Oom Paul's People: A Narrative of the British-Boer Troubles in South Africa, with a History of the Boers, the Country, and Its InstitutionsHillegas, Howard Clemens
History
Oom Paul's People: A Narrative of the British-Boer Troubles in South Africa, with a History of the Boers, the Country, and Its Institutions
Hillegas, Howard Clemens
Afrikaners -- History; Kruger, Paul, 1825-1904; Transvaal (South Africa) -- History -- 1880-1910
The opening of hundreds of mines, and the consequent increase in
expenditures, made it necessary for the Transvaal Government to increase
its revenues. Mining laws had to be formulated, new offices had to be
created, hundreds of new officials had to be appointed, and all this
required the expenditure of more money in one year than the Government
had spent in a decade before the opening of the mines. The Government
found itself in a quandary, and it solved the problem of finances as
many a stronger and wealthier government has done.
Concessions were granted to dynamite, railway, electric light, electric
railway, water, and many other companies, and these furnished to the
Government the nucleus upon which depended its financial existence. Few
of the concessions were obtained by British subjects, and when the
monopolies took advantage of their opportunities, and raised the price
of dynamite and the rates for carrying freight, the Englishmen, who
owned all the mines, naturally objected. The Boer Government, having
bound itself hand and foot when hard pressed for money, was unable to
compel the concessionaries to reduce their rates.
At that period of the Randt’s existence the speculators appeared, and
soon thereafter the London Stock Exchange became a factor in the affairs
of the Randt. Where the Stock Exchange leads, the politicians follow,
and they too soon became interested in South African affairs. Then the
treaty of 1883 was found in the Colonial Office archives, and next
appears a demand to the Boer Government that all British residents of
the Transvaal be allowed to vote. The Boers refused to give the
franchise to any applicant unless he first renounced his allegiance to
other countries, and, as the British subjects declined to accede to the
request, the politicians became busily engaged in formulating other
plans whereby England might obtain control of the country.
At that inopportune time Jameson’s troopers entered the Transvaal
territory and attempted to take forcible possession of the country; but
they were unsuccessful, and only succeeded in directing the world’s
sympathy to the Boers. The Jameson raid was practically Cecil J.
Rhodes’s first important attempt to add the Transvaal to the list of
South African additions he has made to the British Empire. The result
was especially galling to him, as it was the first time his great
political schemes failed of success.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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