Ex-Rhodesian leader dies

November 21, 2007

Ian Smith, the former leader of Rhodesia, dies in South Africa aged 88. Smith helped found the Rhodesian Front, and was notorious for his insistence that there was nothing wrong with millions of blacks being ruled by 200,000 whites. Born in the small Southern Rhodesian mining town of Selukwe on April 8, 1919, the son of a farmer, Ian Douglas Smith was educated locally and at Rhodes University in South Africa, where he gained a degree in commerce.