SOUTH AFRICAN NATIVES.

Hawera Star, Volume XLV, 10 February 1926, Page 8

SOUTH AFRICAN NATIVES.

NEW POLICY OUTLINED

CURTAILMENT OF RIGHTS. CAPETOWN, Dec. 11. The new native policy upon which South Africa is about to embark has caused considerable disquietude anions the natives of the country Although the proposals made by the Prime Mmist<2i\ General Hertzog, are still mdelinite. enough has been seized upon bv the natives to arouse a good deal of criticism. Even the Europeans m Smith Africa are considerably concerned at this new policy, and General Smuts as leader of the Opposition, has suggested that the Prime Minister should cal! a national convention ol all parties to consider the native problem of South Africa. “The South African Party is anxious to keep the native question outside na it v politics, and is prepared to make its contribution to the solution of this question,” he said m « speech this week. "It would be desirable that after the Bills embodying the Prime Minister’s policy have been hud beloie l>.-i rliument a national convention be constituted' to which not only those Bills but the whole native question be referred with the mandate to hud a solution which would, if possible, be • renerallv acceptable to the people ol South Africa. If the convention succeeds iintinding a workable and acceptable scheme, it will report it to 1 arliament. If this scheme appears to be ;i serious departure from the basis ol Parliamentary franchise and representation ns entrenched in the Act of Union, it should not be passed through Parliament until there has been a suitable opportunity of consulting tlie people thereon.” LOSS OF EXISTING FRANCHISE. Put if the ' Etnropeans in the Union are perturbed at this new policy, the natives are even more so. Some 50 members of the Native Advisory Committee met the Prime Minister at Pretoria this week and listened to an address made bv him on his native policy. Interviewed ‘afterwards, these native leaders showed a tendency to criticise the land proposals of this new native policy. ••The Prime Minister’s policy is being put before us in its detail as a settled matter with which we are supposed to be im agreement.”, remarked the Rev. -I. Dube, a principal spokesman and long-recognised leader of the Natal natives. “In reality.” he contin tied. “we are very far from being so. The Cape natives are to lose then; existing franchise, and in place thereof are to. share with the rest of us ai very inadequate representation in the Union Parliament, one that is to be exercised for us by seven Europeans who, if we understand the matter .aright, will have no vote oji questions o,f confidence.

• We are all greatly disappointed by the Prime Minister’s intended territorial and administrative provisions. ’ he said. “It had been supposed that sm\ie. new reserves would he created for natives, but w € are now definitely told that no land will be given us.' We ale merely to get a chance of Inlying or hiring in specified areas.

THROWN BACK INTO BARBARISM

“Then as to the administration of the territories, we were led to undei,stand that in these we could govern ourselves- and follow our own line or development. But how can we do so under a native code such as that in Natal, which was fixed five years ago. J Instead of getting freedom to advance we are Jo be back to barbaiism.” , <f lt seems,” continued Mr Dube, “that no native in the reserves is to possess any rights. All government is liv proclamation of the Governor-Gen-eral. Any native may at any time lie deported to any part of the Union, and that not necessarily for any crime, hut because the local authority thinks the general good may thereby be promoted.”

Mr Sol Plaatje we'comed the Prime Minister’s land proposals. These, he thought, would help thousands of natives who. while vainly looking for reserves. had no practical means of acquiring 'and. This they would now be able to do, especially with the help of the advances which the Prime Miniter proposed. He felt no sentiment against the exclusion of the Capo coloured franchise. It would help to take the political stigma from colour, anti thus be a stepping stone to the ultimate general enfranchisement of the non-European.

IN A DF/QU ATE R EPR ESENTATJ ON. The idea that the Cape natives should surrender their present franchise to obtain seven European representatives in the Union Parliament was, Mir Sol Plaatje thought, absolutely unacceptable. Experience had shown the value of the Cape franchise in making friends for natives in the House of Assembly. It was very observable how faithfully those members whom their votes had helped to place there had supported native interests —notably on the question of the colour bar. The seven European, members offered in the Union Parliament would constitute no offset to the existing franchise of the Cape natives. Such members would he despised by the others by reason of their inferior voting powers and lower status. Their number was too ridiculously small one man to a million constituents. There might have been willingness tosurrender the Cape franchise for direct representation by natives, but f<y nothing less. The scheme of administration for the reserves was, he said, far too arbitrary ; the natives .objected to being cut off from all contact with Parliament.