ARABS TAKE OVER CYRENAICA FARMS WHERE FASCISM PERISHED

Chronicle (Levin), 2 August 1947, Page 4

ARABS TAKE OVER CYRENAICA FARMS WHERE FASCISM PERISHED

Cyrenaica, battlefield of three British advances and two retreats, has suffered greater material damage than any of the other Italian colonies. Mile after mile the desert is littered with the rusting dehris of war, Tohruk is almost uninhabitable, Bem ghazi shattered. The country has emerged, however, with political problems which are simple and straightforward by comparison with those which beset the future of Tripolitania, Eritrea and Somaliland, writes Martin Moore in a despatch to the Herald from Benghazi. Here there is no racial or religious minority. There is 99 per cent. unanimity of political desire: it will not take a United Nations Commission more than a few days to discover ' what the overwhelming majority of Cyrenaicans want. There is no Italian population to complicate the issue; the colonists fled as the Eighth Army swept in. It was on this battlefield that Fascism perished. The little homesteads of the colonial farms — there are nearly 2000 of them on the uplands — at once . preserve its bombast and record its ruin. Most of the houses are derelict now, but on their walls the slogans of Fascism are still fresh. - "INHERITORS OF VICTORY" "Duce Duce! Duce" chants each identical cottage. "We shall win!" shouts each doorless lintel as your truck rumbles on. "Always act as though the Duce were watching you!" admonishes the facade of the Oasa del Fascio in the des-erted village. The good has gone with the bad. Balbo, who fertilised the soil of Libya, shot down by his own guns at Tobruk; the model dwellings turned into sheep-shelters and stripped of their woodwork to boil a nomad's pot. The inheritors of victory have come in from the back desert to this richer land of which the Italians dispossessed them. Often you may see their tents pitched beside the unwanted houses, while they harvest the ground which the Italians reclaimed from scrub. * What will they now do wifh their heritage? What kind of a country is Cyrenaica to become, and under what Government? * LO YALTY TO SENUSSI HEAD Though unlettered and innocent of politics in any Western sense, the 295,000 inhabitants are united in politico-religious loyalty to the Emir Sayed Idris, head of the Senussi sect. He is to them semi-divine, a bestower of "blessedness.'.' Under his emirate, they want national independence, supported by foreign help. For this they look to Britain. The situation is so straightforward and the demand so clear that the people cannot understand why their future should be subject to any international negotiation at all. It was in the daik days of 1940 that the Senussi ranged themselves with us, when few would have gambled on a British victory. France was out of the war, Russia and the United States not yet in jt. Who I then (such is their attitude) are the shadowy Big Four and the remote United Nations that they should have any partan what the Senussi consider a bilateral agreement between themselves and Britain? Cyrenaica has the distinction of being the only colony in respect of which there has been a clear, if nega- * tive, declaration of British policy. Mr. Eden, in the name of the National Government, assured the Senussi that we should not permit the Italians to return here. Mr. Bevin has indicated that this is still Britain 's policy. In so far as the mood of puzzled exasperation can bo translated into a plan, it is this: BRITAIN 'S GUIDANCE SOUGHT The spokesmen of the voiceless nomadic majority wish to see the establishment of an autonomous Senussi State which would enter into a treaty relationship with Brifain similar to that in the Transjorffan. Britain would. control defence, furnish expert advisers and finance thp rehabiiitation of the country, being granted naval and air bases in return. This is assumed to be the plan favoured by the Emir himself. He, however, remains remote in Cairo, declining to come to Cyrenaica until he can do so as ruler. In conversation with local leaders I have fouad no liking for the idea of trusteeship. "Trusteeship— mandate— colony," said the Cadi of Benghazi'. "Just different narnes for

the same thing. What we want is independence," ? . All "with whpm -J ta)ked recognised. the need for foreign help and guidance, None proposed any Fower but Britain for dhis pole. /technicians needed While the people are yet totally unprepared for democratic government, the Emir has shown himself ready to contemplate . an eventual move in that direction. He has acknowledged. the National Front, formed last year by tribal leaders. This body proppses, pn achievement of independencp, to act' as a cons'tituent assembly, draft a constitut'jon and thereafter to give place to an elected chamber. Cyrenaica "s present difliculties and future problems are not political, but economic. Most of its 300,000 square v miles is desert, offering meagre seasonal sustenance to the flocks which must always be the country 's chief wealth.' The cnltivable" area is sufficient to f eed the population and in a good year to yield a small exportable surpius jof barley. But the rainfall is sinai! and often badly spaced. There are only two abundant springs in the whole territory. Above all, Cyrenaica lacks at present the human material capable of making the best of these limited resources. No trained technical personnel exists and, however simpie the country 's economy, it caimot do without some technicians. Cyrenfiica lacks even a skilled agriculturai class — a want so striking that one senior official I have met advoeates the immigration of fellaheen from Egypt'to show the Cyrenaicans how to work their land. i ' Care and maintenance " is an unsatisfactory basis* on which to adininister a territory which needs a steady, long-term policy of water conservation, stock improvement and agricultural education. The Hague Ruies envisaged an .oecupation reckoned by montbs; Cyrenaica, like the other colonies, is suffering because this temporary regime has been dragged out intp years. 60-ACRE HQLDINGS Hampered by inability to embark on long-term schemes wbich would .commit a succeeding government, the British Military Administration has nevertheless accomplished much. It has fed the territory; it has revived the export of sheep and cattle to Egypt, Maita and Falestine; it is steadily repairing, not the houses but the far more important water cisterns; and it is demonstrating that the semi-nomad can be turned into an eificienc farmer. On the Barce plain I watched 15 combines, some with a swath of 20ft., sirmutaneously harvesting 15,000 acres of wheat. It was a prairie scene from the New World, quite different from ^anything intended by the Italians and infinitely removed •from the primitive agriculture of the Arabs. This scheme, which embraces 150 Italian farms and covers 30,000 acfies, is more spectacuiar than economic. It has fulfilled its purpose in providing a grain reserve. Now the land is being turned gradually back into 60-acre holdings, to be farmed by Arab tenants helped by various cooperative services. AN ENGLI0H TEACHER This is how the Italians farmed tho lond. Will the Arabs do as well? A model and a piedge of ultimate suecess may be seen a few miles eastward. Jri-ere, on 300 of the abandoned Italian holdings, a young Englishman, Captain A. G. O. De Manbey, is teaching Arab tenants how to practise crop rotation, to manure, make compost, prune the neglected olives and vines, improve their stock and use and maintain machinery. He has been successful enough to show what might be done with some at Ieast of the remaining Italian farms. Although the houses are derelict, very little of the land has been allowed to return compl-etely to scrub, Tbe Arabs come down each season to scratch and sow, .to harvest and to grase the stubble. Water is the missing essential for fixed tenure and continuous cultivation. The Administration is wisejy giving first priority to the repair not only of the cracked cisterns on the farms, but of tbe old Roman tanks in the grazing areas. Thus the Bedouin .will be able to keep his stock longer in the back country, and the coming class of cultivators will be able to settl-e permanently on land which they now visit only seasonally.