The terms on which the Government are prepared to buy
out the British South Africa Company's political interests in Rhodesia were circulated in a White Paper last week.. The Company is to receive £3,750,000 and to surrender the unalienated lands and all the public works and buildings in Southern Rhodesia, while retaining its mineral rights and the estates in course of develop- ment. Southern Rhodesia will pass under Responsible Government on October 1st ; Northern Rhodesia will be taken over by the Crown next April. Of the compensation awarded, the new self-governing colony of Southern Rhodesia will pay ,000,000, to be raised by loan. In view of all that it has done to secure and develop this great territory the Company might perhaps have expected the larger sums named by Lord Cave's Commission or by General Smuts, but it Ira's been well advised to assent to the offer, which the people of Southern Rhodesia are prepared to endorse. The Company, as a purely mercantile concern, stands to benefit hereafter by the prosperity of the colony, and it would lose rather than gain by imposing an unduly heavy burden of debt on the small but energetic white population of- Southern Rhodesia, which has decided to manage its own affairs.
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