Page images
PDF
EPUB

Art. 12.-THE LATE GERMAN COLONIES IN AFRICA.

The German African Empire (1916): South-West Africa during the German Occupation (1916): German East Africa (1917): The Cameroons (1917). By A. F. Calvert. London: Werner Laurie.

German Colonies; A Plea for the Native Races. By Sir Hugh Clifford, K.C.M.G., Governor of the Gold Coast. London: Murray, 1918.

Native Races and their Rulers. By C. L. Temple, C.M.G., late Lieutenant-Governor, Northern Provinces, Nigeria. Cape Town: Argus Printing Co. London: Way, 1918. WHEN the German Empire determined, in 1884, to embark on the policy of founding a colonial dominion, its acquisitions were made suddenly and as it were at one blow. There was no gradual foundation of small settlements more or less casually made and spreading almost insensibly, it may almost be said inevitably, as has been the case with the colonial dominions of England and France, but great blocks of country in which no previous settlement had taken place were rapidly placed under German protection. They were called Schützgebiete ('Protectorates'), but they were actually annexations, and have ever since been administered as such. In the course of the great war these Protectorates have fallen into the possession of the Allies; German power has crumbled to ruins; and it remains for the Peace Conference to decide on the question of their future government. Speculation as to the exact nature of the decisions which will be arrived at would be inopportune, but it has been officially announced that in any case they will not be returned to Germany, and that in some way or other the Allies must administer them. No one who is acquainted with the history of these regions can seriously advocate their abandonment by European Governments. Anarchy, internecine struggles, and the revival of the slave-trade, would be the inevitable results; the annihilation of peaceful and progressive communities by the more savage and warlike would follow.

Great Britain and France are the countries more immediately interested, and Belgium and Portugal also require full consideration. At the present moment two

of the principal tracts involved, East Africa and SouthWest Africa, are occupied by the forces of the British Empire. The Cameroons and Togoland are in the joint occupation of Great Britain and France. It is therefore opportune to consider what is the nature of the regions and the peoples with which we have to deal.

With the exception of Togoland, a comparatively small region wedged in between the British Gold Coast Colony and French Dahomey, the German colonies are all situated in the great southern projection of the African continent, one of them, East Africa, with a coast-line on the Indian Ocean between the 4th and 11th parallels of S. Latitude, and the other two, the Cameroons and South-West Africa, with coasts on the Atlantic Ocean, between the parallels 1 and 5 N. Latitude and 18 and 28 S. Latitude, respectively. The last two face towards South America, while East Africa has its outlook towards India and the Eastern Seas. These regions are separated one from the other on the coast by territories already occupied by European nations. On the west coast the vast extent of Portuguese Angola, the French Congo and the Spanish Rio Muni intervene between South-West Africa and the Cameroons. German East Africa lies between British East Africa and Portuguese Mozambique. In the centre of the Continent the great expanse of the Congo basin separates east from west. The greater part of this forms the Belgian Congo State, and the northern portion is comprised in French Equatorial Africa. Further south Rhodesia extends between German East and South-West Africa. It is clear therefore that no workable arrangement for the government and development of these regions is possible without an agreement between all the nations concerned.

There are, however, certain conditions which render it probable that Great Britain and the Union of South Africa will be more immediately responsible for the administration of the East African and South-West African territories respectively, while France would naturally be regarded as heir to the greater part of the Cameroons, part of which, it will be remembered, was extorted from her by Germany in 1911. It must be remembered also that British missionaries had formed a flourishing settlement at Victoria below the Cameroons

Mountain, of which they were dispossessed by the Germans with little ceremony. A boundary laid down between the Cameroons and Nigeria would probably in that case be drawn somewhat in accordance with the working arrangement now in force. In the same way the Togoland territory would naturally be divided between the British Gold Coast and French Dahomey, very much as it is at present administered.

