Nyasaland African Congress Nyasaland African Congress The Nyasaland African Congress (NAC) was an organisation that evolved into a political party in Nyasaland during the colonial period. The NAC was suppressed in 1959, but was succeeded in 1960 by the Malawi Congress Party, which went to on decisively win the first universal suffrage elections in 1961, and to lead the country to independence as Malawi in 1964. The North Nyasa Native Association when it was formed in 1912, the first of several such associations of educated "natives". Levi Zililo Mumba was elected secretary. Mumba was the architect of many of these associations, which had
Nyasaland labour migration, mainly of men, to Southern Rhodesia and South Africa. The Nyasaland government estimated that 58,000 adult males were working outside Nyasaland in 1935, but the Southern Rhodesian census of 1931 alone recorded 54,000 male Nyasaland Africans there, so it was probably an underestimate. In 1937, it was estimated that over 90,000 adult males were migrant workers: of these a quarter was thought not to have been in touch with their families for more than five years. By 1945 almost 124,000 adult males and almost adult 9,500 females were known to be absent, excluded those not in touch with