FUTURE OF SOUTH AFRICA.

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume XXXIV, Issue 10958, 29 April 1907, Page 4

FUTURE OF SOUTH AFRICA.

AN EX-NEW ZEALANDERS IMPRESSIONS. An ex-New Zealander, who has been engaged m business at Johannesburg for the past seven years, and is now on a holiday tour through the colony, told a representative of the Christchurch Press last week that m the Transvaal responsible government is going to be a success. "The intelligent Dutch are now thoroughly to be relied upon. Whatever they may have thought before, they now have settled down to work out the destinies of the country on loyal British lines. The Dutch re2>resenlatives that have been elected are all men of practical commonsense, and are not foolish enough to injure their place by vainly inflaming racial feeling. The labor question,, of course, is bulking largely m public matters. Those who have studied the question believe j there is plenty of native labor now available. Whether this is so or not will be proved by the report of the Royal Commission set up for the purpose, but m any case the Chinese will liave to go. No British colony can work out its salvation •if it has to depend upon low-grade alien labor. Those mining propositions that cannot be developed by means of the native labor available should wait for the application of more scientific and economical methods than we are able to employ now. "The depression m the country is terrible, find just before I left 1000 Australians were repatriated. The only industry (gold mining) that is bringing m revenue is not paying its fair share of taxation, but that will be altered. There is no sucli thing as a land tax, and the country laws are a farce, so the Government lias plenty of work to do. The railways are made practically the sole source of State revenues, and the enormously high freights and fares are keeping everything back. Immigration is strangled, and it is impossible to develop the back country, owing to the cost of getting goods m and out. A cargo of timber, valued at £2000 c.i.f., Delagoa Bay, would stand the importer m at £6000 or £8000 ati Joliannesburg. The Government is doing all that is possible to foster the farming industry, arid although how we have to import nearly " everything, m 10 years' we shall want very little. Land values m Johannesburg have dropped 50 per cent, during the laat few years, and there are vacant shops and offices" everywhere. "We have a fine system of electric cars belonging to the municipality,, and a comprehensive scheme of , water supply and sewerage has just been completed. Wages are fairly Rood still, clerks receiving from £20 to £40 per month, while a workingman's board, and lodgings can be obtained from £6 to £10 per month. The new Government is about to "found a land bank with.a capital of five millions, chiefly for the purpose of assisting farmers, by lend, ing them money, much after the same style as advances are made to settlers m New : Zealand. Owing to the ■unsatisfactory nature of land- titles^ there is practically , no means of raising money on broad acres by way of mortgage. There is a free system of education m the Transvaal, with 30,000 more scholars than there were under the old Boer regime. The language question is one of the serious problems of the future. Equal facilities for the use of Dutch and English m the law courts and Parliament have been conceded, arid this is bound to prolong the process of extinguishing racial feeling. . "Our purchases of New. Zealand produce and manufactures have dwindled away almost to nothing ? and there can never be a. large trade don© until New Zealand faces the question of an efficient, fast, ana regular steam service. The United States, Canada, and Germany are making great commercial strides m South Africa, ana particularly Germany; which has brought the fonsiness of . spoon-feeding to a very fine point. Ne\\> Zealand goods are going. to continue tailing a back seat so long as no effort is made to remedy the existing conditions, and the trade must always be spasmodic. , "The Orange River Colony is destined to be Dutcli-speaking for an indefinite period of years. More, than 75 per cei^t. of tae population are Boers, and as yet there is little or no indication of Englishmen going out there, especially to settle." In. reference to Mr Botha's scheme of general South African defence by a voliin. tary force, ; mentioned in -the , cableß of Wednesday, the speaker said. "It is fresh evidence of the sincerity of the Boers to strengthen the hands of the Eirnpire. The scheme will doa great deal towards leading the two peoples together. The fact that Mr Botha's idea is to embrace the whole of South Africa shows that he is looking forward to the time when the different States shaU federate, and from experience I can. say that there is no more fervid patriot m Cape Colony than the truly loyal Dutchman. On the whole, we are looking to the future with every confidence. Intermarriage is gradually breaking down the barrier between the two races." .