The relations between all these territories and their neighbours are dependant on their geographical position and on the natural configuration of the southern half of the African continent. This region forms a vast plateau of which the greater part has an elevation of from 3000 to 5000 feet above sea-level. The outer fringes of this plateau rise gradually into considerable mountain ranges, which, towards the eastern and western coasts, drop rapidly to a belt of low-lying country. This outer belt is drained by a number of rivers with swift currents which are of little value for navigation. On the other hand, the great expanse of the interior discharges its waters by a few great rivers, the Nile and the Niger to the north, the Congo in the centre and the Zambezi in the south. These, together with the chain of great lakes, afford great facilities for inland navigation, which has the highest importance for the communications of East Africa with the neighbouring states, British East Africa and Uganda to the north, the Belgian Congo to the west, Rhodesia and Portuguese Mozambique to the south. To the west the Congo and its tributaries form a great system of waterways connected with Lake Tanganyika by the Lukuga River, and linked up by lines of railway which will be referred to below. At present the chief value of this system is for the Congo State, French Equatorial Africa and Portuguese Angola ; but the northern tributaries, the Ubangi and the Sanga, are navigable into the heart of the Cameroons backcountry. The Niger system is mainly outside the countries under consideration, but its greatest tributary, the Benué, is navigable up to Garua.

German South-West Africa lies entirely outside the region accessible by river navigation. German forethought had indeed provided for access to the Zambezi by stipulating, in the treaty of 1890, for the possession

of a belt of land (known as the Caprivi-strip) stretching between British and Portuguese territory to a point at which that river is navigable; but this access depends for its future value on a railway not yet constructed.

For German East Africa the Zambezi was valuable only through the waters of Lake Nyasa and the Shiré River, which afforded an outlet for the trade of German settlements at the northern end of Lake Nyasa. Lake Tanganyika, a deep and narrow lake with a length of about 400 miles from north to south, is in itself a magnificent waterway, which opened out a great prospect for the development of trade between German East Africa and the Congo State. The struggle for its possession was a very dramatic episode, reflecting the greatest credit on its naval commander and all concerned. Two British armed motor-boats were conveyed first by sea to Cape Town, then by rail to Fungurume in the Congo State, at that time the terminus of the Rhodesian system of railways, and then were hauled by traction engines or oxen or gangs of natives, at one time over a mountain 6400 feet in height, then floated for three weeks through the shallows, rapids, lakes and swamps of the upper Lualaba to Kabalo, whence at last they reached the waters of Lake Tanganyika by the Belgian railway to Albertville. The story is one of the most romantic chapters in the history of the war; and hardly less so is that of the three months' naval campaign in which these tiny vessels destroyed German power on the lake. Thus Kigoma, the lake port which forms the terminus of the railway from Dar-es-Salaam (opened for through traffic just before the war), fell into the hands of the Allies, and communication with the Indian Ocean was restored. Further north the great expanse of the Victoria Nyanza forms a splendid field for traffic between the ports of Mwanza and Bukoba on its southern coast and Entebbe and Kisumu in Uganda and British East Africa. Needless to say the full commercial value of these great lakes can only be realised by the development of the railway systems of the territories which surround them.

The German Mittelafrika scheme contemplated the absorption of the whole of the Congo State, French Equatorial Africa and Portuguese Angola, also of part at least of Rhodesia and Mozambique, so as to have the Vol. 231.-No. 459.

2 H

whole of the resources and communications of tropical Africa concentrated in German hands. It now remains for the Allies to see that the results which the Germans hoped to monopolise shall be realised by friendly relations between themselves for the equal benefit of all. All routes from east to west must pass through the Congo State and make use of its railways and its wonderful system of waterways. No region stands to gain more by such a friendly co-operation than the territory which was German East Africa.

East Africa is in every way the most important of the dominions lately held by the Germans in the African Continent. Its central position on the east coast and its communications with the whole system of the Great Lakes give it opportunities for commercial development beyond those of any other African colony, and not only of commercial development but of political and military power. Without the possession of such a startingpoint it is doubtful whether the Mittelafrika project would have occurred even to the scheming and plotting German mind. It is fortunately no longer necessary to regard it from this point of view, but the same geographical conditions which might have made it an unequalled focus for an aggressive policy may be found still more valuable for peaceful purposes. The configuration of the country has also some peculiar features which give it a great variety of soils and climates, and render it suitable for the production of a corresponding variety of articles.

As has been observed above, it forms a part of the great central plateau which rises rapidly from the strip of level country along the Indian Ocean. This strip is rich in the usual tropical products of Africa; palms of all kinds, rubber and capok, bananas, sugar cane, mangos and papaws abound; everywhere black cotton-soil hints at a future valuable industry. Experiments had been carried out for the purpose of ascertaining the most suitable kinds of cotton; and 35,000 acres were already under cultivation in 1913. The coco-nut palm flourishes in this tract, and copra is an important article of export. This hot moist strip is quite unfit for European settlement. The native population of various races, mainly

« PreviousContinue »