The relationship between Zimbabwe and the Commonwealth of Nations has been controversial and stormy. Zimbabwe is a former member of the Commonwealth, having withdrawn in 2003, and the issue of Zimbabwe has repeatedly taken centre stage in the association, both after Zimbabwe's independence and when it was a colony in the British Empire. Zimbabweans continue to be recognised as Commonwealth citizens in Britain.
Zimbabwe was the British colony of Southern Rhodesia, gaining responsible government in 1923. Southern Rhodesia became one of the most prosperous, and heavily settled, of Britain's African colonies, with a system of white minority rule. In 1953, Southern Rhodesia was integrated into the Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland. However, in response to demands for greater black African power in government, the anti-federation white nationalist Rhodesian Front (RF) was elected in 1962, leading to the collapse of federation.
The RF, under the leadership of Ian Smith from 1964, rejected the principle of NIBMAR that the Commonwealth demanded, and Southern Rhodesia – now styling itself 'Rhodesia' – issued a Unilateral Declaration of Independence (UDI) in 1965. The United Kingdom refused to recognise this, and the Commonwealth was at the forefront of rejecting the UDI, imposing sanctions on Rhodesia, ending the break-away, and bringing about Rhodesia's final independence under universal majority rule as Zimbabwe in 1980. However, differences of opinion on how to approach Rhodesia exposed structural and philosophical weaknesses that threatened to break-up the Commonwealth.
In later years, under the presidency of Robert Mugabe, Zimbabwe dominated Commonwealth affairs, creating acrimonious splits in the organisation. Zimbabwe was suspended in 2002 for breaching the Harare Declaration. In 2003, when the Commonwealth refused to lift the suspension, Zimbabwe withdrew from the Commonwealth. Since then, the Commonwealth has played a major part in trying to end the political impasse and return Zimbabwe to a state of normality.
Early history
Towards responsible government
Zimbabwe was formerly known as Southern Rhodesia from 1901, having been colonised by the British South Africa Company (BSAC), headed by Cecil Rhodes. Southern Rhodesia first became a central issue in the Commonwealth in 1910, upon the creation of the Union of South Africa. The South Africa Act 1909 made provisions for the accession of both Southern Rhodesia and Northern Rhodesia (present-day Zambia) to join the union. This was one of three popular options, but actively discouraged by the BSAC, which preferred union with Northern Rhodesia.Wood (2005), p. 8 This was actively pursued by the BSAC administration, under Leander Starr Jameson and Francis Chaplin, as a means of countering an Afrikaner-dominated South Africa.
In the election of March 1914, BSAC-supported candidates (as opposed to supporters of self-government) won twelve of the thirteen elected seats in the Legislative Council. However, when the charter came up for renewal in August of the same year, it was granted only on condition that further political rights were extended: pushing the territory towards self-government. Furthermore, in 1918, the Privy Council ruled that the BSAC did not own any unalienated land. Now being unable to sell land, it decided against investing any further in the colony, but advocated incorporation into the Union of South Africa, which would be able to compensate its shareholders.
This, however, was unpopular amongst settlers, who, in the 1920 election, elected ten representatives of the Responsible Government Association. Persuaded of its popular support, Colonial Secretary Viscount Milner formed a commission to investigate, and this commission, the Buxton Commission, ruled that the two options – union with South Africa and responsible government – be put to a referendum. Union was rejected by the Southern Rhodesian people, who voted in the 1922 referendum in favour responsible government, which was granted in 1923.
A status of its own
Southern Rhodesia had been granted a great deal of autonomy, including powers over defence and constitutional amendment,Wood (2005), p. 9 but falling short of Dominion status. However, observers would be forgiven for thinking that Rhodesia had just become the eighth dominion (as, indeed, reported Time magazine). Southern Rhodesian Premiers were routinely invited to Imperial Conferences of dominions' Prime Ministers from 1932 onwards; and, when the Dominions Office was created in 1925, Rhodesia was the only non-Dominion to fall under its remit, in recognition of its quasi-independent status.
Indeed, the government of Southern Rhodesia itself was under the same misapprehension. Its official position, which it would hold until UDI, was that Southern Rhodesia was already a member of the Commonwealth, albeit not a Dominion. When Robert Menzies, Prime Minister of Australia, found in 1963 that Jack Howman thought that Southern Rhodesia 'is and always has been a member of the Commonwealth', this caused a diplomatic spat that contributed to the Unilateral Declaration of Independence.
