SOUTH AFRICA

Otago Daily Times, Issue 13860, 25 March 1907, Page 5

SOUTH AFRICA

THE TRANSVAAL PARLIAMENT. CHINKSK LABOUR QUESTION. Prcs3 Association—By Telegraph—Copyright. PRETORIA, March 23. Tim indentures of 407 Chinese labourers on the Rand expire at the end of June, and those of the remainder of the firstbatch iinpoi'lw! expire in August, Mv Smuts announced that the matter would not be debated until Parliament reassembled in June. Sir (.ieorge Parrar (Opposition) urged the appointment of. a Labour Commission. Mr Botha (the Prime Minister) said the Government- contemplated a. two million loan for a, land hank as soon as it was convenient. Mr 1 foyers, whose racial partisanship is notorious, promised (splicing in Knglioh) lo follow the best parliamentary traditions of the Motherland, and also of the mother colony i\t tho (.'apt. March 23. (Received March 24. at 4.24 p.m.) In the Transvaal Assembly Sir Smuts said he considered the proposed commission of inquiry into tbc lubmrr question was likely to lend to procrastination, which he. believed was the object of the Opposition. The statement was received with angry protests. Mr Smuts added that- the Government would all'ord tho mines the promptest and most effective, help. It inknde.d lo tackle , the quest ion, and boped to have a delinite policy ready by June. Tim Legislative. Council passed the Asiatic Registratioa Kill. Lord Selborac reserved it for the' King's approval. The two Houses then adjourned till Juiieli. FEDERATION. CAPETOWN, March 22. Jtr T. P. Theroii, addressing the Capo Afrikander Bond Congress at Sliddlebun;, declared that the bond would do nothing to retard federation, but it must emanate voluntarily from the people.