Death of the Federation

Just last week, after three months of fruitless independence negotiations with Great Britain, Southern Rhodesian Prime Minister Winston Field was forced to resign in favor of the more radical Ian Douglas Smith, who suggests that if Southern Rhodesia cannot achieve a “negotiated independence” it may be driven “to do something else.” Thomas Molnar, who was in Africa at the time of the dissolution of the Federation of the Rhodesias and Nyasaland, was able to interview both Mr. Field and Sir Roy Welensky, who had headed the Federation, and gives us their estimate of things to come.

Salisbury On January 2, two days after the New Year had brought an end to the ten-year-old Federation of Rhodesia, I found myself driving through a downpour to Inyanga, Southern Rhodesia, where I was invited to lunch by the Prime Minister, Winston Field. Southern Rhodesia, the third partner of the Federation that included the soon to be independent countries of Northern Rhodesia and Nyasaland, has not yet been granted independence. The British have been holding out until Salisbury enacts a more “democratic” constitution—which would mean that the country’s 220,000 whites and sizable Indian minority would be outvoted by three million black Africans.

TM

About the Author

Thomas Molnar

Just last week, after three months of fruitless independence negotiations with Great Britain, Southern Rhodesian Prime Minister Winston Field was forced to resign in favor of the more radical Ian Douglas Smith, who suggests that if Southern Rhodesia cannot achieve a “negotiated independence” it may be driven “to do something else.” Thomas Molnar, who was in Africa at the time of the dissolution of the Federation of the Rhodesias and Nyasaland, was able to interview both Mr. Field and Sir Roy Welensky, who had headed the Federation, and gives us their estimate of things to come.

Salisbury On January 2, two days after the New Year had brought an end to the ten-year-old Federation of Rhodesia, I found myself driving through a downpour to Inyanga, Southern Rhodesia, where I was invited to lunch by the Prime Minister, Winston Field. Southern Rhodesia, the third partner of the Federation that included the soon to be independent countries of Northern Rhodesia and Nyasaland, has not yet been granted independence. The British have been holding out until Salisbury enacts a more “democratic” constitution—which would mean that the country’s 220,000 whites and sizable Indian minority would be outvoted by three million black Africans.