SOUTHERN RHODESIA.

Manawatu Standard, Volume LV, Issue 42, 17 January 1935, Page 2

SOUTHERN RHODESIA.

FRIENDSHIP WITH SOUTH AFRICA Southern Rhodesia does not intend entering into partnership with the Union of South Africa, according to a statement made recently by Mr G. M. Huggins, the Prime Minister. Referring to a suggestion in a Labour manifesto that ins policy was driving for union with the south, Mr Huggins declared that he “wished to preserve the utmost friendship between this Colony and the Union of South Africa. That I consider to be essential,” he added. “But I claim that there was never a more solid or firmer body of opinion against union with the South than was shown in this colony at the last election, and there has been no change. “There has been, perhaps.” Mr Huggins went on, “a little wavering among certain sections of the community who are getting very hard hit. They think that they see a market in the South, a doorway through which they can enter and sell their products. Southern Rhodesia’s economic independence of South Africa,” declared Mr Huggins, “depends upon the successful negotiation of a customs agreement with the Union Government.” Mr Huggins also spoke with gratification of the improvement in the relations between Southern Rhodesia and Portuguese East Africa since he had assumed office, and stressed the importance of maintaining this good feeling and of continuing to. cultivate the mostfriendly relations with Northern Rhodesia. It was of the greatest importance, he said, that they should “establish and promote good feeling with Northern Rhodesia against the time when we shall come together.”