ANGOLA.
[TO THE EDITOR CF THE ".SPECTATOR."] have been much interested in the recent correspondence in your columns with regard to Angola and the conduct of affairs there under the Portuguese. One of your correspondents suggested that Angola should he taken over by Germany ; but surely this would be a very serious matter for Great Britain, as, in the first place, the port, i.e., Lobito Bay, with its magnificent natural harbour, will probably be in the near future a most important strategic holding. On the completion of the railway from this bay to Katanga (and so meeting the Cape-to-Cairo railway) it will open up this magnificent country not only to Rhodesia, but it will probably be (so it is claimed) the quickest route to the Cape and also to Australia. Such being the case, it is of the greatest importance to us. Again, the real Angola, fifty or sixty miles away from the coast, where the height begins to rise from about 3,000 feet above sea to the big plateau of 6,000 feet, is a country that it would be hard to beat anywhere from the point of view of fertility and access. The veld is ideal for farming, open rolling plains with ample grass and timber and the finest water imaginable. Anything will grow. Now how is this wonderful country administered by the Portuguese authorities ? Probably worse than any country of its possibilities in the world, but the horrors of this administration can only be properly realized by personal experience. A penal settlement, it is the dumping ground for all undesirables from Portugal, political and criminal. As the officials are mostly sent out by some friend in power, for the moment, at home, and are consequently uncertain as to how long their tenure of office may last, they naturally make hay while their particular sun shines, i.e., that the wretched native is ground down to the very dregs of poverty and misery. It is asserted that the exportation of "labour " from Angola to San Thome, &c., is stopped for ever. A few years ago, when this question was rather more in the public eye than now, this was also claimed to be the case. At the end of that very year a list of the exporters of " labour" for that year was picked up in Benguella : the exporters were few and important men, and their " exports " amounted to thousands! These unfortunate creatures had been brought down from the interior by the loneliest outside routes, away from all carrier and wagon roads, and shipped at night, not from any town, but in boats from a lonely part of the shore, from where. signals were exchanged with vessels awaiting their human: cargo outside. Is this going on now P Quien sabe 7-1 am,
[Our correspondent seems to think that Germany, assuming that Portugal forfeits her rights by continuing to permit slavery, ought not to be allowed to go in and take her place as the mandatory of the civilized world because Angola is so desirable a possession. We cannot agree. It is because it is so desirable a possession that we hold that Germany should be asked to take it over if Portugal is unable to govern it decently. It must be either Germany or France, as we are properly barred by the facts that we have been the ally of Portugal and also have put pressure upon her in the past in regard to her Colonial administration. We could not therefore without hypocrisy take possession of Angola. France, on the other hand, has just taken Morocco. Germany, then, if anyone, should be deputed to do the work.—En. Spectator.]
Previous page
