The colonial legacy of disability: Analysing historical perspectives and disability legislation in Zambia – 1890s-1960s

4.1 Early legislation - The Lunacy Ordinance of 1927

One of the earliest pieces of legislation affecting persons with disabilities in Northern Rhodesia was the Lunacy Ordinance of 1927 (the Ordinance), passed by the Northern Rhodesia Legislative Council.65 By enacting this Ordinance, Northern Rhodesia was simply following the legislative developments that had occurred in other colonies such as Southern Rhodesia, Uganda and Nigeria. The Ordinance was modelled on the Ugandan Lunacy Ordinance of 1906.66 Commenting on the Ugandan Ordinance, Pringle notes that the Ordinance ideally aimed at addressing the ‘European cases of insanity, rather than African patients’.67 The Preamble to the Ordinance stated that it was ‘an Ordinance for the detention of lunatics and suspected lunatics and to regulate the law relating to lunacy in the territory’.68 The Ordinance granted the High Court jurisdiction in lunacy69 and went on to define the term lunatic as ‘including any idiot and any other persons of unsound mind’.70 The use of such language, though less common today but still present in some statutes, to describe mental illness is open to broad and arbitrary interpretation.71 Terms like ‘idiot’ or ‘unsound mind’ do not specifically define or accurately represent mental illness.72 In modern times, these terms are deemed unacceptable and unconstitutional, as will be further discussed below.

The works of Vaughan give some insight into the treatment of mental health and psychiatry in British Colonial Africa and the treatment of Africans. Referencing the Nyasaland Native Lunatics Ordinance of 1913, Vaughan describes how defining insanity was a very confusing matter for white colonialists because of a failure to understand and appreciate the culture, customs, and practices of the native Africans. Observing also that the courts were usually presided over by ‘British district officials’ ill-qualified in legal matters, Vaughan notes how defining insanity in another culture was equally challenging, and the use of African court assessors as linguistic translators, only made the situation worse.73

Despite the ambiguity surrounding the definitions of lunacy or insanity, the ultimate authority for determining who was considered mentally ill rested with white British officials. These officials likely relied on their subjective interpretation of lunacy, as terms like ‘unsoundness of mind’ are fluid legal concepts rather than clear medical classifications of mental disability. Native Africans were particularly vulnerable to discriminatory legislation due to the custodial approach to ‘lunacy’ in Northern Rhodesia and prevailing racist stereotypes. These stereotypes characterised Africans as fundamentally different and intellectually inferior, believing they needed to be ‘civilised’ from a primitive state to the modern standards of Western civilisation.74 It should be noted that the enactment of Lunacy legislation in colonial Africa coincided with the peak of European scientific racism, which viewed Africans as ‘the most primitive of all people’.75 It was during this era, therefore that the tools of scientific racism were used to justify discrimination, segregation, and the unequal treatment of Africans.76 Vaughan, McCulloch, and Campbell, in their separate works on African psychiatry during colonial times, explore the writings on African psychology and psychiatry by famous psychiatrists such as Carothers, Gordon and Vint, who plied their trade in colonial Africa and whose writings provided ‘scientific proof’ that the Africans were racially inferior owning to their underdeveloped brains and frontal lobes in comparison to the Europeans.77 These descriptions of the intellectual ineptitude of Africans were not just restricted to the Africans on the African continent but the same was also said to be true of African descendants in America as well. Thus, in his essay ‘Race intelligence’, Du Bois chronicled how science was used to justify the racial discrimination of blacks through continued attempts to prove that they were of a lesser intelligence and not fully human.78

It was also claimed that certain mental health conditions, like depression, were uncommon among Africans.79 When these conditions were found to exist, it was often suggested that they were caused by exposure to European culture.80 Carothers thus stated:

In general, it seems, therefore, that classical depressive syndromes are seldom seen, at least in Africans untouched by alien influences; and it behoves one to consider whether other cases do occur but are not disclosed.81

The purported increase of schizophrenia among Africans was also explained along similar lines.82 It is, therefore, possible that the reported increase of these ‘exclusively European’ mental conditions in Africans was seen as another indicator of the colonialists’ civilising mission of the natives.83 These theories gained much traction in the perception and treatment of Africans by the colonial governments such that any other theories which proposed a contrary view were often dismissed. For example, in their respective works, Vaughan and McCulloch both refer to Wulf Sachs, a South African psychiatrist and psychoanalyst whose early research on African and European patients concluded that there were no inherent differences between their minds. However, colonial authorities frequently dismissed these findings.84 In referencing the Kenyan colonial experience, Campbell notes that in the 1930s, Gordon’s eugenic views became a key focus for the medical profession in Kenya. Doctors who supported eugenics placed these ideas at the centre of debates concerning African welfare, development, and related medico-legal issues.85 In Northern Rhodesia, the establishment of the Rhodes-Livingstone Institute (RLI) in 1937 as the first anthropological research institution in Africa and the various works published under it were influential in steering colonial perceptions and attitudes about African bodies, minds and social conditions.86

