SOUTH AFRICA'S FLAG.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXIII, Issue 19512, 16 December 1926, Page 13

SOUTH AFRICA'S FLAG.

NO CHANGE IN ATTITUDE. DISTINCT EMBLEM WANTED. . A. and N.Z. CAPETOWN. Deo. 14. ■ Speaking at the City Hall, the Minister of the Interior, the Hon. Dr. D. F. Malan, said there was no change in the attitude of the Prime Minister regarding the flag. , He said there would be no change in Sjie future, because, as an independent cation, South Africa must have its own flag, and that must denote a break with the past. Therefore it could not incorporate either the " Vierkleur " or the Union Jack. DEATH OF SECESSION. EMPIRE CO-OPERATION. CAPETOWN. -Dec. 3. The full acceptance of the declared Imperial relations by the Nationalists must lead to . a readjustment of South African Union politics. The Opposition leader, General Smuts, and his followers, however, advise caution, in view of the possibility of the declarations being merely window-dressing for the Provincial Council elections, which are to be fought during the next few months. A Government organ, editorially, says: "Wb say that sovereign independence has now been achieved. Why still retain it, as an ideal to be striven for, in the party's constitution ? The party must officially repudiate the secession interpretation. The Nationalists also must emphasise tho desirability of co-operating with other parts of the Empire." The paper calls on General Smuts and his followers to co-operate " to carry our status into effect." " In this way," the article concludes, " secession will die a natural death." The undertaking by the Minister for Justice, Mr. Tielman J. Roos, K.C., that the secession article in the constitution of the Nationalist Party will bo edited at next conference, shows that the party will give the Prime Minister, General Hertzog, unanimous support on this vital issue, though in a speech to-day Mr. Roos boldly declared himself in favour of a State Bank, a Left Wing Labour aim which is contrary to General Hertzog's policy. The English papers proclaim that the death of the secession issue is a triumph for the Smuts policy. "It is a rare, if not unparalleled, achievement," says the Cape Argus, "for the leader of an Opposition to effect so wholesale a conversion of the politicians in power."