During his reign, the government of Spanish Guinea received complete cooperation of the Bubi people, often using violent colonial methods to gain favorable results.

The last anti-colonial uprising took place in 1910 at San Carlos, after the assassination of a European by the name of Leon Rabadan and two Indian policemen.

[citation needed] Immediately after the insurrection, the colonial forces pressured King Malabo I to convince Bubi clan leaders to cease further retaliation.

At the end of the 1970s and under the toponymic Africanization policy of the new Equatorial Guinean government, the capital city of Bioko Island, formerly known as the British Port Clarence and the Spanish Santa Isabel, was renamed in honor of King Malabo I.

[1] In the early 1980s the Rey Malabo National Institute, formerly called Cardinal Cisneros, followed suit renaming their organization in honor of the king.