Although established as an independent institute, free from direct colonial governmental control, the RLI still received funding from the colonial government. It had two important missions. Firstly, by utilising tools in social anthropology it would generate ‘scientific’ knowledge about Africans and the effects of colonialism on them. Secondly, ‘it would provide the colonial authorities with useful information that could be used to facilitate the smooth and humane operation of colonial rule’.87 The researchers at the RLI considered themselves as progressive but the colonial government sometimes viewed them with a sense of ambivalence owing to their highest academic and scholarly approach towards anthropological research concerning the colonial subjects.88 However, despite some of their works being critical of Gordon and Vint’s phrenological conclusions on African intelligence and mental defects, there is a palpable sense that their writings stemmed from perspectives that essentialised the differences between the European and the Black African. Davidson’s writings on ‘Psychiatric work among the Bemba’ clearly demonstrate this.89 Kalusa and Phiri also observe that the knowledge generated by colonial anthropologists about African society was used by colonial authorities to maintain their hold on colonial power.90

During this period, the preoccupation of the colonial psychiatrist lay in trying to figure out what characterised a ‘normal’ African as opposed to investigating mental illness. Thus, by pathologising what constituted ‘normal’ African psychology, colonial psychiatry’s main goal was to provide compelling scientific arguments about the inferiority of Africans to Europeans. Vaughan, therefore, notes that:

Colonial psychiatry did identify the ‘lunatic’ and sometimes incarcerated her or him ... but in general the need to objectify and distance the ‘Other’ in the form of the madman or the leper, was less urgent in a situation in which every colonial person was in some sense, already ‘Other’.91

With the legislative use of words such as ‘idiot’ to describe ‘lunacy’, coupled with the racist scientific beliefs, it is easy to see how the Colonial government could use the Lunacy Ordinance as a means of social control over the African.92 In addition, as per its Preamble, the Lunacy Ordinance did not have any provision for treatment, but instead it provided for custodial confinement.93 As such, the ordinance gave magistrates the authority to hold hearings regarding an individual’s sanity upon the receipt of sworn information from an informant who believed that any person within the magistrate’s jurisdiction was a ‘lunatic’.94 The determination of whether the suspected individual was a lunatic required an examination by two registered medical practitioners who would have to certify ‘stating that the suspected person was in their opinion a lunatic and a proper subject for confinement’.95 In the event that no medical practitioner was available, a magistrate could authorise the apprehension and detention of a person considered to be of unsound mind pending an examination by a medical practitioner.96 If the suspected individual were a native African, the certification by one medical practitioner would suffice.97 Native commissioners were also given the authority to order apprehensions and detentions in certain circumstances however the exercise of such power had to be reported to the nearest magistrate, who would then take over the matter.98

In exceptional cases ‘persons of unsound mind’ would by special arrangement with the Southern Rhodesian Government be admitted to the Ingutsheni Asylum (Ingutsheni Mental Hospital) in Bulawayo.99 This situation continued until 1962 after the establishment of the first and at the time the only mental health hospital in Zambia, the Chainama Hills Hospital.100 Like everything else, the wards at this facility were segregated on racial lines as well. Europeans were well housed in comparison with the African patients who were housed in less than conducive and generally overcrowded wards.101 This racially segregated environment made it possible for whites to receive better treatment and attention than their African counterparts who were highly susceptible to gross abuse.102 Where confinement was deemed unnecessary, the magistrate could direct that the suspected lunatic be placed in the care of their relatives or friends. If they were African, they would be handed over to a chief or headman.103 African beliefs in witchcraft as the cause of insanity in certain instances were readily dismissed by the colonial authorities, who were quick to deny its existence.104 The existence of legislation such as the Witchcraft Ordinance also made it more challenging for Africans to explain certain classifications and causes of insanity for fear of being punished under the Witchcraft Ordinance.105 All in all, the responsibility for making decisions of whether one was a ‘lunatic’ was a legal one and not necessarily a medical one. Based on that, the law could then be used to justify unnecessary and unreasonable detentions or to constrain individuals perceived to be troublesome by certifying them as insane.

