WHY DOLLFUSS WAS KILLED

Press, Volume LXX, Issue 21245, 17 August 1934, Page 13

WHY DOLLFUSS WAS KILLED

Domestic Troubles In Austria VISITOR'S OPINIONS "Dolifuss gave orders to kill ] s'o he was killed himself" .... j "What--was reported in New Zealand as a revolution was ! nothing of the kind, but simply I an attempt by the people of I Vienna to protect their own I homes" .... 'lt is quite wrong | to blame Germany and the I Nazis for the Austrian troubles, | which have been caused simply i by domestic disputes." These are the views of Mr D. Roland, who returned yesterday from a visit lasting two and a half years to Central Europe and who was in Austria during • most of the recent troubles. Mr Roland, who was born in Hungary, is a naturalised Eng- j lishman and has made his home in New Zealand for the last 35 years, having been, until a few years ago, chief European buyer, with offices in Berlin, Hamburg, and Vienna, for a number of important department stores in Australia and New Zealand. "What happened in Vienna in j February," Mr Roland told a repre- j sentative of "The Press" yesterday, j "was exactly what would happen! in New Zealand if the government \ suddenly announced that it was I going to foreclose on all mortgages, j The people of New Zealand would j protect their properties, just as the people of Vienna tried to protect their homes." Origin of the Troubles Mr Roland explained that about 40 years ago, just about the time (he general franchise was being granted in New Zealand, the general franchise was granted to the people of Vienna. Immediately the people elected a workers' municipality and Vienna became un- j doubtedly the most democratically j governed city in the world. One of | the first acts of the new municipal- j ity was to deal with the problem of housing, and huge blocks of flats were erected for the workers, some of them capable of housing 15001 families, and each of which had two 'or three rooms at an average rent of ?>s a month for each family. i This housing policy for the benefit ol' he workers was financed by taxes on the well-to-do and especi-I a'ly on the private owners of! tenement houses. Besides special; luxury taxes the owner of any tenement or house built for speculative purposes was taxed to the extent of GO per cent, of the rent his building brought in. At the same time, to protect the workers against being dispossessed, a law was priced making it impossible for any werke.. or his family to be turned out of his home. whether the family w;.s earning money or not. In this way the working classes were assured of shelter and the wage earners could give all then- attention to providing food for their families. ; Privilege* Repealed ; For some years before the assumption of power by the Dolifuss Government, said Mr Roland, there had been an agitation by owners of private house property and tenements for the repeal of this law. it was well known that Dolifuss was a supporter of those capitalists who owned house property in Vienna, and one of the first acts of the Dolifuss Government was to pass a law removing the protection against evict I >'i from all occupants oil houses w>K) had entered them since the war. "The .great grievance of the people of Vienna to-day is that they have lost their protection against eviction from their homes without adequate compensation in the way of certainty of employment or increase in earnings," said Mr Roland. "With the removal of the protection rents have risen to £4 or £5 a month and since industryis almost at a standstill in Vienna the people seem to have a very real grievance. The People's Protest "Dolifuss became more and more unpopular and finally the discontent broke into open violence last February. It is important to remember, though, that what was reported in New Zealand as a revolution was nothing more than the people's protest against a new regime which aimed at making, at their expense, the privat°iy-ownco house properties once again a paying proposition ('or their owners, i "It. wes no* the Nazis who did away with Dolifuss," Mr Roland i continued. "It was internal troubles caused by hi-; own actions. To say the Nazis w :rc responsible is simply ridiculous. Moreover, the troubles are not finished yet. Dollfuss's place has been taken by a Government which is as much in sympathy with the capitalist house and tenement owners and as much against lit working men as he was." At the time of the fighting in Vienna in February Mr Roland was in Budapest, but he visited Vienna after they were over. He stated definitely that 1400 persons, not about 300 as had been officially announced, had been killed. "From the hills surrounding Vienna," said Mr Roland, "Dolifuss trained his guns on Die people of the city and murdered them. A Fatal Decision "At the last Dolifuss decided to wipe out the Working Men's party. Four of their leaders he had hanged a few days before his own death. One of them had been so badly injured in the fighting that he had to be carried to the gallows on a stretcher. The wife of another was -.-'.prisoned for life, merely for bein« the wife of a leader of the party. It was said in Vienna when I was there that these men were hanged without even a semblance of a trial, but I do not know | whether that is true or not. "Finally Dolifuss gave orders that the rest of the party leaders, more 'than 100 men. : houJci be put out of Ihe way. To protect themselves

they killed him. He gave orders to : kill so he was killed himself. 1 | may say that everything I tell you i can be proved by the newspapers i published in Vienna at the time."