ASIATICS IN THE TRANSVAAL.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LI, Issue 34, 30 January 1908, Page 2

ASIATICS IN THE TRANSVAAL.

BLUE IjUUk KEVELATIONS.

loMti STATESMEN Al/AKMED.

Received Jan. 2i), 10.51) p.m. London, January 2D. A lilue Book allows that lively iniagiving* were entertained by the itiglit iioji. Mr. Morley, Secretary of State for India, and the lion. Sir lidwurd Grey, Secretary' of State for Foreign" Affairs, us lo the possible eil'ect of the Transvaal'* legislation in India and abroad. C.eneral Holha, 'Premier of the Transvaal. More the Acts were sanctioned, promised temporary permits to admit distinguished Asiatics by means of signature instead of uuger-print, and promised legislation to restrict the poWtiiß oi expulsion. The Daily Chronicle states that while the self-governing colonies are determined to exclude Asiatics the Impcriiil Government, whichever party is in ofiice, cannot dictate a different policy, but the problem is grave, and an alleviation is to be found in Indian Immigration to home and brown countries in British Africa.

OVKIUiUNMAG TIIK COUNTRY.

I'J'EM ACTION -\IX'IiSSABY. Kcceived .Jan. 2'J, 11.40 p.ill. I'retoria-, January 29. ill 1 . Smuts, in a speech ut I'jetoria, said that owing to the increase of Asiatics it was about time tlie rest oi South Africa took iirm action and the proliered advice ol Natal, otherwise tlie Asiatic immigrants would overrun tlie whole of South Africa. The Transvaal was still willing to register Asiatics if I they wimc forward voluntarily. Tliey would then be legal residents and be placed on a proper footing.

At a public meeting in Durban last month, one of the apeakers said the native question was serious enough, but the longer one studied and the deeper one went into it, the more one was convinced that the Asiatic question was the root of a great many others, and unLil it had been got rid of progress was impossible. Me proceeded to show how the white population was prejudicially alt'ected by the cheap labor of tho alien. The sugar industry, for instance, employed but 2 per cent, of white men. aim. the coal industry, which was going ahead by such leaps and bounds, employed but 5 per cent, of white men. It was all very well to have a big industry, but if it did 'noi give employment, of what good was it? Imported sugar had to pay 3s 0(1 per 1001b duty in addition to paying the amount of any bounty it received in the country of origin. They had io pay the Customs duty and that bounty, for only a third of the sugar consumed in Natal was grown there, and 11-J2ths of Natftlgrown sugar went over the border. The industry did not provide labor and so benefit them; they did not get the benefit of cheap sugar, and they had to pay revenue to balance the losa made in carrying it on the railway. He then went on to deal with the Indian population, estimating the present population, at 120,001). He pointed to the fact that the arrivals amounted to 11,000 a yeaf, and, allowing an annual of births over deaths of 5 percent,' of the population, it meant that at the end of twenty years there would be 1,000,000 Indians in the colony. Coming, to the remedies to be takfln, he said thaj; they must, first of all, go to the root and stop the importation of indentured labor. If the planters would not take the labor of the country, they must go without. They must also put restriction on the immigration of free Asiatics into Natal. They iiad also a means "f freeing the colony from the free Indian. At the present moment £45,000 was lost annually owing to the non-payment of the £3 license.