Alec Smith - Life

Life

Alec grew up on the 21,500-acre (87 km2) family farm in Selukwe (now Shurugwi). Selukwe was a small mining and farming town with a population in the 1950s of around 8,500 (8,000 black and 500 white). In April 1964, when Alec was 14, his father became Prime Minister of Rhodesia. Alec later suggested that this had caused family life to suffer. In 1970 Alec started studying for a degree in law at Rhodes University in South Africa. On his own for the first time, Alec became increasingly alienated from his background and neglected his studies in favour of partying, drinking and drug taking. He first came to public attention at this time by applying for a British passport while declaring that he did not agree with his father's political views and considered himself to be British. He was expelled from university at the end of his first year in 1971. Subsequently, when returning from a vacation in Mozambique, the South African police found him in possession of a quantity of LSD and amphetamines. He was convicted of drug trafficking, fined and given a suspended prison sentence.

Returning to Rhodesia, Alec held a number of jobs. He also served compulsory periods of national service in the Rhodesian army. He was less than enthusiastic as a soldier and was never commissioned. Alec's lifestyle continued to be exuberant and this did not impress his conservative, church-going parents. However, at no time did they disown him.

In 1972 Smith became a born-again Christian. He claimed God freed him from drugs and alcohol and gave him a clear awareness of the injustice of white rule and discrimination against the majority black population. He became associated with the Moral Rearmament group, became a regular speaker at pro majority rule public meetings and befriended a number of black nationalist leaders.

In 1975, the Rhodesian government held talks with black nationalists at the Victoria Falls Conference. That conference failed to produce a solution to the country's political problems, and both parties prepared for war. The Bush War started, in earnest, in 1976. The government mobilised the white population while recruiting volunteers from overseas in order to build up its forces. Alec was called up, but declined to serve. He slipped out of Rhodesia and went into political exile in London. His half-brother Robert, similarly alienated from the politics of white Rhodesia, had been living in the UK since 1970. His father seemed to accept Alec's decision and the two remained in regular communication by letter and telephone.

While in London, Alec met Elisabeth Knudsen, a Norwegian student. The couple eventually married in Oslo, early in 1979. Alec invited his parents to attend the wedding and Ian Smith was most anxious to do so. However, the Norwegians would not have it. The rebel Prime Minister was refused entry to Norway - to Ian Smith's surprise and disgust. In his memoirs, Ian Smith records considerable bitterness over the refusal of the international community to recognise his government, and the Norway incident appears to have been 'the final straw'. The white minority government collapsed and a British governor took control of Rhodesia in December 1979. The Bush War ended a few days later and measures to demobilise the nationalist guerrilla forces were started. At that point, Alec Smith and his new wife returned to Rhodesia.

Alec was ostracised by some elements in the white population who viewed him as a traitor, and some blacks would not accept him because of his family connections. However, Alec and Elisabeth settled into a comfortable family life. Reconciliation between Alec and his father was almost immediate. During the 1980s and early 1990s, Alec held a number of jobs including, from 1991 to 1996, managing director of a professional football team (the Black Aces). Although not an ordained priest, he became a chaplain in the Zimbabwe army reserve. Alec and Elisabeth produced three children - two daughters and one son. Ian Smith's family role as a grandfather offered him some solace after the death of his wife Janet (from cancer) in 1994.

Alec later became his father's business partner. In this capacity he assisted in the editing of his father's memoirs and took over the running of the family's agricultural interests including the estate at Shurugwi. In 1984 he wrote a semi-autobiographical account of the struggle for majority rule in Rhodesia titled "Now I Call Him Brother". It was claimed that the book was ghost-written for Alec by the professional writer Rebecca de Saintonge. The book was not rated highly in literary terms and included the following comments on President Robert Mugabe (p124) : "Mr Mugabe's Independence speech should have roused every Christian heart in the land. The whole tone of his talk was so Christian in content that every believer's heart should have been warmed by the thought that he was talking our language."