ARFICA’S LURE

Lake Wakatip Mail, Issue 4238, 10 December 1935, Page 3

ARFICA’S LURE

FOR EUROPEAN POWERS. ITS ENORMOUS RESOURCES. In pushing his plans for war in Ethiopia, Benito Mussolini is carrying out an old European custom, writes Shepard Stone in the New York Times. During the last half of the nineteenth century the nations of Europe scrambled for Africa, each eager to get the largest, richest, and most strategical share. Italy did not come out very well in that scramble. To-day II Duce is trying to make up for lost time. In pointing his guns at Addis Ababa the Italian dictator is involved in a struggle with Africa’s last real independent nation. Liberia, on the west coast of the continent, is controlled by foreign rubber interests. Her independence is more formal than real. Egypt is essentially, from the international standpoint, a part of the British Empire. Ethiopia, alone of the nations on the African continent, is sovereign. Should Signor Mussolini win the struggle he apparently plans to wage, the entire map of Africa will be marked out in European colors. The African contingent is three times the size of Europe; yet the nations of Europe control most of its vast area. To-day France and Great Britain arc the great African land owners, with other European nations far behind. Relatively few Europeans have migrated to Africa. Ihc climate lias boon the barrier. Owners of Africa. Africa’s approximately 11,4(50,000 square miles are divided among the nations as follows : Area miles). Population. Franco 3,907,(510 35,440,500 Great Britain 3,409,692 47,251,900 Italy 940,734 2,210,600 Belgium ... 922,08.3 11,500,000 Portugal ... 787,008 6,004,950 Spain ... ... 128,606 784,300 Egypt 350,000 15,000,000 Ethiopia ... 350,000 10,000,000 Liberia ... 45,000 1,750,000 The annexation of Ethiopia by Signor Mussolini would mean the addition of laud three times the size ol Italy to the colonial possessions of that country. Though 11 Duct* lias declined to define the reasons behind his East African adventure and the goal at which

ho is aiming, his ambitions have be* come partly known. He wants land for Italy’s growing population; ho wants the increased power which comes with imperial possessions; he wants whatever mineral resources and riches are to be found in the land; ho wants new markets tor Italian goods. 11 Duce would also like to avenge tho Italian defeat at Adowa in 1896 when Ethiopian warriors, under their ruler, Menelik, routed Italian troops who were attempting to conquer tho country. Signor Mussolini would lie able to unite geographically bis East African possessions—ltalian Somaliland and Eritrea.

Italy’s present possessions in Africa are neither large—as African possesion go—nor particularly productive. Libya, on the north, produces olives, lemons, almonds, figs, and sponges. Eritrea, on the east, is relatively unimportant from tho economic standpoint, though it is strategically located. Italian Somaliland is somewhat more fertile; cattle and camel raising are chief industries along with incense, of which Italian Somaliland supplies half of the world’s consumption. Great Promise. Outside the Italian colonies Africa offers its white owners great resources in gold and rubber, cotton and diamonds, fruits and timber, tho less precious minerals, and other commodities. Merchants and diplomats have worked hand in hand to get tho most out of the land and tho natives, who form a cheap labor supply. Though Britain’s African possessions make up only one part of the empire upon which “the sun never sets,” they are nevertheless of great importance in London’s scheme of things. To guard the sea route to India and the Far East, Loudon has progressively taken charge of strategic spots from Suez to British Somaliland to Cape Town. British surplus capital has found its way into innumerable economic channels, from the production of ivory to ostrich feathers. Gold, diamonds, fruits, hides and skins, ostrich feathers, and other products come from South Africa to enrich Britain’s income. France, too, has large political and economic stakes on tho African continent. French African troops play a large part in the plans of French generals, sitting in Paris and making plans ior the defence of li ranee in Europe. Persian merchants and investors obtain much of their wealth from their African possessions. A Huge Legacy. Little Belgium, a dot on the world’s map. extracts enormous fortunes from the Belgian Congo, in area seventyeight times as huge as the Mother Country. King Leopold 11, who was stirred by Stanley’s search for Livingstone, left his country a huge legacy built up on the sweat of the Congo natives and the resources of that area. Copper, oil-palm, copra, coffee, cocoa, rice, cotton, tobacco, and diamonds produced in the Congo enrich the bankers and burghers of Brussels. From Portuguese Guinea and Angola the merchants and investors of Lisbon receive wealth in the form c.f similar tropical goods; Spain, once mie of the greatest colonial Powers on earth, is now one of the smallest benefactors of colonial enterprise.

Thus Signor Mussolini’s activities in sending military machines and men to East Africa is but the latest page in a chapter which was begun when the Portuguese navigators, Diaz and Vasco de Gama, rounded the southern tip of the continent and established trading posts at various points along the coast. That chapter, from beginning to end contains some of the cruellest deeds in the history of European imperialism. Where the white man, as in the exploration and subjugation of the American continent, was unable to achieve his ends peacefully he resorted to guns and powder. Throughout the world there is a sincere hope that II Duce will not go to war. Especially in London, a city wise in colonial affairs, his East African adventure is causing many misgivings. British colonial administrators have many sclffsh as well as moral reasons for wanting to sec the peace preserved. They know that a struggle between Italy and Ethiopia would not fail to have its effects upon 150,000,000 colored Africans, ruled to-day by a handful of white men.

When tobacco first made its appearance in China the pig-tailed populace became so fond of it that the reigning Emperor sternly forbade its use under penalty of death! He was doubtless a “nover-touoh-it” and didn’t approve of his subjects enjoying something he couldn’t relish himself. Anti-tobacco-ites are like that. But smoking is now so universal that were tobacco forbidden to-day the ban would certainly be ignored. A world without tobacco in the twentieth century is unthinkable! Everywhere the consumption of the weed is advancing by leaps and bounds. Herein New Zealand the principal demand is for the genuine “toasted” which combines the most exquisite flavour with the choicest bouquet, and what is practically immunity for the smoker—indulge he ever so freely. The toasting docs it! The live brands of the real tiling—Navy CutNo.il (nulldog). Cut Plug No. 10 (Bullshead). Cavendish, Riverhead Gold and Desert Cold are in constant request. But there are two sorts of “toasted"—the genuine and the imitation. “A word to the wise will always suffice!”