Page 100 - SARB: 100-Year Journey

It is interesting to note that South Africa’s currency question, or the decimalisation thereof, had long been a riddle in banking, industry and government. Indeed, the topic, although not the focus, reared its head during the course of testimony to the Kemmerer-Vissering Inquiry of the mid-1920s into the gold standard. The matter was of such significance that Dr Gerard Vissering, the co-commissioner in the gold standard inquiry, raised it in his Report upon certain aspects of South African banking and currency (Arndt, 1961a, p 92).
However, decimalisation had been a subject of debate since the 1800s. “[As] far back as 1841, a commission in Great Britain reported in favour of decimalising the pound and recommended the introduction of the florin, representing one-tenth of the pound. But while the florin was subsequently introduced, no further steps were taken towards the complete decimalisation of the pound.” (Council of the South African Bureau of Standards, 1954).
At the Imperial Conference in London of 1911, Australia brought up the issue but it did not gain traction among other dominions (Arndt, 1961a). In 1912, Great Britain appointed the Dominions Royal Commission to report on “the advisability or otherwise of adopting a decimal coinage, in conjunction with other matters connected with the trade of the British Empire.” (Arndt, 1961a, p 90).
In the Union, decimalisation predated the Vissering currency report of the 1920s. In May 1913, E C Reynolds, General Manager of the National Bank of South Africa and President of the Institute of Bankers in South Africa, gave an impassioned speech about a “... very important factor in the machinery of our business as Bankers – and of trade and commerce generally, viz., the possibility of this country adopting a
decimal coinage.” (Arndt, 1961a, p 89).
In 1917, the Witwatersrand Centre of the South African Association for the Advancement of Science called a conference “and passed resolutions urging the introduction of a decimal coinage system in the Union.” (Arndt, 1961a, p 91). Arndt (1961a) lists Professor R A Lehfeldt and H C Jorissen as key figures at that
conference.
In 1919, the Journal of the Institute of Bankers
“lamented that, although the majority of the banking and commercial community were in favour of a decimal coinage system, ‘we do not seem to get any
‘forrader [forwarder]’.” (Arndt, 1961a, p 92).
How the rand replaced the South African pound
D-day (or Decimalisation Day) – Tuesday, 14 February 1961 − the date on which the rand became the official decimal currency and three months before South Africa attained republic status on 31 May of the same year, sounded the death knell to the pound’s 135-year reign in the Union. “The ... £. s. d. currency system, ... had been in operation in the Union since 1825, i.e., for more than a century and a quarter.” (Arndt, 1961b).
The day also marked the culmination of work which had taken place over several decades, including three inquiries: (i) the Becklake Committee (1945) of the National Anti-Waste and Conservation Organisation; (ii) the Council of the South African Bureau of Standards (1949); and (iii) the Decimal Coinage Commission (also known as the Diederichs Commission) (1956). Dr M H de Kock was the SARB Governor during this period (July 1945 to June 1962).
The scope of the three inquiries was the study of the feasibility of introducing decimal coinage and the possibility of adopting a metric system of weights and measures in the Union. The conclusion of the Decimal Coinage Commission in 1958 and the release of its report paved the way for the Decimal Coinage Bill, and its eventual passage by the Union Parliament in 1959 as the Decimal Coinage Act. This Act formed the basis upon which the government forged ahead with plans to establish a new decimal currency system with the help of a Decimalisation Board, on which Dr E H D Arndt, a Deputy Governor at the time, served as Chairman after the SARB agreed to release him temporarily to oversee the task.
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