The introduction of European-styled asylums to Africa was predominantly used to confine and house the ‘African insane’ and, to a lesser extent ‘the European insane, for fear that they would become vagrant or otherwise compromise British prestige’.106 However, as Vaughan observes, there was no ‘great confinement’ for natives with mental illness in African asylums during the colonial era in comparison with what was happening in European asylums at the same time.107 Fernando notes that the introduction of asylum-psychiatry into sub-Saharan Africa did not necessarily meet the needs of the Natives with mental disabilities who in most instances got help from their family and community, and resorted to religious and indigenous medicines for treating their mental health problems.108 These observations reflect Carothers’ views who noted that institutionalisation was mainly reserved for those who proved to be a nuisance and could not be managed at home.109 McCulloch goes on to indicate that the common African psychiatric inmate was male, and had either been in the prison system or displayed violent and unmanageable behaviour.110 These observations were also true for Northern Rhodesia as confirmed by Haworth who observes that the transfer of patients to neighbouring Southern Rhodesia was seen by the colonial officials as being too cumbersome and administratively challenging.111 To this end it was more convenient and obviously cheaper for the colonial government to return patients to their villages for supervision by the headman instead of going through with the

ordeal of certification, confinement in a gaol and subsequent transfer hundreds of miles by train under an escort and across an inter-territorial border to an asylum where few if any of the staff or inmates can speak their language.112

4.2 The 1949 Mental Disorders’ Ordinance

A landmark piece of legislation in Northern Rhodesia was the Mental Disorders’ Ordinance of 1949. This Ordinance repealed the 1927 Lunacy Ordinance and was later incorporated as an Act after Zambia gained independence. The Ordinance proceeded from the recommendations of a 1947 committee that had been set up to examine the operations of the 1927 Lunacy Ordinance. According to Haworth, the committee strongly advocated for the construction of an asylum in Northern Rhodesia, arguing that it was in the real interest of African communities to keep those with mental illness detained for long periods.113 The Ordinance also coincided with developments in mental health views on the need to provide curative treatment and not merely custodial confinement for those with mental health challenges. There was thus a shift from trying to investigate what ‘normality’ and ‘abnormality’ meant for an African, to one aimed at researching mental illness.114 This was premised on the recurring fears among European psychiatrists of the effects that urbanisation, industrialisation, and detribalisation were likely to have on the African mind at the time.115 It was about exploring how the Africans would cope or were coping with changes to their social order in the advent of industrialisation.116

The threats of decolonisation and fears of the rise of nationalist anti-colonial sentiments only heightened the sense of urgency amongst European psychiatrists who called for accelerated efforts in assessing mental health risks which were expected to befall the Africans due to the drastic changes they would experience.117 Keller therefore notes that, ‘under colonialism, where the ruling state is in almost constant tension with the population, the position of psychiatric knowledge becomes even more complex’.118 To this effect, the 1949 Ordinance proceeded earlier calls by Donald Mackay, a mission doctor in Northern Rhodesia, on the need to conduct ‘extensive research on African Mental health’.119 Mackay called for the establishment of

mental clinics in every township and men trained in psychiatry and steeped in African background to stem the tide of threatening maladjustment. We hear much of development - but where is their development so pressing as this.120

For Mackay, it was not enough for psychiatrists to understand the African mind from the European perspective of what it meant to be normal or abnormal. There was instead the need to take a holistic approach to understand the African mind in his own setting by considering the Africans ‘background, his faiths, his hopes, his fears, his sex life - and everything else that makes up the mosaic of his mental environment’.121

It was also around this period that the likes of Davidson, a psychiatrist, writing for the Rhodes-Livingstone Institute Journal, called for the use of shock therapy as part of the treatment for some psychiatric cases.122 Davison in advocating for collaborative work between the study of psychiatry and anthropology, argued that work in this area would ‘be of great value both to the Government and to the private industrial concerns’.123 The benefits would therefore result ‘in more efficient administration, reduced policing costs, better physical health and worker discipline, and an improved international image for enlightened colonial rule’.124 He also made recommendations for the establishment of a psychiatric hospital for Northern Rhodesia. Thus according to the colonial office report, the purpose of this Ordinance was ‘to bring the law relating to the care and treatment of mentally disordered and defective persons into line with modern medical practice’ (at the time).125 The Ordinance was modelled on the Southern Rhodesia Mental Disorders Act of 1936 (also formulated after the England and Wales Mental Treatment Act of 1930) since most patients of mental illness were ‘detained’ there for treatment.126 Apart from amending the terminology to conform to the medical standards of the time, the Ordinance also sought to ‘permit administrative improvements in adjudication and the detention and release of patients’.127 The Ordinance in keeping with the individual and clinical view that mental disability is an individual defect of intelligence, defined ‘mentally disordered’ or ‘defective person’ as:

Any person who in consequence of mental disorder or disease or permanent defect of reason or mind, congenital or acquired -

