Syndicate
terms, and the Administrator was beginning to lose patience. A further
conference was held at Pretoria on 22 December. Ross Frames agreed to a
modification of the South West Africa quota figures but made his offer
conditional on a satisfactory contract with the Syndicate and on the
willingness of the Government to attend an international conference:
this the Government refused and the demand was subsequently withdrawn.
It was arranged to hold a further conference on 9 January 1925.
On
23 December 1924, the following message had been sent to Ernest
Oppenheimer from his brother-in-law, Leslie Pollak, at the request of
Mr. Arend Brink, who was the technical adviser to Government. It
referred to the break-down of the December negotiations and continued:
Brink
says Administrator will be at liberty to consider proposals after 1
January and he strongly advises you submit definite proposal without
delay. . . . He says you should act immediately, otherwise, if an
attractive offer made outside source, Administrator will be obliged to
consider it on its merits. He hopes you will appreciate his suggestion
prompted by his friendly regard for you.
The
receipt of this message must have put Ernest Oppenheimer into a
position of almost intolerable difficulty. He had, it is true, secured
in 1920 the reversionary right to the sale of Consolidated diamonds,
but this telegram clearly implied that these rights might not be
recognized if a better offer were made; he might, therefore, be forced
to offer terms winch might be financially disastrous. But Anglo
American Corporation, as well as Dunkelsbuhler's, were still members of
the Syndicate, a position achieved not without difficulty, as far as
the corporation was concerned. And though he had turned over in his
mind, and discussed with his associates, the possibility of a new
syndicate, yet to act in anticipation of a break-down between
producers and the Syndicate, might provoke a crisis which, before he
was absolutely sure that he could count upon the support of Barnato
Brothers in the formation of an alternative syndicate, might leave him
and his friends in an embarrassing situation. All else apart, the
possibility of sales in a competing centre, i.e. not London, carried
implications even more serious than competitive sales as such, which
meant, in any case, the abandonment of the policy of sales through one
channel.
Those
were the days before air travel. Nevertheless he arrived in London on
14 January 1925. He could now talk not only with Louis Oppenheimer and
Walter Dunkels, but with Morgan Grenfell and
