Wilson’s Rhodesia Doubts

Press, Volume CIX, Issue 31967, 19 April 1969, Page 13

Wilson’s Rhodesia Doubts

(N.Z.P. A .-Reuter—Copy right)

LONDON, April 18.

The Prime Minister (Mr Wilson) yesterdaj* indicated that Britain was becoming increasingly impatient over the three-year Rhodesian independence dispute and for the first time hinted in public that he might not be able to settle it.

He told a questioner in Parliament “we really have shown tremendous patience and tenacity in this House (of Commons) and in Rhodesia as well in trying to get an honourable settlement. "I do not think it will be laid to the charge of the British Government if, after all, we have done in leaving the Fearless terms on the table despite strong Commonwealth objection, there is no agreement.” Mr Wilson was referring to the British settlement meeting aboard the warship Fearless at Gibraltar in October, 1968, which many African and other Commonwealth leaders consider too soft and generous to the white minority regime. Urged by a Conservative Opposition member to renew talks with Rhodesia to preserve the British connection and not to adopt a "take it or leave it” attitude, Mr Wilson replied: “I am not sure one really can save a country from people who are determined to destroy it. We have done our best in this matter with Rhodesia." The Prime Minister said Britain would consider any ideas from the Rhodesian leader, Mr lan Smith, which would effectively safeguard African rights in any future Rhodesian constitution, one of the main stumbling blocks in the dispute. “But we cannot go on with a position, year after year, in which we keep putting forward proposals, he (Mr Smith) turns them down fiat, and never once conies forward with alternative proposals," Mr Wilson said. Questioned about Rhodesia's planned referendum on its constitutional proposals for separate electoral rolls for ■ Africans and non-Afri-cans and to test opinion about becoming a republic, Mr Wilson declared: “The proposals of the illegal regime for an illegal constitution are as illegal as the regime, and have no basis in law.

“The only law which counts in this matter is the law provided by the British Parliament, which has the responsibility In this matter.” President Banda said similar considerations applied to the indirect use of force against strategic communications links. Rhodesia would act before! Britain could land a single aircraft in Malawi or Zambia, he said, and African air forces were “butterfly air forces." The President told mem-! bers of Parliament: “Smith’s! is a fighting air force and| an extremely efficient one . J

and if needs be, behind Smith stands the South African Air Force which is superior to any on this continent.” He derided suggestions that North African States might act against Rhodesia: “Cairo —they can’t even fight a woman,” he said. President Kamuzu Banda, of Malawi, yesterday issued a fresh attack on African, Asian and Caribbean Commonwealth leaders over what he described as their unrealistic policies towards Rhodesia.

With the partial exception of Malaysia, he said he completely disagreed with everything spokesmen for these groupings bad said at the Commonwealth conference in London last January. President Banda told Parliament in Malawi that anyone who thought Britain could use force either directly or indirectly against Rhodesia only exposed ignorance of political and economic realities. The President said: “Any African, Asian or Caribbean leader who thinks Smith would watch Britain assembling armies in Malawai, Zambia or Tanzania, with his arms folded, should have his head examined by a psychiatrist.” Mr Smith’s Government yesterday claimed another successful sanctions-breaking year in 1968 —and forecast an even healthier economic outlook for 1969. The forecast came in the Government’s annual survey of economic development during one of the toughest years Rhodesia’s economy has i faced since the country seized its independence from Brit-* ain in 1965.

The survey said Rhodesia

still managed to channel fßbodesian 87.4 m worth of exports through the sanctions net in 1968, and increased its gross domestic product by 5) per cent.

The export figure—£Rhodesian Im less than in 1967—was reached despite a reduction of almost 12 per cent in agricultural production caused by reduced tobacco output and the effects of bitter frosts that came with the worst drought for almost 50 years.