DIAMOND MINERS IN A GUARDED CAMP

Shannon News, 12 July 1929, Page 2

DIAMOND MINERS IN A GUARDED CAMP

EXCLUSION OF CANDIDATES. CAPETOWN, May 28. In connection with the election campaign in South Africa a curious, and probably unique, situation has arisen at Alexander Bay, the official centre of the recently discovered diamond fields. The government mining camp at the Bay is fenced and guarded, and the 200 men employed there arc virtually prisoners, in that they are rarely allowed to go otuside and no one is permitted to visit them inside.

One of the political candidates, who recently applied to be allowed to address the voters inside the camp, was refused permission' and a sequel was his applicatiou to the Supreme Court for an order restraining the Minister of Mines from preventing those electors at present detained in a fenced and guarded camp from attending meetings held in pursuit of his election campaign. It was stated by the applicant that the camp was surrounded by three bar-bed-wire fences, distanced apart, ami was continually being patrolled by police, making.it impossible for him to address the electors in the camp. “None of the diggers in the camp is allowed out,” he said, “nor is any private person allowed to enter the camp or to communicate personally with the diggers. Diggers can only obtain a permit to leave the camp if a doctor’s certificate is presented that one of the family is seriously ill.”

The diggers, it was added, were to be kept under these conditions for at least six months and thus would not be able to hear the candidate’s views.

The application was dismissed on the grounds that political candidates had no more right than anyone else to claim admission "to Crown property to which the public were denied access.