"LEAVING TO-NIGHT FOR KIMBERLEY TO ATTEND THE NATIVE CONGRESS. INFORM PLAATJE."
It had never previously happened that a representative of the Government attended a coloured political assembly, and it was felt that wiser councils had prevailed with the Government, and that as a result it had decided to meet the Natives, at least half-way. If gambling was one of the indulgences of the Natives, some at least of the delegates would have wagered that Mr. Dower was conveying a concession to the Native Congress, by which it would be unnecessary for the latter to send a deputation to England. So thoroughly was the idea of a concession associated in the mind of the Congress with the approaching visit of Mr. Dower that it postponed the election of delegates for the mission to England. This anticipation was a reasonable one as the Union's recent legislation was in the melting-pot.
The law against British Indians, passed at the same time as the Natives' Land Act, was just then recommended for modification, under pressure brought to bear upon the Imperial Government by the Government of India and other agencies. Again, the Labour members were creating difficulties both at Capetown and Westminster over General Smuts's Deportation Bill, which compelled the Government to amend its conditional banishment clause — a hardship that was not as vital or as absolute as the banishment clauses against black tenants in the Natives' Land Act. Consequently, the native delegates to Congress, representing as they did an overwhelming majority of the inhabitants of South Africa — a section that had received nothing but violent legislation from the South African Parliament since the inauguration of Union — had every reason to expect that, for the first time, a Government emissary was carrying an olive branch to the Natives; but, alas! unlike the industrial strikers, the Natives had no votes to create a constitutional difficulty; unlike the British Indians, they have no Indian Government at their back; therefore, their vital interests, being negligible, could comfortably be relegated to the regions of oblivion, and this hope, like all its predecessors, was falsified.
Mr. Dower attended the Congress on Saturday, February 28, and again on Monday, March 2, and made speeches.
He was profuse in expressions of the gratitude of the Government to the Natives, their leaders and their chiefs, for the loyal co-operation they have always rendered the authorities, and he came to ask them, he said, to perpetuate that loyal co-operation and to refrain from appealing to Great Britain on the Natives' Land Act. To appeal would be to put back the clock of the Native Affairs Department for many years. Of course, it did not matter about the putting back of the Natives' own clock, since its only use is that of an index for the registration of Government taxes, municipal pass fees at one shilling or more per month per Native, and similar phases of the black man's burden. Thus, in answer to questions put by the members of the Congress, Mr. Dower was not able to say that one iota of the provisions of that Draconian law would be modified before the Commission made its report, nor could he give a pledge in the name of the Government that if the Commission reported favourably to the Natives, Parliament would carry into effect the Commission's report, even though the pledge sought took no account of the possibility of the Commission's report being hostile to the interests of the Natives. This then was the character of the visit which the Government Secretary paid to the Native Congress. It was entirely barren of results, and as such it left the Congress as it found it, in bewilderment and gloom.
Fresh fears took hold of the Congress. When the commissioners' names were gazetted, they were not received with any great amount of enthusiasm by the native population, for the best that could be thought of the Natives' Land Commissioners was that they were not associated with any political party. With such a view, it can be understood what were the feelings of the Congress when it thereafter learnt that four of the five commissioners were present, as delegates, at the conference of the Ministerial party held at Capetown two months before (the conference at which Generals Hertzog and De Wet definitely severed their connexion with General Botha), nor was there anything to show that the fifth commissioner was not there also. Therefore, the situation amounted to this, that this Land Commission, which should be composed of impartial members, or, if made up of party politicians, it should at any rate represent the three political parties as well as the Natives, was in reality but a branch of the Ministerial party which foisted this very Land Act upon the country.
It was finally resolved to appoint a deputation of five to accompany the president, Mr. Dube, to England if further efforts failed. The Congress nominated nine names, and the election of five delegates from these was entrusted to a committee of fourteen members of the Congress, who balloted for five and reported the result to the full Congress as follows: —
S. T. Plaatje 13
S. M. Makgatho 9
Saul Msane 6
W. Z. Fenyang 3
T. M. Mapikela 3
Dr. W. B. Rubusana 2
A. K. Soga 2
M. Pellem 2
Chief Mamogale 1
The first-named five were therefore declared elected. Mr. Fenyang subsequently stood down in favour of Dr. Rubusana; Mr. Makgatho was not able to reach Capetown in time for the steamer's departure, so the deputation that eventually accompanied the president to England were: —
1. Dr. Rubusana. 2. S. T. Plaatje. 3. Saul Msane. 4. T. M. Mapikela.