RHODESIA: One Step Closer to Black Rule

The danger is that the fighting may turn into all-out civil war

We 're trying to put things right, but the battle carries on. What a time, what a time it's been.

What a time, indeed. The current ballad by Rhodesian Singer Clem Tholet reflected the country's mood as Tholet's father-in-law, who happens to be Rhodesian Prime Minister Ian Smith, led his white countrymen one step closer to black majority rule. Last week, at Smith's urging, white Rhodesians went to the polls to approve by a wide margin a new constitution under which rule is to pass from the country's 240,000 whites to its 6.4 million blacks. The transition will take place after the whites, along with 2.8 million black voters, approve a new government in another election scheduled for April 20.

Smith, who had spent two weeks touring the embattled country, professed to be delighted that 85% of the 67,000 voters had supported his position in the referendum. "I had faith in the Rhodesian people to face up to the realities of life," he declared. "The result is even better than expected."

In truth, however, it had been a somber campaign. Smith's audiences no longer expected the speeches about preserving the "Rhodesian way of life" that had once characterized his campaign style. As he traveled through guerrilla-hit cities, towns and farming areas, his message was unadorned: "We have no other choice. This constitution is the best deal we can hope for. I'd rate our chances of success at a little more than 50%."

Every audience had felt the devastating effect of the last six years of active guerrilla war. At the Sports Club in the farming area of Centenary where Smith spoke, the man who should have been the chairman, Gert Muller, had died in a rocket attack on his farm on New Year's Day. One woman told Smith that she had lost five relatives within six months. She was supporting him in this election, not out of enthusiasm so much as out of a grim and grudging acceptance of the inevitable.

Some of the sharpest criticism of Smith's policies came in the cities and towns, where terrorism is increasing. In Salisbury the Prime Minister was heckled by a group of ex-servicemen still committed to the idea of a military solution. Some critics called the referendum a "mandate for disaster," and one young veteran taunted Smith with the words of another current song: "Will someone tell us why we fight?/ Why what once was wrong is now what's right?" Nobody tried to explain that, by fighting off political change for so many years, the Smith government had helped to bring Rhodesia to its present impasse.