Documents: Africans Acting Alone

DOCUMENT 48e. Resolutions of the Convention of Bantu Chiefs, Held under the auspices of the African National Congress, April 15, 1927 (Published in Minutes of Evidence, Select Committee on Subject of Native Bills)

(Rev. Z. R, Mahabane.) I would like to submit the resolutions of the Convention of Bantu Chiefs held at Bloemfontein on the 15th April, 1927, under the auspices of the African National Congress. The first is on the Representation of Natives in Parliament Bill, and reads as follows:

"The Convention, having considered the Representation of Natives in Parliament Bill, declares that after 16 years' experience of indirect representation of Bantu interests in Parliament, the Bill is not capable of acceptance by the Bantu population of the Union unless--

"(I) The Franchise Rights conferred upon the African people of the Province of the Cape of Good Hope by Her Majesty's Govern­ment and Parliament in the year 1853 are left intact;
"(2) The Bill is so amended as to provide for the direct representation in Parliament of African interests by members of the African race.

"The Convention therefore respectfully and yet strongly submits that the time has arrived when the Colour Bar clauses of the South Africa Act, 1909, shall be eliminated, and members of the non-European populations of the Union, as forming an integral and inseparable element of the population, received into full citizen rights in this the land of their common habitation.

"In case Parliament is not prepared to give favourable consideration to these representa­tions the Chiefs in Convention respectfully urge the Government to withdraw the Bill for the present."

The second is a resolution on the Coloured Persons Rights Bill, as follows:

"This special Convention of Chiefs further deplores the proposal of the Government in the direction of creating a three-stream policy in the national life of the Union by an attempt to separate members of the African races of the Union into two opposing camps by the introduction of the Coloured Persons Rights Bill.

"In the opinion of this Convention this measure is calculated to create a spirit of antagonism among those concerned."

Then there are two on the Land Bill. First:

"The Convention expresses the conviction that no satisfactory solution of the land problem will ever be found unless a Round Table Conference between the Government and duly elected representatives of the African people, on the lines of the recent Conference on the Indian question, is held, the method of a Select Committee in which the African is not represented being absolutely unsatisfactory."

The second resolution was taken on the 1st January, 1926, and is as follows:

"The Convention desires to bring to the notice of the Government, as well as to members of the farming community, the hardships from which the native African people living as squatters on European-owned farms are suffering as a result of the operation of the Natives Land Act of 1913. The Convention strongly urges the Government to consider the amendment of the Act so as to restore the status quo ante the passing of the Act of 1913."

And then I have resolutions on the fran­chise taken on the 1st January at a special Convention of the African National Congress held at Bloemfontein. They are as follows:

"That the Africans have, as subjects of His Majesty King George V, the legal and moral right to claim the application or the extension to them of Cecil Rhodes' famous formula of 'Equal rights of all civilized men South of the Zambesi,' as well as the democratic principles of equality of treatment and equality of citizenship in the land, irrespective of race, class, creed or origin;

"That the peoples of African descent have, as an integral and inseparable element in the population of the great Dominion of South Africa, and as undisputed contributors to the growth and development of the country, the constitutional right of an equal share in the management and direction of the affairs of this the land of their permanent abode, and to direct representation by members of their own race on all the legislative bodies of the land, otherwise there can be no taxation without representation.

"Congress, therefore, seriously urges mem­bers of the great European race of the Union to take the whole question into their consider­ation, and calls upon Parliament to take steps in the direction of so amending the South Africa Act of 1909 as to make provision for adequate representation of the non-European races domiciled within the borders of the Union of South Africa in the Parliament of the Union and in the Provincial Councils thereof.

"That whereas this Convention is convinced that the grant and exercise of the Cape native vote is a heritage of vital importance to the Africans, which has not at any time been abused or misused, but on the contrary, has ameliorated native African conditions and instilled confidence in the traditional justice and fairplay of civilized Christian Governments, Congress therefore resolves that the Cape Franchise be allowed to continue as it has obtained since its grant in 1853, and urges for its further extension to the Northern Provinces of the Union.

"In view of the fact that the supreme need of the country, as well as the world at large, is peace, goodwill, harmony and co-operation among the racial groups composing the population of the land, and whereas any policy of discrimination, non-co-operation as well as political and industrial segregation on racial or colour lines is, in the considered opinion of this Convention, calculated to produce undesirable results--such as race antagonism-- and whereas the solution of the problem of the adjustment of the relations between white, black and coloured in South Africa is as urgent as it is insistent, this Convention is convinced that a solution that is likely to be acceptable to all parties concerned would be found if a Round Table Conference of an equal number of the representatives of the Union Government and the African National Congress as well as other non-European organizations could be called together at as early a date as possible."

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