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ANNEX II

FINALPagoMINTONIQUE OF THE Page Tokpf 29ALLS

CONFERENCE ON THE CLOSER ASSOCIATION OF THE CENTRAL AFRICAN TERRITORIES

The Victoria Falls Conference issued the following communique after its final meeting on Friday, September 21st, 1951:—

1. The present Conference was convened by the Governments of the United Kingdom, Southern Rhodesia, Northern Rhodesia and Nyasaland for the purpose of discussing the question of Closer Association of the British territories in Central Africa.

2. The Conference opened at Victoria Falls on Tuesday, 18th September, and was of a representative character. In the case of Southern Rhodesia the representatives included the Prime Minister and other Ministers and leaders of the Opposition parties in Parliament. In the case of Northern Rhodesia the delegation consisted of the Governor and official and unofficial members of the Legislative Council, including Africans. Nyasaland was represented by the Governor, senior officials and leading unofficial persons, European and African. The United Kingdom delegation consisted of the Secretaries of State for the Colonies and for Commonwealth Relations, accompanied by some of their chief advisers.

3. The Conference had before it the Report prepared last March by a number of senior official advisers of the four Governments concerned. The authors of that Report had been requested “to examine the problem in all its aspects and consider whether it is possible in the light of this examination for them to formulate proposals for a further advance to be made in the closer association of the three Central African territories which they could recommend to the Governments of these territories and to His Majesty's Government in the United Kingdom ”. Their work was purely exploratory and did not commit any of the participating Governments to the adoption of any proposals that they might formulate.

4. The Report of the London Conference of officials was unanimous on all points. Its main recommendation was that closer association between the three territories ought to be brought about and that the need for this is urgent. It recommended further that this should be done not by amalgamation of the territories, but on a federal basis; and put forward in some detail a scheme framed to take particular account of the special features of the Central African situation, including the self-governing status of Southern Rhodesia, and designed to provide substantial safeguards for the interests of Africans. Moreover, those matters most closely affecting the life of Africans would under the proposals in the Report come within the territorial and not within the federal sphere; and within the territorial sphere the Northern Rhodesia and Nyasaland Governments would remain responsible as at present to His Majesty's Government in the United Kingdom.

5. In announcing the present Conference it has from the outset been made clear that there was no intention of reaching decisions at it binding on any Government. It was realised that such a conference might disclose points of difference with regard to the principle of federation as well as to the proposals made in the Report to bring it into being. This has proved to be the case. It has become evident that further discussion within each territory and exchanges of views between the four Governments will be necessary, and the Conference has therefore adjourned. It is hoped that the position can be sufficiently clarified to enable the Conference to reassemble in London about the middle of next year.

6. On the main question of federation, as so far presented and examined, the Conference, with the exception of the African representatives, showed itself favourable to the principle of federation. The representatives of African interests in Northern Rhodesia explained that Africans would be willing to consider the question of federation on the basis of the Report of the London Conference of officials after the policy of partnership in Northern Rhodesia had been defined and, as so defined, put into progressive operation.