7 FEBRUARY 1941, Page 2

General Hertzog's New Party

It was not to be supposed that General Hertzog, having resigned his leadership of the Re-united Nationalist Party of the Free State and parted company with Dr. Malan and the extreme Nationalists, would long cease to take a leading part in South African politics. It was on the policy of non-belligerence for South Africa that he was defeated at the beginning of the war and was replaced by General Smuts, and he has not departed from this policy, in spite of his inability to swallow the Republicanism and the spirit of -race hatred which distinguish the Malanites. His secession from the Nationalist Party meant not his disappearance from the ranks of the Government's opponents but a split in the Opposition, and now he and his friends have formally created a new " Afrikaner " Party, con- sisting of ten members of Parliament and four senators. In a statement issued last week the new party invites support from South Africans who, though rejecting the Malanite policy, view with distrust the present Government's Imperialism, described as " holistic," in terminology borrowed from General Smuts in his role as philosopher. In the opposition the Government face the same men, but now openly disunited.