Africa

by Guy Arnold

  In his search for wider national support Obote moved to the left and in 1969 announced a ‘Common Man’s Charter’ as well as further nationalization measures and redistribution of incomes. In May 1970 plans for 60 per cent nationalization of 80 major companies were announced. In the meantime, however, Obote was losing his grip on the army, which by 1969 was overspending its budget by 28 per cent. Amin, now a Major-General, was assisting the Israelis to channel military aid to the Anya Nya in southern Sudan and he continued to do so, despite a reversal of policy on this issue by Obote. In December 1969 Obote was wounded in an assassination attempt, an event that gave him an excuse to ban all opposition parties. There were indications that Amin had been involved in the attempt. The death of the Kabaka in London on 22 November 1969 (of acute alcoholic poisoning) led to unrest in Buganda. On 1 May 1970 Obote announced that his government was taking immediate control of oil companies, banks, insurance, mines, transport, manufacturing and plantation industries. In explaining these major takeovers, Obote referred to his Common Man’s Charter of October 1969 and explained:

  The basic reason, really, behind the measures I announced on May Day is that we are trying to prevent a development of a violent conflict between the masses who produce coffee and cotton and the managers and directors of big companies who really are engaged in a line of activities to which the people find themselves as spectators.34

  BURUNDI AND RWANDA

  The huge imbalance in population between Hutu and Tutsi in Burundi and Rwanda has meant that the Tutsis, the minority, have always felt threatened unless they were the rulers with the result that they have gone to great lengths to dominate the majority Hutus. This imbalance has raised fundamental questions about democracy since any universal franchise election must always result in a Hutu majority. Checks and balances are essential if the two people are to live in harmony. The unhappy history of these two small landlocked and overcrowded states has, too often, been in the form of violence by the one group against the other. The two states of Burundi and Rwanda, the former Belgian Trusteeship Territory of Ruanda-Urundi, signalled before they became independent in 1962 the deeply troubled path of brutal Hutu-Tutsi antagonism that would plague their independent existence down to 2000. The Belgians had followed the German practice (Ruanda-Urundi had been part of German East Africa until 1919) of working through the established system of chiefs and retaining the Tutsi monarchy, which meant accepting the inequalities resulting from Tutsi domination over the Hutus, so that by independence deep-seated Hutu resentments, which the colonial administration had done nothing to assuage, had instead become more entrenched.

  In Burundi a new political party, the Union pour le Progrès National (UPRONA) (Union of National Progress) was formed but it proved ineffective and unable either to contain or control the ethnic tensions and suspicions that mounted on the approach of independence. In January 1962 self-government was granted by Belgium and at that point the monarchy appeared to be the most acceptable form of government to both Hutu and Tutsi. Burundi, by then fully separated from Rwanda, became independent on 1 July 1962. The mwami or king, Mwambutsa IV (who had reigned since 1915), attempted to balance the rival claims of the two ethnic groups by the alternate appointment of Hutu and Tutsi prime ministers. Even so, there was a Hutu uprising in 1965 though this was suppressed. In July 1966 Mwambutsa IV was ousted in a coup by his son, who became king as Ntare V. The new king appointed Michel Micombero as his Prime Minister, but after only four months the latter deposed the King and proclaimed a Republic with himself as President. Micombero then systematically purged the government and civil service of Hutus, entrenching Tutsis in all the important offices. By 1971 the ruling Conseil Suprème de la République (CSR – cabinet) consisted of 23 Tutsis, only two Hutus and two others. At independence the Hutu accounted for 80 per cent of the population and the Tutsi for 13.5 per cent.

  In 1916, during World War I, Belgian troops from the Congo had occupied Ruanda and following the peace the newly formed League of Nations created the mandate of Ruanda-Urundi, which was placed under Belgian control. During the years of their mandate the Belgians on the one hand ruled through the traditional kings and chiefs but on the other hand encouraged the rise of Hutu aspirations, with the inevitable result that they brought about the collapse of the system so that in 1959 a violent Hutu-Tutsi civil war erupted when the Hutus rose in revolt against the dominant Tutsis. The civil war ended in the collapse of the monarchy and the exile of Kigeri V who was later deposed. The Belgians, who had eventually restored order, introduced a series of democratic reforms, which favoured the majority Hutu; in the municipal elections of June–July 1960 the Parti de l’Emancipation du Peuple Hutu (Parmehutu) won an overwhelming victory. A referendum of 1961 recommended the abolition of the monarchy and subsequent legislative elections gave the Hutu massive political control, while the leader of Parmehutu, Gregoire Kayibanda, became the country’s first President at independence on 1 July 1962.

