southern Provincial President.

67 The most prominent of these was Gideon Ndandala Mankapwi of Keemba Hill who, though an Improved Farmer, was a dedicated branch organizer.

68 Sec/Nat/366, ZNA: Tour Report, no. 9 of 1951.

69 Ibid.

70 N/0001/2/8, ZNA Provincial Agricultural Officer to Mazabuka, D. C., 12 Aug. 1952.Google Scholar

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72 Apart from lands taken up by the Catholic and S.D.A. Missions, Ufwenuka and Chona chieftaincies on the eastern escarpment suffered no major land losses to white seelers. This partly explains the A.N.C's low profile in these chieftaincies. See Muchangwe, I. H., ‘Report on Ufwenuka/Chona Regional Pan’ (Lusaka, 1963), 4Google Scholar: Mount Makulu Research Station Library.

73 Sec/Nat/366, N/0834/3, ZNA: Tour Report, no. 10, 1952.

74 Sec/Nat/366. N/0834/4, ZNA: Tour Report, no. 9, 1953.

75 Interviews with Moonga, Naul (29 Apr. 1974)Google Scholar and Chingila, Thomas (30 Apr. 1974).Google Scholar

76 The District Commissioner, in 1952, noted the chief's ability to ‘run with the hare and hunt with the hounds’. See Sec/Nat/366. N/0834/3, ZNA Tour Report, no. 10, 1952.

77 Sec/Nat/366. N/0834, ZNA: Tour Report, no. 12, 1949.

78 Sec/Nat/366. N/0834/3, ZNA: Tour Report, no. 10, 1952.

79 Interviews in the area.

80 Sec/Nat/366, N/0834/3, ZNA: Tour Report, no. 10, 1952.

81 Howard, as cited in n. 45.

82 Sec/Nat/366, N/0834/4, ZNA: Tour Report, no. 5, 1953.

83 See Rotberg, , Rise of Nationalism, 214–52.Google Scholar

84 During the first two seasons of the loan scheme, nearly £1,500 was paid out to Improved Farmers. See Native Affairs Report (1954), 91.Google Scholar

85 Prominent among these was Paul Mwiindwa, Congress branch secretary in the area. Interview with Mwiindwa, Paul, 21 Nov. 1973.Google Scholar

86 Southern Province ‘Stock-taking’, 1960. Mount Makulu Research Station Library (Lusaka).

87 Native Affairs Report (1957), 78.Google Scholar

88 Native Affairs Report (1956), 79.Google Scholar

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90 The scheme made no progress in Mazabuka District and met only limited success in Choma District. See Native Affairs Report (1957), 80, and (1958), 71.Google Scholar

91 This was repeated in various interviews on the plateau.

92 Northern Rhodesia Legislative Council Debates, 7 Nov. 1957, no. 93, col. 175. See also Native Affairs Report (1957), 75.Google Scholar

93 Native Affairs Report (1957), 75.Google Scholar

94 Native Affairs Report (1958), 71.Google Scholar

95 Ibid. 67.

96 During 1958, the Authority's Inoculation Order was to be invoked at least seventeen times to compel African farmers to put their animals at the disposal of the Veterinary Department's staff. See Native Affairs Report, (1958), 71.Google Scholar

97 See Muchangwe as cited in n. 72: also interview with Kaluwe, Franklin (18 Dec. 1973).Google Scholar

98 Interview with Kazoka, William, 23 Apr. 1974.Google Scholar

99 By Jan. 1957, a total of six chiefs, including Naluama, had been deposed in Northern Rhodesia for reasons not unconnected with Congress. See Fabian Colonial Bureau (F.C.B.), 103/2/item 3, Congress circular, vol. III, no. 3. Jan. 1957, Rhodes House Library, Oxford. The Paramount Chief on the Tonga plateau, Mugodi Monze, was himself deposed in 1959: Native Affairs Report (1959), 66.Google Scholar

100 Expenditure on the I.F.S. for the Southern and Eastern Provinces rose from £87,403 in 1954–5 to £103, 973 in 1956–7: computed from various Agriculture Department Annual Reports.

101 Cf. Berger, Elena L., Labour, Race and Colonial Rule, (Oxford, 1974), 7, 238.Google Scholar

102 Native Affairs Report (1959), 70Google Scholar. Scotch carts were locally-produced two or four-wheeled wooden carts used as farm transport.

103 Interviews with Michello, Job (28 June 1974)Google Scholar, Milambo, Ellison (23 June 1974)Google Scholar and other Congress organizers.

104 ‘Southern Province, Stock-taking’, 1960Google Scholar. Mount Makulu Research Station Library (Lusaka). The Improved Farming scheme was finally terminated during the early 1960s.

105 See Dixon-Fyle, , ‘Politics and agrarian change’, 258–9, 282, 289–90, 341.Google Scholar

106 Ibid., 309, 383–7.