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VOA
By Peta Thornycroft
21 November 2007

Former Rhodesian Prime Minister Ian Smith who died in Cape Town late Tuesday brings to an end an era, which haunted citizens of independent Zimbabwe. Peta Thornycroft reports for VOA that Ian Smith, who took his country into war rather than give up white minority rule, died unrepentant.

The Zimbabwe state press has reported Ian Smith’s death at 88, in moderate tones.

Opposition to his rule helped bring to power the present leader of Zimbabwe, President Robert Mugabe, who lead guerrillas in a punishing civil war for one man one vote. Only black people with a certain education could vote in what was then Rhodesia.
Ian Smith stayed on in Zimbabwe after independence, without security, and continued to farm undisturbed until health problems forced him to move closer to his two surviving children in Cape Town.

He never wanted to leave Zimbabwe and remained profoundly critical of President Mugabe’s rule.

“Many of his political decisions and policies were disastrous for this country,” noted David Coltart, one of Zimbabwe’s longest serving human rights lawyers, who as a teenager was drafted into Ian Smith’s police force during the end of the civil war. “The draconian legislation passed under his tenure as prime minister in the 1960s and 1970s and the unilateral declaration of independence announced by him in November 1965 were the root cause of the civil war that erupted in then Rhodesia in the 1970s. Those policies also radicalized black nationalist movements and directly spawned the violent and fascist rule of Zanu-PF today. I think history will show that his policies contributed to the disastrous state that Zimbabwe is in today.”

Coltart like most Zimbabweans, including President Robert Mugabe, who was jailed for a decade during the civil war, say Mr. Smith led a personally moral life and loved the country.

Notwithstanding the ruinous policies of the Rhodesia Front party he led, Ian Douglas Smith himself obviously had a deep love for Zimbabwe, evidenced by the fact that unlike so many of his colleagues he continued to live in Zimbabwe after independence (he only went to South Africa at the end of his life for medical treatment) and remained a Zimbabwean citizen until his death.

Ian Smith lived an exemplary family life and in private was a down-to-earth, modest man. Ian Smith was not corrupt nor was he a megalomaniac. However whilst Ian Smith acted in what he thought were the best interests of then Rhodesia he made some disastrous political decisions as Prime Minister which directly contributed to the trauma that Zimbabwe is suffering from today.

The racially discriminatory and draconian laws introduced or maintained, and the Unilateral Declaration of Independence made, during his tenure as Prime Minister were the root cause of the civil war which tore Rhodesia apart in the 1970s. The policies of his Rhodesia Front party radicalized black nationalists and directly spawned the violent and fascist rule of Zanu PF.

David Coltart MP
Bulawayo South
21st November 2007

By David Coltart
Bulawayo
8th November 2007

The recent passage of Constitutional Amendment 18 through the Zimbabwean Parliament with the consent of both Zanu PF and the opposition MDC has caused much alarm and confusion within Zimbabwean civil society and even amongst MDC supporters within Zimbabwe and abroad. Some have gone so far as saying that the opposition has sold out. Others think that the opposition has made a serious error of judgment and has compromised not only principle but political advantage. This arises from a perception that Amendment 18 only helps Zanu PF and that there is no benefit for those struggling to bring democracy to Zimbabwe. The press has enhanced this view by its reporting that Amendment 18 allows Robert Mugabe to handpick his successor.

Whilst I think we in the opposition did ourselves and our colleagues in civil society a disservice by proceeding with unseemly haste in passing the amendment, and by failing to explain our actions sufficiently to our colleagues, I do not think our consent per se was a mistake. There is no doubt that the process used to pass the amendment was flawed. But had we been able to consult widely and argue our case with our civic partners I am sure they would have agreed that we should consent. Accordingly save for the one reservation about the flawed process I think history will show that it was the right thing to pass the amendment.

Firstly, the amendments, to put it negatively, do not introduce any worse provisions than any that already sully our Constitution. In other words the amendments do not make the Zimbabwe Constitutional order any worse than would have been the case had the original draft of Amendment 18 tabled by Zanu PF been passed. That document would have, for example, allowed further gerrymandering of the delimitation process (the original amendment proposed the existing 20% maximum variation between constituencies to be increased to 25% - which would have allowed Zanu PF to create even more rural constituencies and to further dilute the urban vote).