A QUESTION

Hawera & Normanby Star, Volume LVII, Issue LVII, 11 April 1910, Page 3

A QUESTION

THE FUTURE OF THE SUEZ CANAL.

(By H. Hamilton Fyfe, in the Daily Mail.)

There has just taken place an event which all tlie newspapers, whether they are for or against the iintish occupation, describe as being ot great importance in the history or Egypt.

The bieneral Assembly oi £he Legislative Council has been convoked m extraordinary session to discuss a matter winati win afreet the welfare of the country, one way or the other, tor the next hundred years. This matter is the proposed renewal of the concessions to the Suez Canal Company tor another forty years after 19bbJ, when the present agreement between the company j and tne Egyptian Government ex- j pires. I It may seem like looking a long way ahead to decide now what shall happen sixty years hence. Bu'c the company is anxious to get its position clearly defined, and tne advantage to Egypt will bo equally great. Egypt needs money for various public worKs. There is mucn land waiting to be reclaimed and made fertile, if only tke Government couid. afford to undertake further irrigation works. Many people bought lands ten years ago thinking they would shortly have water brought to , them. But no water has come. There are no funds to spare for it. Railways, too, are badly needed. Many cotton growers would extend their plantations into new districts if they could get their cotton carried to the sea by rail. To send it on camels does not pay. Here are two ways in which the development of the ! country is kepft back by lack of money for public works. Then there is education : a better system urgently required : impossible for lack of funds. THE POSITION OF THE COMPANY. Well, Egypt has now the chance to make up tnese (deficiencies at no cost to herself. Here is the situation. When the canal Avas made forty years ago the company obtained a concession from the Government for a century from 1869. It was also arranged at that time that the Government should receive 15 per cent of the profits, which amount at present to between two and three million pounds a year. This 15 per cent was unfortunately surrendered in the 'financial chaos which led ,to the intervention in Egyptian affairs of ! Great Britain and France, and now j Egypt gets nothing out of the canal at all. Nor under the original arrangement could it get anything for sixty years to come. As Mr H. ±\ Harvey, ' financial adviser to the Khedive, said in a JNote presented last year to the Cabinet : — The actual situation presents (this anomaly, that the present generation, upon whom falls a heavy part oi the sacrifices entailed by the construction, of the canal, derives no benefit from it, whereas in sixty years the generations to come will nnd in it, perhaps, a vast source of wealth. It would be not only fair, but economically a great advantage to lee Egypt ot to-day and the next generation receive a portion of the ruture profits. The proposal before the Legislative Council, alien, is this: That tor forty years, from 1969, the company shall still own the canal, but shall divide the annual profit with the Government. In return for this prolongation of their ( concession, the company undertake to j pay into the Egyptian Treasury during ■ ,the sixty years to come annual sums carefully calculated on a fair financial basis. These sums, it is calculated, ' would in the period between now and 1969 place at tlie disposal of the Govern- ' ment an amount) not less than £90,000,000. WHAT THE NATIONALISTS WANT. Why, then, is ifche Nationalist party so clamorously demanding that the Legislative Council shall reject the proposal? Why have the members of the Council met in a spirit of antagonism to the scheme? Why is Prince Hussein, the President of the Council, so depressed by their attitude (and by the personal attacks made upon himself also) that he speaks of wishing to resign his post and abandon public life? The key to the situation lies in .the phrase, "Egypt for the Egyptians." The noisy Nationalists say, "Let us get rid of all foreigners as quickly as we can." Also they argue that- if Egypt obtains possession of the canal in 1969 it will be able to make huge profits. Also they profess to disbelieve that the £90,000,000 would be applied to the development of Egypt. "The English would steal it," they snarl, "or send it to the Soudan." As to their contention that Egypt would benefit to a greater extent financially by taking over the canal in 1969, it is palpably unsound. The canal i has become so necessary to the comI merce of all nations that they would certainly not allow the dues to be raised, and to make the Nationalist dream come true with the present rates in force ships would have to follow one another through at the rate of one an hour, both by night and day, which is manifestly absurd. In all probability the canal dues will have to be reduced again before very long, as they have been once already. There is this to be considered, too. In sixty years' time the modes of travel and conveyance may be as different from those of to-day as the latter are from those of 1869. There is the conquest of the air to be reckoned with. In any case, it is quite possible that in sixty years' time the Powers might decline altogether to let the canal pass under Egyptian control. At all events, commercial opinion is very strongly in favor of continuing the management of the company as long as possible.