Documents - Part One: The All Africa Convention

Document 14. "Policy of the AAC." Statement issued by the Executive Committee of the AAC, December 1937

1. Segregation:

(a) Segregation in all its forms is to be opposed.
(b) All Colour-Bar laws are to be fought.
(c) Africans demand the freedom to organise trade-unions, unemployed councils, the right to strike, the abolition of racial barriers in existing trade-unions and in industry, as well as race prejudice generally; the stoppage of police terrorism against African workers.
(d) Opposition must be organised against those sections of the Urban Areas Act and the Native Laws Amendment Act that provide for the compulsory removal of Natives from towns merely by reason of unemployment and of being "redundant." The position of those Africans whose homes are in the towns and have never been in touch with rural areas must be safeguarded.

2. Political Rights:

A vigorous agitation must be conducted for

(a) the right to the franchise for the Africans;
(b) representation by indigenous Africans in all State councils, particularly the House of Assembly;
(c) the appointment of an African member on the Native Affairs Commission as well as other com­missions that are periodically appointed to inquire into various aspects of Native affairs.

3. Land Rights:

(i) The allocation of land sufficient for the needs of an ever-growing African population.
(ii) Acceleration of the acquisition of the "released areas" and of the economic development of existing reserves.
(iii) Opposition to the eviction of Africans who are called "squatters" or who are dwellers on lands outside of reserves and released areas.
(iv) The settlement of Africans on the land under such favourable conditions as will obviate the necessity to leave their land and seek employment on unjust terms.
(v) Maintenance of the right to purchase land on freehold title for those African individuals or communities that desire so to do.
(vi) The abolition of all restrictions placed in the way of Africans in purchasing land anywhere.
(vii) The multiplication of agricultural schools for Africans in order to foster adaptability to make a success of rural life.
(viii) That the appointment of a Native member to the Land Board for the released Areas be made legally compulsory instead of being left optional as at present in the Native Land Trust Act.

4. Unemployment:

Government financial relief, freedom from Poll Tax and abolition from rent dues for all unemployed Africans must be pressed for.

5. Wages:

The All African Convention demands

(a) equal pay for equal work irrespective of race or colour.
(b) an eight-hour day in all industries;
(c) a more liberal wage-scale for African labourers in all classes of urban and rural employment;
(d) that Native workers be brought legally within the protective scope of the Wage Act and Industrial Conciliation Act because much of the prevailing pov­erty, under-nourishment and low degree of health is directly traceable to the deplorable low rates of wages obtaining universally among African employees.

6. Taxation:

(a) The abolition of the Native Poll Tax.
(b) The reduction of the Poll Tax as a first step towards its abolition.
(c) The substitution of a tax based on a reasonable proportion of a man's income in place of the Poll Tax.

7. Pass Laws:

The radical abolition of all Pass Laws and of the substitution thereof of an income tax receipt as proposed in 6 (c) above.

8. Education:

The All African Convention endorses the resolutions and statements issued by the South African Native Teachers' Federation in December 1936, and specially stresses the axiomatic fact that the education of the African is essential to his efficiency in employment and his progress in agriculture.
The first step towards improving the present inadequate system of Native education is to put into force the recommendations made in the Inter-Departmental Report on Native Education (1936) as analysed and criticised by the South African Native Teachers' Federation, especially the points suggesting
(a) that Native education be financed on a per caput basis, instead of the present fixed and inadequate subsidy;
(b) equal pay for African and European teachers in Native schools or colleges whenever qualifications are equal;
(c) and a general improvement in the salary scales of African teachers.

9. Health:

(a) The widest publicity and inquiry into the present appalling state of malnutrition and incidence of disease among Africans generally;
(b) the employment of more nurses in urban areas and reserves;
(c) scholarship facilities to enable promising young Africans to enter the medical profession and improve the health of their people;
(d) the establishment in the Union of South Africa of a fully equipped medical school for Africans granting a recognised and registrable medical certificate.

10. Chiefs:

The improvement of status and financial allowances for African chiefs and headmen in view of their serious responsibilities in maintaining law and discipline in extensive and populous districts.

11. Protectorates:

In re-affirming Minute 29 of its 1936 session, the All African Convention decisively opposes all proposals to incorporate the Protectorates of Basutoland, Bechuanaland and Swaziland into the Union of South Africa on the ground that such incorporation will not be in the best interests of the Africans in those Protectorates, especially while the Native policy of the Union Government continues to be that of Segregation, Colour Bars and all sorts of political and economic discriminations at the expense of the Natives.

12. Economic Policy:

The Convention stands for: -

(a) The advancement of the economic interests of Africans in the belief that this is the key to all progress;
(b) encouraging Africans to serve Africans in mutual exchange of living stock and agricultural products by means of central depot links that will bring producers and consumers into touch with one another;
(c) developing associations of farmers, credit societies and cooperative systems of buying and selling agricultural products;
(d) inculcating individual thrift and frugality in every community, especially by means of deposits in Saving Banks accounts;
(e) training Africans in founding trading shops, grain stores, and factories to supply goods to African centres and communities or reserves, thus incidentally widening the scope of the employment of Africans by Africans in all phases of work;
(f) stressing the need of an education on the lines of book-keeping and business methods, thereby promoting economic uplift, initiative, and efficiency;
(g) and urging successful business men and women to provide frequent public lectures calculated to rouse the national conscience and to stimulate African latent gifts in trading and business capacity.

13. Representation:

(a) All the candidates returned as members at the elections held during June 1937 under the 1936 Representation of Natives Act are hereby recognised as the accepted mouthpiece of Africans in their various representative State Chambers of the
(i) Senate;
(ii) House of Assembly,
(iii) Provin­cial Council, and
(iv) Native Representative Council.
(b) These representatives will be expected to attend the plenary sessions of the All African Convention at Bloemfontein for the purpose of ascertaining the opinion of African views on various questions, securing a mandate for expressing African views on matters arising from time to time, and of giving an account of their stewardship.

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