  Much of Rwanda’s history following independence concerned Hutu-Tutsi rivalries, which periodically climaxed in bloodshed and massacres. In the immediate aftermath of independence the Hutus carried out a consistent policy of depriving Tutsis of positions of political influence; then, in December 1963, following an invasion carried out by émigré Tutsis, the Hutus massacred about 10,000 Tutsis and caused many more to flee the country. Thus the Hutus had established total political control and in 1965 made Rwanda a one-party state. In the elections of 1965 and 1969 Parmehutu candidates were returned unopposed, and Kayibanda was re-elected as President. His regime became more authoritarian and isolated. At independence the Hutu (who were farmers) accounted for 90 per cent of the population while the Tutsis (who were cattle herders) accounted for 9 per cent.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  White Racism in Central Africa

  Few issues during the 1960s caused as much African anger as did the 1965 unilateral declaration of independence (UDI) by the white minority in Rhodesia. The declaration itself, the fact that it had not been pre-empted by earlier British action and the realization that even the British Labour Party, which had always been seen as friendly to African aspirations, would refuse when in power to deal effectively with the rebels, confirmed long-held African fears that the West would always come down on the side of the white minorities. When the immediate drama that followed Smith’s declaration of independence on 11 November 1965 had subsided and his rebel regime was in place it soon became apparent that the series of ‘talks about talks’ and the British Prime Minister Harold Wilson’s meetings with Ian Smith on board HMS Tiger in 1966 and HMS Fearless in 1968 had everything to do with finding a face-saving formula that would relieve Britain of its imperial responsibility, and nothing to do with resolving the problem as it ought to have been resolved in favour of African majority rule. The British had always had the knack of distancing themselves by one remove from events for which ultimate responsibility was theirs. They had done this – and were still doing it – with regard to South Africa and now they did it over Rhodesia.

  THE CENTRAL AFRICAN FEDERATION

  The Central African Federation of Northern and Southern Rhodesia and Nyasaland had been created in 1953 and had always been seen by the whites in Southern Rhodesia and by the Africans in all three territories as a device to perpetuate white control in the region. There was no attempt on the part of the Federation’s white founders to hide their contempt for the Africans who were supposed to be their ‘partners’ in a new imperial venture. Sir Godfrey Huggins (later Lord Malvern) the long-time Prime Minister of Southern Rhodesia dominated the two-day conference of white politicians who met at Victoria Falls in February 1949 to consider the proposed Federation of the three territories. He left no doubt in the minds of the delegates from Northern Rhodesia about how the Federation should be implemented. He said, among other things, ‘The natives must be ruled by a benevolent aristocracy in the real sense of the word… Our democratic system does not embrace mob law.’ Later, for good measure, he
added: ‘The history of the world suggests that there is prima facie evidence that there is something wrong with the Bantu branch of the family.’1 It was Sir Godfrey Huggins, the principal architect of the Federation, who propounded the concept of racial partnership as ‘the rider and the horse’ and the Africans were to be the horse. As the debate about implementation proceeded in the years following this meeting, Huggins was to say of the Federal Constitution, when it was being drafted in 1951, ‘Once the Imperial government have granted this constitution they have lost all control – don’t forget that… In practice the reservations [about African rights] are not worth the paper they are written on.’

  Huggins’ principal political partner in the Federal story was the rough diamond Roy Welensky (knighted in 1953) who became the Federal Prime Minister. He too made plenty of pronouncements about white supremacy. ‘It has got to be recognized, once and for all, that when we talk of maintaining high standards in the federation… we mean white standards. People who have in their minds that we might abdicate in 10 or 15 years… ought to prepare themselves for a rude shock.’2 As opposition to Federation grew so Sir Roy and other whites put down their markers to make plain their determination to hold onto power at all costs. In 1956 Sir Roy said: ‘We Europeans have no intention of handing over the Federation to anyone, because we have no intention of getting out. We believe that the African should be given more say in the running of his country, as and when he shows his ability to contribute more to the general good, but we must make it clear that even when that day comes, in a hundred or two hundred years’ time, he can never hope to dominate the partnership.’3 The history of Rhodesia is the history of Anglo-Saxon racialism in Africa. Two factors operated throughout the colonial period: white control of African education in order to limit advance and white control and demarcation of the land. The open expression of these racial views was the prelude to inevitable repression, conflict and bloodshed. In the retrospect of a later ‘forgive and forget’ culture about imperialism it is important to recall the sheer demeaning contempt such attitudes conveyed. At the same time, the growth of African nationalism and the inexorable pressures it exerted lent a kind of desperation to such pronouncements, which, for all their arrogant certainty, reflected a growing sense of white unease at a less than secure future. ‘The white leaders of the Federation realized more clearly than any other Europeans in Africa, except the South Africans, that once the principle of African advancement is admitted there can be no halt in its progress to eventual majority rule.’4 And so, over these years, the groundwork was established that would form the background to UDI, and growing white extremism became the order of the day. Garfield Todd and Edgar Whitehead were the last two white leaders prepared to make any concessions to the African majority before the white extremists took control. ‘Todd was the last European political leader at all prepared to work with African political leaders; Whitehead was to disregard nationalist leaders and sponsor an African middle class of what he called “responsible” African leaders; the Rhodesian Front were to turn to the chiefs for support. From this time forward “partnership” was dead as far as politically conscious Africans were concerned. The steady flow of repressive legislation and the repeated banning of African Nationalist parties by the Whitehead government only served to emphasise that the races had parted ways.’5

