History of Zambia - Colonial Period

Colonial Period

In 1888, Cecil Rhodes, spearheading British commercial and political interests in Central Africa, obtained a mineral rights concession from local chiefs. In the same year, Northern and Southern Rhodesia, now Zambia and Zimbabwe, were proclaimed a British sphere of influence. To start with the territory was administered by Rhodes' British South Africa Company (BSAC), which showed little interest for the province and used it mainly as a supplier of cheap labour.

The most important factor in the colony's economy was copper. The discovery of copper is owed partly to an American scout, Frederick Russell Burnham, who in 1895 lead and oversaw the massive Northern Territories (BSA) Exploration Co. expedition which established for the Western world that major copper deposits existed in Central Africa. Along the Kafue River in then Northern Rhodesia, Burnham saw many similarities to copper deposits he had worked in the United States, and he encountered natives wearing copper bracelets. Later, the BSAC built railroad to transport the copper through Mozambique.

In 1923 the British government decided not to renew the company's charter; as a result, Southern Rhodesia was annexed formally and granted self-government in 1923. After negotiations the administration of Northern Rhodesia was transferred to the British Colonial Office in 1924 as a protectorate, with Livingstone as capital. It was later transferred to Lusaka in 1935. A Legislative Council was established, of which five members were elected by the small European minority (only 4,000 people), but none by the African population.

In 1928 important discoveries were made in the region from then on called Copperbelt - enormous copper deposits were found, transforming Northern Rhodesia from a prospective land of colonization for white farmers to a copper exporter. Already in 1938 it produced 13% of world's copper extracted. The sector was immediately monopolized by the Anglo American Corporation (AAC, North-American) and the Rhodesian Selection Trust (RST, South African), who would control the sector till independence.

The bad security conditions and increased taxes helped to trigger a strike of African mineworkers in 1935, known as the Copperbelt strike. The strike was crushed by the authorities that killed 13 miners in the repression.

During the Second World War white miners came out on strike in 1940. Realising the importance of their products for the war, they demanded higher salaries. This strike was followed by another by African mineworkers.

Even before the war, there had been talks about merging the two Rhodesias, but the process had been halted by the British authorities, and brought to an absolute stop by the war. Finally, in 1953, both Rhodesias were joined with Nyasaland (now Malawi) to form the Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland. Northern Rhodesia was the centre of much of the turmoil and crisis that characterized the federation in its last years. At the core of the controversy were insistent African demands for greater participation in government and European fears of losing political control.

A two-stage election held in October and December 1962 resulted in an African majority in the legislative council and an uneasy coalition between the two African nationalist parties. The council passed resolutions calling for Northern Rhodesia's secession from the federation and demanding full internal self-government under a new constitution and a new national assembly based on a broader, more democratic franchise. On 31 December 1963, the federation was dissolved, and Northern Rhodesia became the Republic of Zambia on 24 October 1964.