BELGIUM'S NEW COLONY.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 15821, 21 July 1913, Page 8

BELGIUM'S NEW COLONY.

RECOGNITION OP THE CONGO, APPROVED BY PUBLIC OPINION. (SW Oub Own Corbxsfojuibot.) LONDON, May 3L

On Thursday night the House of Commons took the vote of £39,000 for the salaries and expenses of the Foreign Office. This is always the occasion for a review of the fore : gn policy of the Government, and this time Sir Edward Grey was complimented from all quarters of tiie House. An instructive portion of th| debate was devoted to the Congo. Sir Edward Grey said that some years' ago ho gave a pledge, which had often been repeated, that the Government would not officially recognise \he annexation d the Congo by Belgium until our consular renorts showed that the condition of things in the Congo was substantially >n accord with the treaty obligations, and until the House of Commons had had an opportunity of discuEsintr the report. The Government was of opinion that the time had now come when it could officially recognise the annexation. The consular report now before the House showed that the conditions had completely changed from those that existed before _ the responsible Government of Belgium took matters in hand. Every other country m the world had practically recognised the Congo as a Belgian province, and, now that the state of affairs had so decidedly improved, for us to continue to separate ourselves from other Powers and to withhold the recognition would be to give the Belgian Government justifiable cause of complaint, and would impair the cordial relations which,it was our earnest desire.to preserve.—(Chews.)

LAND FOR THE NATIVES.

Sir Gilbert Parker (Conservative) said there was now on the Belgian throne an enlightened monarch, who had shown his sympathy and his desire to understand the condition of affiairs in the Congo, and he was supported by a modern and en- • lightened Governinerit, which, however, did not find it easy when the Congo was taken oyer to carry out the reforms desired, not by reformers in Belgium alone, but by people in every civilised country in the world, particularly in the United States and France, because there whs in the Parliament of Belgium a party which strenuously put obstacles in the way d those reforms being accomplished, He desired to know whether his Majesty's Go- ~j vernment had made any stipulation with 1 regard to the rights of natives to obtair>. access to the land. / Mr Silvester Home (Liberal) desired an assurance that recognition of '(She annexation would not involve any abrogation of our treaty rights in the Congo. He hoped pressure would be brought to bear on the Belrian people, and that every possible > effort would be made to ensure that under ' no pretence whatever would they return .

to the old system. The extension of railways, the development of British trade, the increase of industrial and educational facilities • all over the Congo made it rmpossible for the country to return to the old order of things. He did not think they could ever, go back to the nightmare of dark days in the Congo, and that Honso

had no right to impugn the good faith of the Belgian Government so long as it were able to produce evidence of practical reforms.

A LONG CHAPTER CLOSED.; Sir Edward Grey, in reply to the discission, said: "A decree was issued in 1910, which secured to the natives _ ihe right to use the products of the soil of native lands. It has been proposed to supplement that by a further instruction, making it clear that the natives would be able to obtain freely what lands they desire for cultivation. The instructions have not been actually issued, but they are being drafted. A draft of the regulations will shortly be completed, and when approved will be signed at once. Meanwhile I am assured that at the present moment tlie natives have no difficulty in acquiring the land they desire. There is no more difficult task than having continually to make complaints about treaty rights and other matters to a nation with which we wish to be on tho most friendly terms. There has been a great deal of impatience all round. In Belgium also there has been considerable impatience that we have not recognised sooner than we have done. 1 have always replied to any intimations of that kind that when the recognition did take place, after so many years of complaint and discussion, it was eminently desirable that it should not be the mere act of the British Government of the day, but the act of the British Government of the day carrying with it the .goodwill of Parliament and of public opinion. "In whatever communications 1 may have had with regard to the recognition I have always pointed out that it was impossible for me, by mere words, to secure the goodwill of the House of Cominonfl and public opinion unlese I could lay before Parliament report fom our own consuls which would bring home to the House ot Commons how great the change in the actual state of things has W I have waited for that, and I hope that both here and in Belgium it will be felt that it has been worth while waiting, so that now, when the time for recognition has come, it should take place with the goodwill ot both sides in the House of Commons, and that that recognition, coming from some of those who have been most critical of the state of things under the old regime, should be a frank and full recognition that the state of things is now entirely different. . ' " That is a cause of great satisfaction, and I feel that to-day in announcing to the House that we are prepared to recognise officially the Congo as a Belgian colony, we axe happily in the position of doing what is morally right and justifiable as well as what is politically expedient. It is not always that those two tiings go together, but I have- always hoped that this long chapter of complaint and trouble connected ' witii the Congo would be closed in some such way as it has been closed to-day. I hope this will be appreciated in Belgium, and that they will feel, if we have delayed, that we have only delayed in order that when the recognition came it might come in a form which would wipe all the compkinteaway, all the friction, and all the'trouble •wtfch have existed in the past."—(Cheers.)