4.3 Blind Persons’ Ordinance 1961

An important development in 1961 was the enactment of the Blind Persons’ Ordinance for the welfare of the blind in Northern Rhodesia. The Ordinance provided for the creation and establishment of the Northern Rhodesia Council for the Blind under the chairmanship of a Commissioner for Blind Welfare.141 The role of the Commissioner for the Blind was to advise the Minister on all matters affecting the education, training, and employment of blind persons.142 The Council’s aim was to coordinate the work of existing organisations in the field of blind welfare, which also included supporting the Royal Commonwealth Society for the Blind,143 in its campaign with mobile clinics in certain provinces of Northern Rhodesia.144 This Ordinance also provided for the voluntary registration of blind persons by the Boards for the blind established by the Council for the Blind and where no Board was in place to the District Commissioner having jurisdiction in an area.145 Where an application was made, the individual was required to be examined by an authorised officer who was required to certify whether or not they were satisfied that the person examined was indeed blind.146 As the name suggests, the Blind Persons Ordinance as well as the Northern Rhodesia Council for the Blind, were not all-encompassing of other impairments but restricted their reach to the blind only.147 The main reason for concentrating efforts on the blind was because of the high prevalence rate of blindness among children in the northern provinces of Northern Rhodesia.148

The government’s predominant concentration on the welfare of the blind, did not necessarily imply that other forms of impairment were left unattended. The care for other persons with disabilities, especially those with physical impairments, was mainly the responsibility of the Ministry of Local Government and Social Welfare in collaboration with grant-aided voluntary organisations. Thus, through the Ministry’s Social Welfare Division, adults with physical disabilities could obtain assistance either in the form of some subsistence or ‘in deserving cases, help with vocational training and the provision of tools or equipment to enable [them] become self-sufficient’.149 The Federal Government, through the Ministry of Health, also provided services for juveniles with mental disabilities (referred to at the time as ‘ineducable juveniles’), whilst specialised training facilities were made available for children with mental disabilities and learning difficulties (referred to at the time as ‘educable defective children’) through the Ministry of Education.150 The Territory also had leper schools for persons suffering from leprosy. From 1960, the leper schools were the responsibility of the Ministry of Local Government and Social Welfare having assumed responsibility from the Ministry of African Education. Other categories of physical disabilities were catered for by voluntary bodies, such as the Northern Rhodesia Society for Handicapped Children, The Northern Rhodesia Polio Fund, and the Lusaka Society for African Cripples.

From this, it is clear that the formal education system during the colonial era was both segregationist and discriminatory not only on the grounds of race but on the grounds of impairment as well. Speaking on the South African school system during the apartheid-era Ndlovu, however, argues that whilst it is easier for us to focus on the negatives of these segregated special schools for persons with impairments, it is also important to address some of the positive elements as well.151 Thus, although the system could be viewed as segregationist, it can also be viewed as a system that recognised the humanness of learners with impairments.152 In effect, these special segregated schools were designed and built in such a way that they could be accessible for those with impairment. They also had trained teachers and specialised equipment to cater for the unique needs of those with impairments.153 Nonetheless, as already mentioned earlier, it cannot be overlooked that because segregation was an entrenched system in the entire socio-economic fabric of Northern Rhodesia, the best schools with the best equipment and the best teachers were largely located and designated in white settler neighbours. Facilities for the native black Africans were usually given secondary priority, whose welfare was often left to the benevolence of the various missionary societies scattered around the country.

4.4 Progressive developments and reforms in disability advocacy, 1930s-1960s

The late 1930s also experienced the advent of World War Two (WWII). Meshack points out that ‘after the Second World War broke out, it quickly spread into the African continent and the British and French immediately started mobilising their African Troops and preparing for war’.154 Further, Geurts notes that:

WWII was a pivotal moment for disability theories because there was an emergence of the ideology of equal chances ... however, this ideology was not extended to the African Population because Africa was still perceived as a disease-ridden place where impairment was considered natural.155

Despite the above perception, there was a progression in the education, and to an extent the care of persons with disabilities. To start with, after the death of Issie Hofmeyr, a missionary’s wife who founded the first school of the blind, Ella Botes started a class for visually impaired students in 1914 consisting of 12 students at Madzimoyo in the Eastern Province. In 1940, Ella Botes later opened a school solely for blind boys with the help of the young men trained at Magwero.156 In 1952 schools and centres for the blind such as Kangonga and Kambowa rehabilitation centres in Ndola were established. These centres not only provided sheltered employment but training in various skills. For instance, the Kangonga rehabilitation centre taught the making of baskets, cane furniture and brooms while the centre in Kambowa mainly focused on agriculture. By 1963, a total of 27 pupils who were visually impaired had passed standard VII from the school in Magwero. These pupils were subsequently trained as teachers, telephone operators and evangelists.