464
SIR ERNEST OPPENHEIMER
Something
more should, perhaps, be said about the corporation's links with the
Federation. Circumstances have established strong tics between this
group and the territories that Cecil John Rhodes brought into the
Commonwealth. An inherited tradition almost demands that the
corporation, which has dominant interests in Rhodes's company, Dc Beers
Consolidated Mines, should continue his policy of fostering the
development and settlement of the Rhodesias. Besides, it is good
business. Our early enterprise has drawn, and continues to draw, highly
satisfactory rewards from Northern Rhodesia. There is, indeed, a moral
obligation that we should take a leading part in assisting the progress
of the Rhodesias; and more material considerations endorse this policy.
For here is a young country eagerly awaiting all the development that
modern civilization can offer. The scope tor business in all spheres is
wide; and large resources arc needed for the fulfilment of even part of
the ambitious programmes that the sponsors of the Federation have
foreshadowed.
♦ XXII ♦
The
'moral obligation that we should take a leading part in assisting the
progress of the Rhodesias' very soon found concrete expression. In June
1955 there was registered the Anglo American Rhodesian Development
Corporation Limited, with an authorized capital of -£2,000,000. 'The
principal objects of the Development Corporation', said the Rhoanglo
report for the year, 'are to provide finance for the development of the
natural and other resources of the Federation, and generally to assist
with further works and enterprises likely to benefit the Federation of
Rhodesia and Nyasaland.' A further call of 5s. to be paid-up capital
was made in the next year. The first step taken was to assist the
Rhodesia Railways to provide additional facilities. At about the same
time, the provision of finance for the Kariba power scheme became
important. The action taken is set out in the statement to the Anglo
American Corporation shareholders made by Ernest Oppen-heimer, to
accompany the 1956 report:
...
It has wanted little acumen to assess the Federation's most urgent
needs as being transport and power. In June 1955 a new company, Anglo
American Rhodesian Development Corporation Limited, was formed to be
the agency through which the corporation and its associated companies
could assist in the financing of public services in the Federation. The
most practical assistance that this company could give obviously lay in
the sphere of railway transport; and our own interests in the
Copperbelt and at Wankie would be served at the same time. After
negotiations with the Rhodesia