Nonetheless, Southern Rhodesia did recognise that it had limits on its self-government. For example, foreign relations were not maintained, nor could the government change the Southern Rhodesian pound from parity against the British pound sterling. The most important derogation was on racial affairs; laws related to racial affairs were to have Royal Assent withheld. However, despite these limits, and the formal supremacy of British statutes under the Colonial Laws Validity Act 1865, a convention emerged that Parliament would not legislate for Southern Rhodesia, nor the Governor withhold assent, without the Legislative Assembly's permission. The threat of intervention may have achieved some successes, such as when the Rhodesian government attempted to ban native Africans from voting outright in 1934, but these were few and far between.Louis et al. (1999), p. 552–3 The result is that, even though self-government had been tailored to avoid the creation of a system that subjugated the native population, it happened anyway: directly against the zeitgeist of the rest of the Empire at the time.
Bledisloe Commission
Discussions returned on the further integration of Southern Rhodesia with surrounding colonies. Plans to amalgamate with Northern Rhodesia had been rejected by the settler population in 1916 on the grounds that merger with its less developed neighbour would delay self-government. However, when the Hilton Young Commission recommended in 1929 an even wider union, encompassing both central and eastern Africa, a Rhodesian union became the lesser of two evils, and jumped upon.
In the face of this opposition to the recommendations of the Hilton Young Commission, in 1935, Viscount Bledisloe (newly departed Governor-General of New Zealand) was asked to evaluate the future of cooperation and combination of the colonies of central Africa.Louis et al. (1999), p. 270 The government required him to take into account the 'interests of the inhabitants, irrespective of race'. Taking four years to report, and acquiring the nickname 'Viscount Bloody-slow' for this, Bledisloe concluded that there was a single barrier to political integration: Southern Rhodesia's racist legislation. Under the doctrine of non-interference that had been established, this was seen as insurmountable, putting off any political integration, yet allowing for the economic integration that Bledisloe recommended as feasible.
Southern Rhodesia in the Second World War
Southern Rhodesia attempted to show its loyalty to, and independence of, the mother country by symbolically becoming the first colony to affirm the United Kingdom's declaration of war on Nazi Germany in 1939 (like other colonies, as well as Australia and New Zealand, which had not ratified the Statute of Westminster, it had no power to declare war itself). It is often reported that a greater proportion of the population of Southern Rhodesia served in the war than of any other part of the Empire. Even though this has become a part of nationalist folklore, this is to include only the White population (of whom, 15% served), and not the population as a whole (of whom, 2% served). Nonetheless, there developed a nationalist perception that the UK and its empire owed the Southern Rhodesians a debt: which continued right up until the late 1970s.
During the war, Southern Rhodesia benefited from the 'lucrativeness of loyalty', by hosting several bases of the British Commonwealth Air Training Plan. Even though there were no established training facilities before the war, shortly after outbreak, Prime Minister Godfrey Huggins offered to raise three air squadrons, initiating a dialogue that led to the United Kingdom offering a blank cheque to train as many pilots and air crew as Southern Rhodesia could manage. In total, 10,107 service personnel, including 7,730 pilots, were trained in Southern Rhodesia under the plan. The construction and operation of the bases (paid for mostly by the UK and Canada), as well as the location of thousands of service personnel in the colony, boosted the war-time economy of Southern Rhodesia dramatically. Higgins estimated that the training camps were as important to the war-time economy as the gold-mining industry.
Central African Federation
Deliberations
In 1945, a Central African Council was formed as a consultative body for the three British central African territories: Southern Rhodesia, Northern Rhodesia, and Nyasaland (present-day Malawi). This was the limit of the British wish for integration: fearful for the same reasons Bledisloe had been. However, the conversion in July 1948 of the Northern Rhodesian settler leadership, under Roy Welensky, to supporting federalism (from long-held support for amalgamation) promoted London to reconsider its position.
When Welensky held talks with the Southern Rhodesia leadership at Victoria Falls, he agreed a wide-ranging agreement that, far from loose federalism, seemed more a plot to amalgamate under white Rhodesian leadership. This would be a recurring theme, firstly in April 1950, as a vicious circle of patently unacceptable Rhodesian proposals were made and flatly refused: potentially alienating the promise of resolution, hence pushing white settlers towards South Africa.
The official visit of Gordon Walker to the region in early 1951 was the turning point for the United Kingdom. Startled by the strength of pro-South African support in Salisbury, Walker's report made it clear that, spurned, Southern Rhodesia could turn to outright revolt, as 'potential American colonies – very loyal, but very determined to have their own way'. This, it was feared, would lead to a cataclysmic war between settler-dominated south and east Africa and native-dominated west Africa: ripping apart the nascent Commonwealth. Coupled with the Baxter report from a conference of officials, the report to the cabinet stated unequivocally: "[federation is] urgently desirable in the interests of the territories (including those of the African inhabitants) and of the Commonwealth."
It has been suggested that the main impetus for the British fear of South African domination of central Africa was to avoid South Africa cornering the market in various raw materials: including gold, chrome, and uranium.
Forming a federation
The Federation would be 'the most controversial large-scale imperial exercise in constructive state-building ever undertaken by the British government'.
Towards independence?
Collapse
Rhodesia after UDI
Unilateral Declaration of Independence