Smith, Ian Douglas

Zimbabwean politician, founder of the Rhodesian Front in 1962 and prime minister 1964–79 during white rule. In 1965 he made a unilateral declaration of independence (UDI) for Rhodesia (as Zimbabwe was then known) and, despite UN economic sanctions and international isolation, maintained his regime with tenacity. The armed guerrilla movement to overthrow white rule gradually gained ascendancy in the 1970s and Smith was forced to accept in 1978 a political settlement in which the country's black majority was given democratic rights and would have a role in power-sharing.

In 1979 he was succeeded by Bishop Abel Muzorewa, who became the country's first black prime minister, and the country was renamed Zimbabwe. Smith was minister without portfolio in the new coalition government, but after the 1979 Lancaster House Agreement, new elections were held which brought Robert Mugabe's Zimbabwe African National Union–Patriotic Front (ZANU–PF) to power with a large majority. Smith became leader of the opposition in parliament as head of the whites-only Republican Front (RF), but its support fell. In 1986 the RF was replaced by the multi-racial Conservative Alliance of Zimbabwe which later merged into the Movement for Democratic Change, after Smith retired from active politics but remained a fierce critic of Mugabe.