  Southern Rhodesia had done very well out of the Federation since it had siphoned off the greater part of the wealth from Northern Rhodesia’s copper industry for the development of its own economy. ‘The Copperbelt was the milch cow and Northern Rhodesia suffered a net loss in the years 1953–63 of nearly £100 million – the bulk of which was used to develop Southern Rhodesia and the rest to prop up Nyasaland. As though this were not enough, when the £280 million Federal debt was divided up at the end of 1963, Northern Rhodesia was saddled with £96 million – for which it had relatively little to show in the way of assets; it was more than five times the territory’s national debt in 1953.’6 Further, despite Northern Rhodesia’s United National Independence Party leader Kenneth Kaunda’s protests when the Federation was broken up, almost all the military equipment went to Southern Rhodesia and so passed under white control. The end of the Federation on 31 December 1963 saw the three territories going their separate ways: Northern Rhodesia and Nyasaland would soon become Zambia and Malawi respectively on independence while Southern Rhodesia, whose white politicians were moving even further to the right than their already hard right position began to prepare for UDI. Both before and after the end of Federation Britain had ultimate responsibility for these three territories and at no stage can it be exonerated of blame for what happened. As Lord Malvern said in retirement in 1962: ‘No bill that had not been agreed with the British government ever saw the light of day in Southern Rhodesia.’ Both Kenneth Kaunda of Zambia and Hastings Banda of the Malawi Congress Party (MCP) had fought to end the Federation, which they saw as a device to perpetuate white control. Ian Smith had resigned from Sir Edgar Whitehead’s government in 1961 because the Constitution that Whitehead had worked out with the British Commonwealth Secretary Duncan Sandys allowed the possibility of ‘premature African dominance’. Smith proceeded, with other racial extremists, to found the Rhodesian Front. Once it had become clear that the whites in the Federation could not maintain control over Northern Rhodesia and Nyasaland without British help, British interests quickly turned to making their peace with the rising African leaders.

  From the beginning of 1964 events in Southern Rhodesia moved sharply into crisis gear. When he became Prime Minister in 1964 Smith said: ‘I cannot see in my lifetime that the Africans will be sufficiently mature and reasonable to take over… If we ever have an African majority in this country we will have failed in our policy, because our policy is one of trying to make a place for the white man.’ Clifford Dupont, another hard-liner, shortly followed with the terse statement: ‘We can and will halt the wind of change.’ On the African side, the Zimbabwe African People’s Union (ZAPU), the successor to the Rhodesian African National Congress, had been founded in 1961 by Joshua Nkomo; it was banned by the white majority government in 1964. It then set up headquarters in Dar es Salaam in Tanzania, later moving to Lusaka in Zambia. From 1964 to 1969, while Nkomo was detained, its external leader was James Chikerema. Like the other liberation movements, ZAPU had to turn to the Communists for support and at first ZAPU accepted aid from the People’s Republic of China but in 1965, after entering into an alliance with the African National Congress (ANC) of South Africa, it switched to the USSR. However, under Nkomo ZAPU was never sufficiently militant to satisfy its more radical members; this led to a split in 1963 (before it was banned in Rhodesia) when Ndabaningi Sithole left it to form the Zimbabwe African National Union (ZANU). In 1967 ZAPU launched its first guerrilla raids into Rhodesia from Zambia though these had only a limited impact. Faction fights between Ndebele and Shona members again split ZAPU at the end of the decade when Chikerema, a Shona, deserted ZAPU to form the Front for the Liberation of Zimbabwe (FROLIZI). ZANU was a more radical nationalist movement than ZAPU and early adopted a policy of guerrilla warfare against the white regime, especially after Ian Smith came to power in 1964. It was outlawed that year.

  MOVES TOWARDS UDI

  The British Labour Party came to power in October 1964 under the leadership of Harold Wilson. It was said at the time that the Rhodesia file was at the top of the urgent business awaiting the new Prime Minister’s attention. The Federation had been dissolved at midnight on 31 December 1963. Nyasaland became independent on 6 July 1964 as Malawi, and Northern Rhodesia followed on 24 October to become Zambia. In April 1964 Winston Field was ousted as Prime Minister of Rhodesia by his followers, because of his apparent unwillingness to carry out a UDI. He was replaced by Ian Smith and once he had taken over it was clear that Rhodesia was set upon the course that would lead to UDI in 1965. The Smith regime could not be accused of hiding its intentions either to follow the South African apartheid pattern or to break the Britis
h connection and seize independence illegally. By mid-February 1965, having taken the measure of Wilson, Smith became increasingly open as to his agenda. ‘If you persist in standing in the way of our just request,’ he wrote to Wilson, ‘I shall have no alternative but to take such steps as may be necessary…’7 In elections of 7 May 1965 Smith and the Rhodesian Front won all 50 of the A Roll seats to make his position impregnable on the political front. In Britain, as emotions on both sides of the debate ran high, the Duke of Edinburgh entered the debate when, in a speech at the University of Edinburgh, he said: ‘I think everybody recognizes that the ultimate result is inevitable. But I think a few years here or there do not matter if we can achieve this result peacefully and quietly.’8 As negotiations were carried on between the British government and the Rhodesians the British position was set forth in what came to be known as the Five (later Six) Principles: