Petition to the Governor of the Colony of the Cape of Good Hope, from the Transkeian Territories General Council, June 21, 1909

To His Excellency the Honourable Sir Walter Hely-Hutchinson, Knight Grand Cross of the Most Distinguished Order of Saint Michael and Saint George, Governor and Commander-in-Chief of His Majesty's Colony of the Cape of Good Hope and of the Territories and dependencies thereof, etc., etc.

The Petition of the undersigned humbly sheweth:

1. That your petitioners are members of the Transkeian Territories General Council and as such representatives of nearly all the Native tribes resident in the Native Territories of His Majesty's Colony of the Cape of Good Hope.

2. That your petitioners beg humbly and sincerely to express to Your Excellency the devotion and loyalty of themselves and the people whom they represent in this Council to the throne and person of His Most Gracious Majesty the King.

3. That some of your petitioners, and many of the people whom they represent in this Council, have under the benign and fostering rule of the British Government acquired rights and privileges as subjects of the British Crown which to them are of inestimable value and that foremost amongst these are that equality in the eye of the law conferred upon all British subjects, and the possession of the franchise.

4. That your petitioners and the people whom they represent in this Council have for many years exercised the rights, which they enjoy under the peace, and security afforded them by the protecting folds of the British flag.

5. That it has ever been the desire of your petitioners and of the people this Council to be the loyal and law-abiding subjects of His Most Gracious Majesty the King.

6. That in no instance has it ever been shown that your petitioners, or the people whom they represent in this Council, have ever, as a people, misused the privileges of the franchise so freely and ungrudgingly conferred upon them and us by the British Crown. whom they represent

7. That your petitioners and the people whom they represent in this Council have followed with great interest and concern the

deliberations of the inter-Colonial Convention appointed to consider and to formulate a scheme for the Union of His Majesty's several Colonies in
South Africa
.

8. That your petitioners and the people whom they represent in this Council view with great apprehension the Act of Union known as the South Africa Act which has been passed by the several Parliaments of His Majesty's South African Colonies, and which introduces a principle hitherto entirely absent from and foreign to the law of His Majesty's Colony of the Cape of Good Hope, that principle being the colour line running through the various sections of the Act, descriptive of the qualifications necessary for members of the two Houses of the Union Parliament.

9. That by this colour line your petitioners and the people whom they represent in this Council are forever excluded from entrance into the Parliament of United South Africa.

10. That as an instance of the operation of the colour line in the South Africa Act, your petitioners beg to point to Section 32 of the Act which fixes the number of members assigned by the Act to each of His Majesty's South African Colonies, and to clause 1 of section 33 of the Act which defines the principles upon which the number of members so assigned is based: and that in their opinion His Majesty's Colony of the Cape of Good Hope has already been deprived by the colour line of a great part of the preponderance of members in the House of Assembly in the Union Parliament which it would have otherwise enjoyed.

11. That even though none of your petitioners or the people whom they represent in this Council have ever desired to or attempted to enter the Legislative Houses of His Majesty's Colony of the Cape of Good Hope, yet they enjoyed the right of doing so had they so desired and it is now felt that the explicit introduction of a colour line into the franchise and the consequent exclusion of British subjects of African descent are not only a grievance to the Natives of His Majesty's Colony of the Cape of Good Hope, but are a withdrawal of the rights which they have enjoyed and which they have in no instance abused.

12. That your petitioners therefore, humbly and with the respect due to the exalted position which Your Excellency occupies, beg that Your Excellency may be pleased to submit for the consideration of His Most Gracious Majesty the King the prayer of his devoted and loyal native subjects, your petitioners, that the colour line in the South Africa Act may be expunged.

13. And as in duty bound your petitioners will ever pray.

SIGNED:          

DALINDYEBO.

VELDMAN BIKITSHA

his X mark.

SIMON P. GASA.

ENOCH MAMBA.

GEORGE JAMANGILE.

BUCHANAN MOSHESH.

AARON NJIKELANA.

S. MILTON MTLOKO.

MBIZWENI JOJO

his X mark.

PAUL NKALA.

FALO MGUDLWA

his X mark.

HENRY SHOSHA

Source:

Karis, T & Carter G. M. (1972). From Protest to Challenge: A Documentary History of African Politics in South Africa, 1882-1964, Volume 1: Protest and Hope, 1882-1934. Stanford University: Hanover Press.

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