Lecture #8

Colonial
Encroachment
• There were several parties interested in the territory that eventually became
Zimbabwe.
• The Portuguese from the east...especially given the fact that they had interacted
with this part of the country since the 15th Century.
• This, of course, led to their complacence which eventually led to their failure to
colonise the country when a more determined and well-resourced force in the
form of the British came on the scene.
• The concept of signing concessions and treaties between Shona chiefs and
Europeans had existed as early as the 1860s and many treaties were signed in the
second half of the 19thc century.
• Some were made by powerful colonial forces who intended to use them to take
over land. Others were made with chancers who intended to sell them to the
highest bidder.
• As we have already seen, by the time of the scramble for Africa there were also
a number of missionaries who had established mission stations or were active
on the Zimbabwe plateau.
• Thus the relationships that had been built between the shona and a number of
European groups shaped the trajectory which the scramble took especially
when it came to the forces advancing from the south.
• The two main actors were the British and the Afrikaners as well as the Germans
(to a lesser extent).
• The British had maintained presence by occupying the Cape and Natal and they
had economic interests, controlling trade etc.
• The politics in SA had made the struggle between the British and the Boers so
intense.
• Lord Gifford and George Cawston’s Bechuanaland Exploration and Exploring
Companies which had the much better backing of London financiers (and through
its agent, E. A. Maund), had been able to secure a ratified concession from
Lobengula that superseded the Rudd Concession which was already being
repudiated by the Matabele king.
• Attempts by Rhodes and the Cape government to gain a Royal Charter had been
turned down by the British Imperial government and these were the grounds on
which the amalgamation of British Concessionaire companies into the BSAC with
Rhodes as managing director was mooted; to serve British Imperial interests as a
single entity.
• According to S. B. Stevenson, although they denied it, the two main arms of the
British colonial mission, that is the Imperial government itself and the colonial
office were actively involved in colonial encroachment from around 1884.
• S. B. Stevenson, The colonial office and the BSACo.

• Keppel-Jones, A., Rhodes and Rhodesia: The white man’s conquest of Zimbabwe
1884-1902, McGill-Queen University Press, Kingstonia,1983.

• D. Warhurst, P. R., The Anglo-Portuguese relations in South Central Africa 1890-

1900 N. Beach, War and Politics in Zimbabwe
• 1878 Andrada tries to annex large parts of Mozambique and Zimbabwe on behalf
of Companhia de Mocambique
• 1884-85 Bismark hosts the Berlin Conference
• 1887 Lobengula signs the Grobler treaty
• 1888 Feb lobengula signs the Moffat Treaty
• 1888 March Lobengula signs the Rudd concession
• 1889 oct queen of England grants Rhodes a Royal charter.
• 1890 Lippert
• 1890 September Pioneer column occupies Mashonaland and raises the union
Jack in Salisbury.
• Lobengula granted all concessions to these companies giving the impression that
he was the overall ruler of Matabeleland and Mashonaland.
• This claim was obviously an overstatement if not a blatant exaggeration of the
extent of his control.
• This overstatement was the major excuse over which British claims lay and a
weakness over which the claims were contested locally.
• When Rhodes was awarded the Royal Charter in 1889 he began to make
preparations to occupy Mashonaland.
• Rhodes had become the Managing Director of the British South Africa Company
on whose behalf Rudd had signed the concession with Lobengula in 1888. [The
imperial government was heavily involved in the process.]
• The charter had various clauses which stated that the imperial government would
continue to be in charge:
‘we shall be in all things aiding this our charter....’ It singled out the fact that it was going to
provide military and financial support and that the BSACo would facilitate the occupation.
• In 1890 Lobengula signed another treaty with Lippert in a desperate bid to
weaken Rhodes’s position.
• Lippert was to make an annual payment to Lobengula for a lease which gave him
the right to grant, lease, or rent parts of Ndebele land in his name for 100 years.
• However, Rhodes got wind of the concession and bought the concession from
Lippert thus strengthening his position.
• As the BSACO was organising the Pioneer Column they discovered that Joaquim
Paiva de Andrada had made progress and signed treaties with Tendai Mutasa
ceding several concessions to the Portuguese. Joaquin Paiva de Andrada
(Portuguese) was giving out flags to chiefs he had signed concessions with.
• However, Mutasa was confronted by Rhodes and made to cancel all treaties with
Andrada and forced to surrender all his territories to the BSACO. Meanwhile the
imperial government issued an ultimatum to Portugal and a gunboat was
dispatched to the Zambezi.
• Aderndorf managed to get about 7 treaties in Mashonaland one of which he
signed with chief Chirambamuriwo.
• News got to Rhodes that the Boers were going to form a Republic of the North in
Mashonaland (led by Louis Adendorf) and that a coalition between the Boers and
the Portuguese was being mooted.
• In response the British imperial government organised the Bechauanaland Border
Police to be on high alert.
• The Boers lost southern Mashonaland because of divisions amongst themselves
caused by Rhodes’ influence in South African politics, particularly the multiracial
Afrikander Bond which worked against the essentialist and Boer-centred initiative
led by Louis Adendorff to trek into Mashonaland.
• In both instances the British Imperial Government threatened military action in
support of the BSAC, a fact that puts paid to all assertions that the British were
reluctant imperialists.