The British Approach - We're Getting out as Cheaply as Possible

While we were in Gaborone, I had a few inconsequential dealings with the British High Commissioner. I knew he was involved with the political changes that were being negotiated regarding the future of Zimbabwe, as were all the British High Commissioners of ‘Frontline States’. I once asked him the extent of a British Aid programme that would follow the elections and the advent of a majority government in Zim.

A look of abject horror crossed his face. “Aid, nothing! We’ll be getting out as cheaply as possible!” he said, presumably summing up whatever amounted to British policy on the subject. In Africa, all the colonial powers had been disastrous, and the best that could be said for the British is that they were the least worst. They had attempted to rule with a light touch, allowing their African possessions to operate more or less independently, with Northern and Southern Rhodesia and Nyasaland even federating into a bloc called “The Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland”.

This bloc was, of course, controlled by white minority governments, all operating under what they considered to be an “enlightened” policy of guidance, which was in fact nothing more than paternalistic and ultimately racist political and economic domination of the African majority. It was for this reason that the Federation collapsed on December the 31st 1963. Northern Rhodesia and Nyasaland became the truly independent countries of Zambia and Malawi respectively, and shortly after, Southern Rhodesia unilaterally declared independence under Ian Smith in 1965.

This was inevitable, as a situation where a few hundred thousand whites controlled the lives and destinies of millions of practically disenfranchised black subjects was simply untenable. In fact, the Federation, and Ian Smith’s sudden unilateral declaration of independence )UDI) from the British Empire, had both been doomed attempts to maintain white power over these countries. It’s difficult to believe, but Smith, when he made the UDI, seems to have sincerely thought that this would allow his government to stave of black African rule. What he got instead was a bush war lasting fifteen years. This was a three handed affair, between Smith’s government forces, Ndebele factions from the West under Joshua Nkomo, and the Shona from the East under Robert Mugabe.

Smith’s UDI provoked the British under Harold Wilson to attempt a naval blockade off the Mozambique coast trying to prevent goods being shipped from the port of Beira, where a rail line to the Rhodesian city of Bulawayo had operated since 1898.

The bush war went on until 1979, when eventually peace talks were negotiated. There was a great deal of unrealistic posturing by the British who favoured a Bishop Muzorewa as the Southern Rhodesian (Zimbabwe) independence leader.

At the time I had several trips to Salisbury (now Harare) and generally asked the taxi drivers who was going to win the forthcoming election. The answer was always Mugabe. I actually ran a book in our office in Botswana and was just one seat out when the election was declared. The British and Americans and everyone else, despite having access to information better than a straw poll of taxi drivers, appeared to be utterly blindsided by this eminently predictable outcome.

 Mugabe was appointed Prime Minister of Zimbabwe in April 1980. He robbed the country blind from day one and made Zimbabwe into a basket case, which it remains to this day.

All the parties had the example of what happened to the white Kenya farmers at independence, including my parents, who as part of the independence settlement were bought out by the British Government (at low prices of course). Maybe if this had been done in Rhodesia/Zimbabwe, a lot of the death and anguish caused by the forced evictions of white farmers might have been avoided.

I don’t know what aid has been given to Zim since 1980. I do know that Mugabe insisted on “controlling” (read ‘stealing’) any funds intended for the acquisition of land owned by white farmers. The idea was abandoned as a result of this. No money has ever been paid to any white farmer as compensation for the loss of their property.