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More than 5000 entries on the history, culture and life of Britain (published in 1993 by Macmillan, now out of print)
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Zimbabwe
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Republic and member of the *Commonwealth since 1980. This region of Africa, immediately to the north of South Africa, was developed from the early 1890s by Cecil *Rhodes and the British South Africa Company. It was known as Rhodesia from 1895. In 1922, when there were some 34,000 European settlers, a majority voted to become a self-governing British colony rather than the fifth province of independent South Africa. It was known by then as Southern Rhodesia, by contrast with the northern area (now *Zambia) which had been pioneered a little later by the same company. After the ten years in which Southern Rhodesia led the Federation of *Rhodesia and Nyasaland (1953–63), it alone of the three was unable to gain independence because it rejected the principle of majority rule (there were then about 220,000 Europeans and 3.8 million Africans).
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In 1965 the prime minister, Ian *Smith (b. 1919), made a unilateral declaration of independence (UDI). In spite of two series of talks between him and the British prime minister, Harold *Wilson, on warships off Gibraltar (the Tiger in 1966 and the Fearless in 1968), no solution was found; sanctions imposed by Britain and the UN remained in force. These, together with a prolonged guerrilla campaign inside Rhodesia, led to the concession of universal suffrage and the election in 1979 of the country's first black prime minister, Abel *Muzorewa (b. 1925). Talks in London later that year, involving for the first time the rebel leaders Joshua *Nkomo (b. 1917) and Robert *Mugabe (b. 1924), resulted at last in an agreed constitution. Mugabe became the prime minister of the newly independent Zimbabwe in 1980 and president in 1987.
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