The next major event took place two years later, in 1965, towards the end of my final year of high school. It rocked us almost as much, but I don’t suppose that it ricocheted around the world quite as fast as the news of the American assassination. Yet this event was vital, shocking, gut-wrenching for those few Whites who, like us, were opposed to an act of defiance which was to change our politics forever. On November 11th, 1965, a date no doubt chosen because of its significance as Armistice Day, Ian Smith, the right-wing Prime Minister of Southern Rhodesia, made a Unilateral Declaration of Independence (UDI), severing all links with Britain and immediately assuming control of the country. Ian Smith and his government, along with most of the 250,000 Whites living in Southern Rhodesia, were determined that the four million Blacks would not have similar rights to the Blacks in Northern Rhodesia, then newly independent and renamed Zambia. At the time, Britain had been negotiating with the Southern Rhodesian government, desperately trying to initiate progress for disenfranchised Africans, most of whom were then little more than servants to the ruling Whites.
This Unilateral Declaration of Independence affected our family more than most. I was 18, soon to write my final Advanced A-Level Examinations at school. My mother was working as a telephone operator in our local Salisbury telephone exchange, where she was soon to be promoted to a supervisor, proof that she was excellent at her job. At that time, the Salisbury exchange was multiracial, employing Whites, Coloureds, and even some Blacks. I knew all too well that my mother, aged 40, slim, pretty, lively, had always been very social. She got on well with others no matter their colour, race or creed. We soon discovered that this admirable quality would prove to be her downfall.
In the political climate of UDI, the government realized that my mother could, if she so chose, listen in on sensitive political and military phone calls. The fact that she would have considered such an action as a betrayal of trust did not count. The powers-that-be weren’t prepared to take a chance. She was known to be liberally minded. The government, anti-British and very right-wing, stepped in, demanding that her supervisor, far from promoting her, fired my mother there and then. This poor lady, a single woman of about 50 years of age, was appalled, but didn’t have much choice since failing to obey would mean she, too, would lose her job. So, within 24 hours of UDI, my mother was sent packing. Our family reeled from such a summary firing, based upon political motives.
I cannot adequately convey how quickly the government of Ian Smith introduced its new policies, destined to keep separate the Whites, Blacks and Coloureds, with the latter two races subservient to the first. The effect upon all of us was immediate and, although we didn’t know this at the time, our life was to become even more difficult. Not only did the world react to the illegal declaration by imposing sanctions on us, but also so much of the democracy under which we had been living began to change. The firing of my mother was but a first step on a long road towards fear and uncertainty. Being sacked had a profound effect on us, but on my mother most of all. I can remember her being in a state of shock, wandering round the flat, looking dazed, almost unable to talk, continually burping with nervous indigestion. I recall the endless murmurings of my parents talking late into the night. What could any of us do, though? Nothing. Ian Smith was in control of everything now, and what he and his minions decreed, was to be obeyed.
So, although my mother was soon hired by Shell, the petroleum company which had its headquarters in Shell House, Salisbury, the Declaration of Independence marked the start of our years of living under what amounted to a police state. We three children were told by our parents never to tell our friends at school that our family was more liberally minded than most of the Whites, and that we opposed this illegal Declaration of Independence. We were not to take part in any political discussions. We were to keep quiet and not say anything to make ourselves any different from the people around us. We adapted as best we could.
