Ratepayers of the Shanghai Inter~ national Settlement were. taken to task by the "Shanghai Nippo" for their lack of interest in the conduct of municipal affairs as evidenced by the small attendance at the annual meeting held on April 16.
Commenting on the same subject, the "Shanghai Mainichi" expressed the hope that the Shanghat Municipal Council would conduct an administration for the benefit of the various national groups, instead of promoting British interests alone.
"To state that most of the local Britons live on the Council would be no exaggeration," the "Mainichi" declared. "There is abundant evid-fence of how the British are connive Ing to utilize the Council to promote their own ends. We believe that it is lime for the SMC. to realize how all the regulations under which it Koverns are designed to create a society with the Britons on top and to reflect accordingly on its future As evidence, the Japanese dally cited the British policemen "who devour a vast budget with their sal-ries and who devote their activities to the protection of British interests and to the promotion of British enterprises."
Police as Proof "To give a familiar example let us fake the British Consulale-General, It has only a court and no police force. The Japanese Consulate-General has its own police force to deal with its countrymen. The British are able to direct and utilize the Munlelpal Police at will to meet their Reeds. Tt also happens that British policemen's salaries are far in ex cess of those paid policemen of other hnationallties. These salaries naturally are borne, not by the British alone, but by the entire Settlement population," the "Mainichi" asserted, The paper went on to criticize the comparison made, by the chair~ man of the Council between. the municipal rates in Shanghal_ and in aelly of the same size in England, "Mathematical comparison is poss! ble, but so Jong as an administration really adapted to the special condltions prevailing In the Settlement is enforced, we cannot but feel that the S.MC. remains, what it has always been, on agency for the promotion of British" intorese"" the" "itaniehi"
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.