March 3.
By the last mail from home there reaches us a summary of the new draft convention submitted to the Egyptian General Assembly on February 9, for the renewal of the Suez Canal Company's Concession. It will be recalled that the subject was discussed at different times last year, when it was understood that, for a certain sum down and other arrangements, the Khedive was prepared to extend the date at which the Canal would revert to the Egyptian Government. But the fact that the actual concession does not expire till November 17, 1968, not less than the complicated natare of the question, probably served to limit the in terest that was taken in the prospect of renewal chiefly to shipping circles. Article I of the draft convention now agrees that the concession shall be renewed for forty years, up to December 31, 2008; and for this extension the Company will make payment in the following manner. A sam of £4,000,000 is to be paid to the Egyptian Government la four equal parts, payable on December 15 next and on the same date in the three following years. From and after January, 1969, the net revenue of the Canal is to be divided equally between the Company and the Government, with this proviso that the Company's share is not in any circumstances to be less than £2,000,000; and in the event of the revenue falling 80 low as that, the whole of it is to be taken by the Company. Finally it is agreed that from 1921 to 1968 the Company shall pay a percentage of the net revenue to the Government, beginning with four per cent and rising by two per cent every ten years. Of the remaining provisions the most noteworthy are those stipulating that the Government may he represented on the board of administration by three members; that it will pay all pensions and indemnities falling due to the staff on the expiration of the concession; and that the Company undertakes to carry out necessary repairs and improvements in the southern entrance to the Canal, and to deepen, at a cost of not more than "£690,000, the approach to the Canal in the harbour of Suez.
On two points the Egyptian Council of Ministers has raised oblections, insisting that the revenue shall, after 1968, be shared equally between the parties, irrespective of its amount; and further that the Government shall not bind itself to the payment of pensions and indemnities. As an offset to this
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.