Louis Botha

Louis Botha (born September 27, 1862, near Greytown, Natal [now in South Africa]—died August 27, 1919, Pretoria, South Africa) was a soldier and statesman who was the first prime minister of the Union of South Africa (1910–19) and a staunch advocate of a policy of reconciliation between Boers and Britons, as well as of limiting the political rights of Black South Africans.

The son of a voortrekker (Boer pioneer settler of the interior), he grew up in the Orange Free State, where he received his only formal education at a German mission school. In 1884 he helped to found the New Republic in the Vryheid district in Zululand (now northern KwaZulu-Natal). There he purchased a farm and married Annie Emmett, granddaughter of an Irish patriot. When the New Republic became part of the South African Republic (Transvaal) in 1888, Botha became politically active and held a number of posts before he was elected to the Volksraad (parliament) in 1897. There he sided with the moderates against Pres. Paul Kruger’s hostile policy toward the Uitlanders (non-Boer, mostly English, settlers).

Rising tensions between Great Britain and the Boer republics led to the outbreak of the South African War in 1899. Botha rose rapidly in the Boer army to command the southern force besieging Ladysmith (now uMnambithi). While leading an ambush, he captured an armoured train; Winston Churchill was among the prisoners. When Piet Joubert, the commandant general of the Transvaal forces, died (March 1900), Botha was named to succeed him. Despite his talents as a general, he could not hold back the overwhelming numbers of British reinforcements. After the surrender of a large Boer army at Paardeberg and the fall of Pretoria, Botha organized a guerrilla campaign, but Britain eventually forced him to negotiate. He was one of the signatories at the Peace of Vereeniging (May 31,1902).

After the war, Botha returned to politics and in 1904 helped form a new party in the Transvaal, Het Volk (“The People”). When Het Volk won the Transvaal elections of February 1907, Botha became prime minister. Botha and his colleague Jan Smuts, showing political realism, downplayed the fostering of Afrikaner (Boer) interests and stressed conciliation with Britain. The National Convention of 1910 chose Botha as the first prime minister of the Union of South Africa (precursor to the Republic of South Africa), which amalgamated the British colonies (the Cape and Natal) and the former Boer republics (Orange Free State and the Transvaal) into one political entity. Botha was adamantly opposed to granting political rights (either to vote or eligibility as members of parliament) to Black South Africans. He thus played an important role in creating the problems relating to majority political disenfranchisement and minority rule in the 20th-century South Africa.

While serving as prime minister, Botha established the South African Party in 1911. Botha pursued subtle policies of white (British-Boer) conciliation and greater autonomy for South Africa. The most important measure of his administrations was the Natives’ Land Act of 1913, which segregated land throughout the Union, laid down the basis for a system of “native reserves” for Black South Africans, and began the policy of “influx controls” to reduce their access to cities. Botha’s policy of white conciliation provoked opposition from extremist Afrikaner groups led by J.B.M. Hertzog, who formed the National Party in early 1914. Botha’s support for Britain after the start of World War I in 1914 led to further splits among Afrikaners and provoked the rebellion led by Christiaan Rudolf de Wet and C.F. Beyers. One point of contention was the use of South African troops to attack German interests in Africa, including the mobilization against Germans troops in German South West Africa (now Namibia). The German defeat there in 1915 at the hands of a campaign that was personally led by Botha further exacerbated the situation. South African troops were also sent to German East Africa (now Burundi, Rwanda, mainland Tanzania, and part of Mozambique), Egypt, and the Western Front in France. Before his death in 1919, Botha participated in the Paris Peace Conference and advocated leniency for the former enemies.