BIG SOUTH AFRICAN DEAL

Dominion, Volume 10, Issue 3021, 7 March 1917, Page 6

BIG SOUTH AFRICAN DEAL

SIR J. B. ROBINSON' DISPOSES OF HIS MINING INTERESTS. The announcement of the big deal which has taken place between Sir Joseph B. Robinson and Mr. S. B. Joel, by which Mr. Joel, on behalf of the Johannesburg Consolidated Company, has acquired Sir Joseph's interest in the Randfontein and Langlaagte Estates, aroused considerable interest in mining circles in London. It iB described as the biggest deal in the history of South African mining. The companies concerned are the Randfontein Estates Gold Mining Company (Witwatersrand) with a. =rMre capital of three million pounds; $io Randfontein Central Gold Mining Company, with four and a half millions; and tho Langlaagte Estato and Gold Mining Company, with £950,000. Sir J. B. Robinson, who was chairman of all three of these companies, is ono of the pioneers of the. Rand mining industry. Ho sent the first parcel of South African diamonds to London, and he helped to develop the famous De Beers Mines. In 1905 Mr. Robinson (his baronetcy came three years later) was head of a group of 17 mines, with an aggregate oapital of over £11,600,000, but the current issue of the Directory of Directors associates his name with only three, and those the companies his interests in which he has now disposed of. Sir Joseph was ono of Kruger's personal friends. Ho condemned the policy which led to the Jameson Raid, and ran his own mines with native labour. In 1906 he was very indignant with the late Mr. Alfred Lyttelton, who had asked in a debate in the House about native labour _ in Portuguese East Africa, ."AYho is Robinson, who walits a. special \ license for recruiting natives?" He showed how, by hampering the supplies of white and black labour, the Chamber of Mines, the Eckstein section of the mine-owners, endeav-' oured to create an artificial demand for yellow labour.

Mr. S. B. Joel, who went to a Spit-a-Ifields Board School before lus uncle, Mr. Barney Barnatd, called him out to South 'Africa and fortune, is, ns all the world knows, head of Barnato Brothand on the board of fifteen South African mining companies. He is one of the most prominent racohors* owners; and a famous yachtsman.