Evening Post. WEDNESDAY, APRIL 9, 1924. THE CRISIS IN SOUTH AFRICA

Evening Post, Volume CVII, Issue 85, 9 April 1924, Page 4

Evening Post. WEDNESDAY, APRIL 9, 1924. THE CRISIS IN SOUTH AFRICA

The significance in South African politics of the Wakkerstroom byelection was clearly explained in a message which reached us from Capetown on Monday. Kecognis.ing the importance of the contest, the Government had put forward an exceptionally • strong candidate whom it had induced to resign an important official position in order that he might represent it, but he. was defeated by more than 200 votes on a poll of less than 3000. " The election," says our cabled report, "was pivotal as regards -the feeling of the country, and is admitted as an outstanding Nationalist victory." The Nationalists, of whom General Hertzog is the leader, were said to be jubilant at the result, and to be predicting a big victory for the party at the General Election in September. But the promptitude and resolution with which General Smuts has met this reverse—a promptitude almost equal to that displayed by M. Poincare a fortnight ago, and a resolution for which his histrionic performance provided little room—will save them from the need of waiting so long. General. Smuts will advise the Governor-General to dissolve Parliament, and hopes to have the necessary legislation passed by tomorrow. Though the presumption is always against an extraordinary, dissolution, the reasons given by the South African Premier for an immediate appeal to the country appear to be sound. Standing alone, a much more decisive defeat than that which the Government has sustained at the hands of the Wakkerstroom electors, would not justify a dissolution. But as the culmination of a series of reverses and disappointments, as the last straw added to an already almost intolerable burden, even a much less striking defeat might reasonably be deemed sufficient for the purpose. It is a question not merely of numbers but of tendencies and forces, not merely of counting heads in the lobby but of moral weight and of public confidence. It is for this reason that a Government sometimes suddenly goes to pieces, though its Parliamentary majority is apparentlly far above the danger point, and conversely a Government may carry on and do good work for session after session though its margin of safety in any critical division is very narrow. In' the present case the doubts of the Prime Minister confirm the jubilation of the Opposition. The Government, he said, was doubtful, after the Wakkerstroom election, whether it still enjoyed the confidence of the country. A mere Parliamentary majority was not enough, as the Government was dealing with questions of policy which xor»ly a Government which enjoyed the confidence of the country, and in addition the' confidence of Parliament, should undertake. The Government therefore desires that the opinion of the country should be taken, and that the confidence which was expressed in it three years ago, but since then has obviously waned, should either be renewed and strengthened or passed on to another party. Compared with the majority with which the only other survivor. of the war Premiers was able to manage the New Zealand Parliament successfully last year, General Smuts's working majority of six seems quite handsome, but in comparison with what the electors gave him in February, 1921, it has a very sickly look. The result of the 1921 election was: South African (Government) . Party, 76; Nationalists (Opposition), 47; Labour, 10; Independent, 1. The majority with which the Government started out was thus 18—or after the election of the Speaker, 17—and has now been reduced to 6. Two-thirds of the confidence which was then expressed by the electors may now be said to have been withdrawn, and the Government's moral force has been so much weakened in the process that its determination not to struggle doubtfully on with a crumbling remnant but "to put it to-the touch—To gain or lose it all," is doubtless best for everybody. Colonel Cresswell, the Labour leader, welcomes the decision as exuberantly as General Hertzog. An outstanding feature of the struggle in 1921 was that while each of the two principal parties • increased its poll, Labour received a bad set-back. Colonel Cresswell attributes the result to the fact that that election was fought " on completely false issues," and declares that it was " intended solely for the reduction of the Labour representation. If the confidence with which the Labour leader says that his party now awaits another appeal to the people is justified, one of the main reasons is that the " false issues " of which he complains were in large measure of its own creation, and have to that extent been since removed by its own action. The South African elections of 1921 were watched throughout the Empire with grave anxiety, because of the possibility that Labour's hostility to the Government might bfi instrumental in giving a victory to General Horfczog, with his gospel of racial hatred, republicanism,

and secession. The Empire was grateful ■ that in these circumstances a large transfer of votes from Labour to the Government dispelled this danger. If it can await the present struggle with less concern, the reason is that Colonel Cresswell has put his party right on this point and compelled General Hertzog to forego any immediate attempt to realise his revolutionary and disruptive programme. From the Imperial standpoint the vital part of the compact arranged between the Labourites and the Nationalists in April last was contamed in the following part of the letter written by the Labour leader to General Hertzog and confirmed by the latter :— The most obvious difficulty in the way ?%?, Ny f su. ck c°-°Peration being effective is the fact that, quite irrespective of the real uews and intentions of yourself and your party the South African Party I propaganda has inoculated members of. the English-speaking section of the PP:?h % T , ma"y Parfcs of the country with the behet that if your party achieved power you would at once set about trying to cut the painter and establish a republic—the old secession bogey, in fact, of the 1921 election. . In this regard you said that in the Parliament which will then be elected should a Nationalist Government ccme Unto power, no Nationalist member of 1 arhament will use his vote to upset the existing constitutional relation of South Africa to the British Crown. The compact effected by this correspondence was described by Mr. Burton as. an exchange of pledges, i'l which the Nationalists promised the Labour Party, "We will not steal your Flag for five years," and the Labour Party promised the Nationalists, "We will not steal your land for five years." Without trespassing on local politics, an outsider may be grateful to Colonel Cresswell for putting the security of the flag in South Africa beyond any immediate doubt.