RHODESIAN IMPASSE SOLUTION CLAIMED TO BE IN SOUTH AFRICAN HANDS

Press, Volume CIX, Issue 31936, 13 March 1969, Page 12

RHODESIAN IMPASSE SOLUTION CLAIMED TO BE IN SOUTH AFRICAN HANDS

'By

JOHN BULLOCH,

writing to the "Dailg Telegraph”. London, front s.im,

' ay junn duliami, w »hc uuii U leiegrapn, London, from Salisbury) (Reprinted Irom the “Daily Telegraph” bu arrangement)

Midnight oil is burning in two Government departments in Rhodesia as Mr lan Smith pursues the dual policy which has won him the support of his party and the wary admiration of his country. In one, lawyers are working overtime to prepare the White Paper which will set out the' new all-Rhodesian Constitution; in the other, a small group of senior civil servants is working on the new approach to Britain.

The Rhodesian leader, once again firmly in control of his party, has committed himself, publicly and privately, to seeking a settlement with Britain. This is his “top priority,” his “first choice?’ But at the same time, he is preparing for failure. His Parliamentary draftsmen are hammering out the details of the new constitution, announced in a flurry of forced publicity, which is to be put to the country in a referendum in May.

Elements Of Absurdity

The situation has some elements of absurdity. Mr Smith

appears in the role of a skilled circus performer riding two horses round and round the ring. The spectators applaud, though they know he is getting nowhere. And the virtuoso himself knows equally well that at some stage one of his steeds has to be abandoned. The horse Mr Smith has said he favours is the one which will take him to a settlement with Britain. After more than three years of independence, he and all his supporters know that this means acceptance of Britain’s six principles, the first of which is unimpeded progress to majority rule. But while in one Government office Mr Gerald Clark, the secretary to the Cabinet, Mr Ray Stallwood, the Prime Minister’s secretary, and a number of senior officials prepare the Rhodesian brief for the next round of talks with Britain—leading, it is hoped, to compromise on each side—others are working full out on the new constitution which has succeeded in bringing the riven Rhodesian Front together. The fact that it has done so is “prima facie” evidence that it flies in the face of most of Britain’s principles. Income Basis

Examination of the plan makes this even more clear. At first, the numbers in Parliament will be as they are now—with 50 members elected by Europeans and 16 by Africans. But eight of those 16 will be chosen by an electoral college made up of chiefs and headmen. Then as African incomes increase, the theory goes, African representation in Parliament will be increased until parity with the European members is achieved.

The phrase used is “the contribution of the African race to the national exchequer,” and the measurement will be the amount of

income tax paid. The time scale is not specified, and the fact that half the African members will always owe their positions to selection by a body which requires Government sanction for continuation in office is not stressed. But it is not difficult to see the lengthy period envisaged: at the moment, Africans contribute 1.8 per cent of all the income tax paid in Rhodesia, and this figure has varied little over recent years. There would have to be a major break-through into the

cash economy by the three million Africans still living at subsistence levels in the Tribal Trust Lands before any significant change was apparent. White Rule Assured Put bluntly, Mr Smith’s proposed new constitution ensures the one thing that the Rhodesian Front party has always quietly represented: Government in Euroipean hands for the foreseeable future. And the fact must be faced that those in power in Rhodesia now, who accurately represent the feelings of the majority of the European electorate, do not want, and will not accept, any settlement which could lead to African rule in 10, 20 or 30 years time. Right or wrong, Rhodesians have been conditioned by the events of the last 10 years in the rest of Africa. In Britain now the Congo upheavals of the early ’sixties are no more than footnotes to history; reports of gangs of youths attacking miniskirted girls in Zambia read like amusing travellers’ tales; the presence of Red Chinese . technicians in Tanzania is no I more than one more manifesitation of the cold war. But I in Rhodesia these things are of the here and now.

Thousands of people had first-hand knowledge of the Congo, if only in trying to help streams of bedraggled and dazed refugees. Zambia is next door, a State once part of the Rhodesian Federation; and in the Zambezi valley it is Chinese guns which Rhodesian National Servicemen are countering with obsolete Western arms. A Calvinistic Streak The immediacy of events

conditions the reaction. It is compounded of fear of what could happen here, stubbornness in holding on to what has been gained, and a touching faith that in the end things will turn out all right. There is a Calvinistic streak in the Rhodesians, too, which has played its part in preventing a settlement. It would have been easy enough to have agreed to almost any conditions in return for legal independence, knowing that an imposed constitution could have been torn up. But that would put Mr Smith and

his colleagues on all fours with so many other African States, the countries they despise and decry. So honesty has prevailed. That is the situation, and it appears to represent the old conundrum about the immovable object and the irresistible force. But is that so? In fact, there are factors which could solve this impasse, though they are not in Britain’s power to command. Rhodesia is an African, and specifically a Southern African, problem. It is in Africa that it must be solved. And the one hope of doing so lies in South Africa. An Ambivalent Course Mr Vorster's republic, over the last three years, has pursued almost as ambivalent a course as that followed by Mr Smith. “Normal trade” with Rhodesia has been maintained, because it was imperative for South Africa to demonstrate that sanctions could not and would not work. At the same time, great pressure was put on the Rhodesian Government to reach a settlement, because this small buffer State was causing so much trouble that South Africa’s whole out-ward-looking policy was jeopardised. Modern South Africa was built on gold, but peak production has been reached and passed, and now South Africa must develop her other basic exports to maintain the standard to which she is committed. Geography dictates that economic expansion must take place in the African continent: and only Rhodesia, this geopolitical entity, stands in the way. South Africa has far more compelling reasons than Britain for dealing with this problem. So South Africa should be allowed to do so. Let sanctions be maintained (if only because Britain has surrendered to the United Nations her freedom of action in the affair). Let the Fearless terms be left where they lie. Let us have no more talks, no more itinerant politicians advancing ideas for solving the minor problems which are of no account as long as they evade the central issue. Let us instead leave Southern Africa alone to settle its own fate. Pavlovian Response This is not a callous solution, nor one that ignores the legitimate ideals of black Rhodesians. Each time new negotiations are opened the strong Right wing in Rhodesia suffers another tremor of fear, and in Pavlovian response ensures that when those talks fail a further step to the Right is taken. A spell of real isolation for Rhodesia, with all prospects of new dickering removed, would allow the political and economic forces at work in Southern Africa full play. South Africa, once the possibility of being accused of being Britain’s agent was removed, would be free to exert her full pressure. And that is considerable. All the wordy conferences of the last three years have done no more than crystallise Rhodesian attitudes. A spell of silence, a return to real diplomacy. and an acceptance of the facts as they are might accomplish what all the hectoring has failed to do.

Mr lan Smith's current talks in Cape Town with the South African Prime Minister (Mr Vorster) lend special interest to this article by a London “Daily Telegraph" correspondent in Salisbury, Rhodesia.