Page:MALAYSIA BILL RHODESIA AND NYASALAND BILL (1) (Hansard, 11 Juli 1963).djvu/31

 owing to the break-up of the Federation.

I am thinking particularly of places like the University College at Salisbury. I very much regretted the decision of the Nyasaland Government to withdraw their support from even individual students at the University College. I appreciate their reasons for doing that but, on the other hand, it is a great pity that University College where serious efforts were being made to bring about racial integration within the Federation should be penalised for political reasons which were no fault of the authorities at the college.

Anyone who has any interest in academic life knows that the cost of establishing and sustaining three separate universities in the territories would be beyond their resource. It has been suggested that there should be a university at Lusaka, and I know that Dr. Banda would like to have one in Nyasaland—a laudable desire, but to have an establishment which could match the sort of university we have in mind seems to be at present beyond the bounds of possibility save on some academic federal basis. There are many other matters on which co-operation and the pooling of contributions is extremely desirable.

It is to be hoped that with the new political situation it may be possible for Committee B to have a successful outcome to its work. It has been said that Committee A is the bulldozer while Committee B is the cement mixer. I hope that the constructive work of Committee B will be really successful. Much depends on the attitude of the Southern Rhodesian negotiators and delegates. If they are prepared, in the political sphere, to be realistic and to accept the obvious future, it may be possible to obtain co-operation on many other things.

If, on the other hand, they fail to do this, one can look forward only with a certain apprehension to the fall of standards in many directions in Central Africa; health services, scientific research and so on—and I am anxious that there should be co-operation in these matters as well as in the more obvious physical elements such as power from Kariba, the railways and so on. I hope that there will be a general feeling of wishing to lose as little as possible of what may be salvaged and that there will be a general desire, in the interests of the standards of living of all the people of Central Africa, to contribute to what are considerable common services and enterprises.

It is extraordinary that at this time, when we are burying the Central African Federation, the East African Federation should be coming into being amid general good will. One can only hope that the disruptive elements in Southern Rhodesia will appreciate that their future will be far more secure and prosperous if they can accept the political facts of life.

The fear has been expressed that Southern Rhodesia might wish to go in with the Republic of South Africa. This fear was mentioned emphatically 10 years ago when we were discussing federation. I never believed it then and I do not believe it now. I cannot believe that Southern Rhodesia could be so misguided as to think that there would be any future happiness or prosperity in that conjunction. I do not think, therefore, that that is a factor to be seriously considered.

I can see that there might be considerable dangers for Southern Rhodesia and for the rest of Central Africa if the British Government do not pay more attention to the Protectorates and do something in that direction. I appreciate that it would be out of order for me to go into this aspect in detail, but let us not repeat some of the mistakes we have already made in some parts of Africa by continuing to treat the Protectorates in such a way that we will find, in possibly only a few years, that we are faced there with serious political crises without their being in an economically viable state to look after themselves. This is one of the serious problems in this part of Africa to which Her Majesty's Government seem to be giving far too little attention. However, I shall not pursue that now, because it would be out of order to do so on this Bill.

I am sorry that the Federation has failed, but, frankly, I never thought, in the circumstances in which it was initiated, that it had any possible chance of success. I can only hope that the political leaders in the Federation, including Dr.