BRITISH AND GERMAN EAST AFRICA, AND UGANDA 111
They are indignant at the enforcement of the pledge of the
Colonial Secretary, Lord Elgin, in 1908 that the highlands
should be reserved for white farmers. They resent the seg-
regation in the towns and their exclusion from the franchise
by which the whites now elect representatives in the legisla-
ture. They affirm that the Ordinance of 1915 requiring the
Governor’s consent for transfers of land from Arabs to
Asiatics has been used as a veto on such transfers. Some
have feared that the restrictions upon their rights would lead
to eventual expulsion from the country, and to the ‘“Euro-
peanization” of East Africa. Some of them have suggested
that East Africa should be made a political dependency of
India, since the complete dominance of Indians in this region
appears to them a natural offset to the exclusion of Indians
from the self-governing Dominions of the empire. On the
other hand, the whites argue that the highlands should be
reserved for them because they cannot, as can the Indians,
live in the lowlands; that segregation in the towns is neces-
sary for sanitary reasons; that the Indians are not fit for self-
government and are much less fit to take part in governing
the whites and the natives; ! and that, if the country is
thrown open to Indians without restrictions, they will swamp
both whites and natives. The contact of natives and In-
dians is alleged to be more deleterious to the former than
their contact with the whites. The outstanding features in
the progress of the contest may be briefly reviewed. In 1919
the Report of the East African Economic Commission fa-
vored an increase of European immigration and the confining
of Indians to certain areas, to be enforced by a prohibition
of the sale of land by Europeans to Indians. This Report
! The white settlers feel it as a grievance that the local Indians took so
little part in the war, furnishing only 376 combatants whose only casualties
were five executed for treachery. See articles by Major Ewart S. Grogan
and F. S. Joelson in the National Review, August, 1923, and the [British]
Outlook, March 31, 1923.
