CAB129-45 — Page 134

Page 134 legitimate ambitions. Reform must continue if the indigenous system is to be fitted to shoulder its modern responsibilities. To reassure the lesser chiefs and headmen the communities, of which they are the leaders, should be fitted into the system of local administration as an integral part of it. These com- munities should be accorded a well-defined and well understood place and given the opportunity of managing their domestic affairs for themselves and of exercising a due influence on the administration of those of a wider concern. Local enquiries will be necessary to determine how best this can be done; and these enquiries should have as well the most important aim of bringing the Administration into closer contact with the Basuto people.

7. In my view Mr. Jones's analysis of the causes of the outbreak of these murders is eminently sound and I have accepted his main recommendations. Some progress has indeed already been made during the past year in the direction of modifying the Native Authority system to secure a closer association of the people with the conduct of their own affairs, but development must inevitably be gradual and the Basuto themselves must be consulted. Local enquiries on lines suggested by Mr. Jones will be conducted to discover the best method of introducing further changes and, to ensure that the future development of the system of Native Adminis- tration is soundly conceived and executed, we shall draw to the full on the experience of other Colonial Territories.

8. I propose shortly to issue as a White Paper Mr. Jones's report together with an accompanying memorandum setting forth my conclusions. (The text of this memorandum is at Appendix B.)

9. The press followed the course of Mr. Jones's enquiries in Basutoland with keen interest and publication of the report which contains criticisms both direct and implied of the past administration of Basutoland will inevitably revive this.

·

10. I feel that my colleagues would like to have this advance information of my intention. If any of them have comments which they wish to make, I should be glad if I could have them within a week after Easter.

Commonwealth Relations Office, S.W. 1,

P. C. G.-W.

:

27th March, 1951.

APPENDIX A

SUMMARY OF MR. JONES'S REPORT ON MEDICINE MURDERS IN BASUTOLAND

Background

The Basuto were originally a concentration of Sotho-speaking tribes of the Southern Bantu, banded together for self-preservation. They were united as a nation under Moshesh, a petty chief of the Kwena tribe, during the nineteenth century. Following various disputes and local wars, they were finally and at their own request taken under the protection of the British Crown in 1870.

The basic unit of their social structure is the village group, which contains about 100 male taxpayers and their dependants and is subject to a minor chief termed a headman. These village groups are again grouped together in ward sections each under a sectional chief; these sections in turn are grouped in wards under ward chiefs, and these wards together form the Basuto nation with the Paramount Chief as its head.

Economically Basutoland is a labour reserve of the Union of South Africa; its people are cattle herders and farmers by inclination, but the land cannot support the whole population. A proportion only lives in relative comfort supported by the contributions of the younger members of the family who have migrated to work in the Union. The result is a society which is both anachronistic and insecure, consisting of an unduly large ruling class supported by a subsidised peasantry which is unwilling to change its methods of farming or herding and holds that if a man wants to make money he must seek employment outside Basutoland.

·

3