RIOTS IN SOUTH AFRICA

Dominion, Volume 14, Issue 27, 27 October 1920, Page 7

RIOTS IN SOUTH AFRICA

I r, >• NATIVES ATTACK PORT ELIZABETH « POWER STATION 0 6 . CROWD FIRED INTO BY POLICE (By Telegraph-Press Assooiation-Copyrieht Cape Town, October 26. j After the desperate crowd was driven I, from the police station the Port Elizas beth natives were driven from the city, (' and held a meeting at their locations. 3 They then attacked the power-station. I The police fired over their heads, but j failed to stop them. They then fired into the crowd, killing one and wounding I seven. An attempt to set fire to a petrol * store containing seventy thousand cases failed. Tho rioters cut the . telegraph " arid telephone wires. Police and other reinforcements were sent from " town and elsewhere. The natives to-day are holding a meeting, but there hays t been' no attempts at violence. The total casualties were twenty-four [ natives killed and forty-one wounded, , including many women, and one EuroI pean, male killed and two females wounded. ' ? The rioting was the climax of propaJ ganJa for organisation of the natives, which has been proceeding for some weess. It Started with a demand for ! 10s. 6'd. as tho daily wage for native , males and 7s.'6d. for females. Respon- ' sible native opinion opposed the propa- , ganda methods. Firing upon the rioters commenced without command by , men hemmed in at a police station by a howling mob, and who believed the position was desperate.—Reuter. [Following the arrest of' Masabalamba, , president of the native workers' organisation at Port Elizabeth, a crowd of natives attacked the police station. The ' police repulsed three attacks, but' eventu- . ally the mob invaded the station. The police and a number of returned soldiers then opened fire, and the casualties were estimated at between 40 and 50, including fourteeii killed, two being Europeans.] —■ 1 1 1 I