Union of South Africa

The Union of South Africa (1910 - 1961), also called South African Union, was a British dominion located at the southern point of the Africa. It was surrounded in north by the South-western African, the Bechouanaland and the Southern Rhodesia, in the North-East by the Mozambique Portuguese and the Swaziland. The British Basoutoland as for him is wedged within the South-African territory.

History

The Union of South Africa constitutes in 1910 of four British colonies in southern Africa, i.e.:

the the Cape Province resulting mainly from the Colony of the Cape
the Transvaal
the free State of Orange
the Native

British dominion, it profits in 1931 from the Statut from Westminster recognizing an independence to him in fact.

The political life of the Union is initially dominated by the political conflicts between Afrikaners and Anglophones before being it between white and coloured men (black, mongrel, Indian).

As of 1912, laws organizing the racial segregation are adopted but it is starting from 1948 that the policy of Apartheid is institutionalized with the victory of the national Parti and the installation of an intransigent unicoloured government on the segregation.

Into 1961, after the Massacre of international Sharpeville and the rise of criticisms against the racial policy of apartheid, the South-African dominion changes statute, following a Référendum organized within the white electorate, and becomes a republic under the official name of Republic of South Africa (RSA).

Policy

The Union of South Africa is a Démocratie parliamentary but limited to the only white (approximately 20% of the population) and to a lesser extent to the mongrels (until the Fifties).

The Head of the State is the King or the Reine of the United Kingdom represented (E) by a Governor-general of South Africa.

The head of government is the Prime Minister, chief of the party which holds the majority at the Parliament.

The Parliament is composed of two rooms: a Senate, whose members are elected by the councils of province, and a Room of Parliament called " Volksraad" in Afrikaans, whose members are elected by the White. The mongrels are them-even represented until 1959 by white deputies.

The white political parties in the South African Union are distributed mainly according to linguistic or racial criteria. Two political principal trainings are the national Parti (afrikaners preserving and republican) and the Plain Parti (representing the moderate english-speaking loyal supporters and afrikaners).

At the blacks, the African National congress does not have any parliamentary representation because the blacks do not have the right to vote.

The notable political personalities of this time are Louis Botha, Jan Smuts, James Barry Hertzog, Daniel Malan, Johannes Strijdom, Hendrik Verwoerd, Tielman Roos, Nicolaas Havenga, Jan Hendrik Hofmeyr as well as the resistant ones to the racial segregation like Alan Paton, Albert Luthuli or the young person Nelson Mandela.

In 1959, the electoral majority was lowered by 21 to 18 years.

The October 5th 1960, it is by Référendum that the government of Hendrik Verwoerd makes approve by 52% of the voices the abolition of the Monarchie and the transformation of the Union into Republic of South Africa.

Bank holidays

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