Politieke woelinge in Natal 1910 - 1915

[摘要] English: British Natal, clinging desperately to her socalIed picturesque individuality and British identity, entered Union in 1910 with strong indicationsof reluctance. Fearing that her very existenoe might be endangered in apolitical union with the Afrikaners of all four provinces, she allowed herpolitics to be dictated by her Britishness and her imperial passions SouthAfrica as the home of a new-born nation entered into her frame of mind onlyin so far as it was seen as an extension of the Empire, in body and spirit.This attitude already became evident at the time of the National-Conventionand was further stressed by Natal the only of the former British colonieshaving to put the question of entering Union to the vote in a referendum.Although the outcome was overwhelmingly in favour of Union, there remaineda vociferous minority unreconciled to the new political developments.To safeguard their Britishness in the Union the Natalians demanded a bestmenform of government in 1910, for in that way alone would they secure forthemselves and their compatriots in the other provinces political co-partnership with the numerically stronger Afrikaners. The rejection of theirdemands, together with their political inexperience, made them reluctant tojoin the political parties formed outside Natal.along rather foolishly.Consequently they bungledNeither Natal's 17 Members of Parliament, nor her lively Press, could succeedin creating some kind of local party political unity, for they failed tosalvage themselves from the ranks of the Bothaists, Unionists, Independentsand Labourites all of whom received a measure of support. To these fourwas added a fifth group with the formation of the Federal League in 1913,the outward expression of a desire to secede that was to haunt Natal politicsuntil the early sixties.Instigated by newspapers like The Natal Witness and The Natal Advertiser theycompensated for their political incapacity by a malicious campaign againstthe Afrikaners, whom they regarded as backward and whose language and culturethey despised. In Gen. J.B.M. Hertzog they recognised the living symbolof all that they found hateful in the Afrikaner: his strong-minded insistenceon maintaining and developing his own heritage, rather than to submit to theall-powerful British culture. On him and Hertzogism they vented theirwrath in an attempt to destroy both.However, their attack had the opposite result, for Hertzog enjoyed strongsupport among the Natal Afrikaners. Even leading personalities, like Adv.E.G. Jansen, an enthusiastic supporter of the co-mingling of Afrikaner andEnglishman, revolted under the constant attack and became an upholder ofthe Hertzog faith. Together with men like J.J. Muller and Adrian I.J. Nelhe helped in hoisting the standard of the National Party in Natal, therebyfiring the first shots in the erupting battle between Afrikaner nationalismand British imperialism.Present in embryo form at the time of Union, this struggle became viciousat the outbreak of the Great War. While the Afrikaner minority remaineddivided in its loyalty to Gens. Louis Botha and Hertzog, the Englishmajority of Natal found itself for the first time since .Union forged intoan imperial partnership that scored a resounding victory at the polls in1915.Thus the first trial of strength between the two different brands ofnationalism, as represented by Afrikaner and Britisher, ended in a defeatof the former. But the struggle was to continue.While Englishman and Afrikaner were having their tug-of-war, the Blackswere sitting on the sideline; for, although the two White sections werefuriously fighting for political mastery among themselves, they wereheartily in agreement that White supremacy was to be maintained at allcost. Neither of the two had any love for their Black neighbour.

[发布机构] University of the Free State