POSITION ON THE RAND

Otago Witness, Issue 3101, 20 August 1913, Page 24

POSITION ON THE RAND

A STARTLING ASSERTION

CAPETOWN, August 15. Mr Kocotze, the Government mining engineer, in his annual report on the Rand mines, pleads for improved health conditions. Phthisis had killed off the best miners, leaving the inexperienced, who are of mixed nationality, and incapable of dealing with the huge output. The select committee which has been inquiring into the position of Post Office servants recommends trade union recognition, a 48-hour week for postmen, and the continuance of Christmas boxes. August 18. Owing chiefly to the Trades Federation’s attitude the Government will abandon the Industrial Commission and substitute a departmental investigation. A round table conference between the heads of the mining industry and the miners, and a Labour inquiry into the strike in opposition to the Judicial Commission are announced. JOHANNESBURG. August 15. The medical testimony given before the Judicial Commission states that an examination of the wounds inflicted during the riot has proved that the largest proportion of them was caused by firearms in the hands of the rabble. LONDON. August 17. After the meeting between Mr Botha and Mr Smuts and the strike leaders in the Carlton Hotel, Johannesburg, on July 6, when the conditions for an armistice were arranged, a striker called Mr Botha aside and advised the Ministers not to leave the hotel that evening. When asked for the reason he stated that the executive of the Trades Federation had issued instructions that any Ministers found in Johannesburg were to be shot at sight. Subsequently a Labour leader, addressing the strikers, stated that the delegates had conic to the conference fully armed, and that had an agreement not resulted the Ministers would not have left the hotel alive. August 18. The Daily Telegraph’s Johannesburg correspondent reports the sensational discovery of a bag of blasting gelatine at the Central Fire Brigade Station. Bombs, with detonators and fuses attached, were also found in drains in different parts of the city, indicating either a scheme to

destroy the city or that some miscreants, who were afraid of being caught with explosives after the riots, hid them.