BOER GOVERNMENT FOR SOUTH AFRICA MAY GROW STRONGER

Grey River Argus, 31 May 1948, Page 5

BOER GOVERNMENT FOR SOUTH AFRICA MAY GROW STRONGER

Anxiety Reported in London JOHANNESBURG, May 29. It is understood that General Smuts will not accept various offer.-, of seats in the new South African Parliament, but will retire to his farm. This, however, does not necessarily imply his permanent retirement from politics. He shrugged his shoulders when asked to commment on his defeat. “These things happen, what is to be. will be,” he said. The Governor-General has asked General Smuts to remain. in officuntil'the formation of the new Government. The Nationalist Party, with 70 seats in the new Parliament, and a close working arrangement with the ' Africander Party, which won nine seats, will have the advantage over General Smuts’ United Party holding 65 seats, and its friendly Labour Party, holding six. The three nonelect'ive communal representatives normally support General Smuts. The Nationalists will have to name one of their members as Speaker, which will reduce their working majority to four. Some political observers said that this was too narrow to permit great freedom to Doctor Malan. The Africander Party will support the Nationalists, while the Labour Party vtfill ally itself with the United Party. Dr. Malan is assured of 79 votes in the new House of Assembly. The Opposition, with the support of three European representatives of natives will have 74. BOERS MAY HOLD NEW ELECTION The political correspondent of “Die Burger,” The Malan Partys principal organ, states that there is a possibility of a speedy second appeal to the electorate because the Nationalists would not have a proper working majority. The Pretoria correspondent of the Associated Press prophesies that, m another election, the stream running against General Smuts would run even stronger. Mr W. C. Duplessis, the Standerton farmer, defeated General Smuts personally. The defeat of General Smuts is the climax of a steady, relentless political campaign by the Nationalists. Dr. Malay’s Nationalists, organised strongly for election, exploited postwar grievances and also the racial issue. Overseas reaction to the South African treatment of non-Europeans and, particularly, United Nations criticism, set up a strong reaction in South Africa. ALL BOERS There is not a single member in the Nationalist or Africander Party of English descent, all being of Africander descent. Many people of English blood voted for the Nationalists. One new Nationalist member was interned during the war, because of his strong anti-war attitude. There are a number who openly sympathised with the Germans during the war. There arc none, however, who were members of the Fascist New Order Movement which Dr. Malan repudiated. Since the end of the war, the Nationalists have~odne everything possible to divest themselvess of any evidence of Fascist leanings. • Dr. Malan is a Democrat, who has held office in the Union Cabinet He was Minister of the Interior in the first Nationalist Government formed under General Hertzog m ,1924. Dr. Malan lei’t the Cabinet only after 1933, when General Hertzog formed a coalition with General Smuts. Inside Dr. Malan’s party are Republicans who W’ould like to see South Africa break with the British Empire.

Misgivings in England LONDON, May 29. The defeat of General Smuts and his party has aroused some alarm in Britain, where it is being aeoated whether South Africa will remain in the Empire. The result is not expected to mean that South Africa win take immediate steps to withdraw from the Empire. Tne London Daily Mail states: “We must look to the future of South Africa with anxiety”. Mr Churchill said: “A great statesman has fallen, and with him his country will undergo a period ot anxiety and perhaps a temporary eclipse”. Reuter’s correspondent in Pretoria states that, although the new South African Government is unlikely to attempt to stop Britons migrating to South Africa on their own account, it is unlikely that it will do anything to encourage migration as the Smuts Government did. The party leaders are Democrats with an isolationist outlook, and a strong national feeling. They are untiring fighters for the rights of the Afrikand-speaking section, which forms over half the Union’s white population. Many are able lawyers, Business men, and farmers. Dr Malan was born in 1874 at Riebeck West, and graduated Doctor ot Divinity from the University of Utrecht. He was elected for Calvinia, and when General Hertzog took power in 1924, became Minister og the Interior. An ardent Nationalist, he sponsored the institution of a South African flag to the exclusion of the Union Jack, urged the formation of a republic, and instituted other anti-Bn-tish moves. By 1938 he had become a bitter anti-Semite, and favoured repressive legislation against the nafives. At the 1938 elections he urged prohibiton of Jewish immigrants, abolition of the native franchise, and exclusion of natives from the towns. Mr Ben Schoeman, the National Party chairman, ascribed the party s victory to the colour question, the housing shortage, the high cost of living, the scarcity of certain foodstuffs, and the Government’s vigorous immigration policy from Britain and Europe. SYDNEY, May 29. Some Australians said the defeat of the United Party and the unseating of General Smuts is a severe blow to the British Commonwealth of Nations.