A COUNTRY BETWEEN TWO FLAGS - Part 3
In 1932 the Government, lacking funds in the world depression, tried to chop expenses by cutting the salaries 0(, among others, Civil Servants. Mr. Huggins, whose constituency of Salisbury North was predominantly Civil Service, exploded.
To save the Rhodesian Party Government from defeat in the confidence vote (which would have meant a general election, and one was due the next year, anyway), he voted for his party, then crossed the floor the next day-and became Leader of the Reform Party Opposition.
It was the first step that was to take him to the office of Prime
Minister for 20 years, until on September 7, 1953, he became the First Prime Minister of the Federation. He retired on October 31, 1956, after setting a record for the longest continuous service of any Prime Minister in the history of the British Commonwealth. His nearest rivals had been William Pitt' and Mackenzie King of Canada.
A former politician.farmer, the late Luke Green, once asked: "What would have happened had Huggins not steered the country for 20 years? Coghlan died suddenly in 1927. H. U.
Moffat was a man of much integrity but a little mild as Premier of a young and vigorous country. He grew weary and he probably knew that he wasn't a popular Premier. When he resigned in 1933, his Minister of Mines, George Mitchell, became Prime Minister. for a few months before the general election.
"And this was Huggins's chance.
"He didn't' want to go into politics, but once he had been talked round he became a vigorous campaigner, and his Reform Party won with a small majority. After a spell of party dissensions Huggins combined his right wing elements with the Opposition Rhodesian Party to form the United Party-and he won the next election hands down.
"Huggins was the best man Rhodesia could have had in her developing stages. He made mistakes but he was man enough to admit them and to adjust his thinking to changing circumstances.
"Had we lost Huggins to a succession of Prime MInisters with differing outlooks, history might well have been changed."
(It was about this time that Luke Green said: "I broke my neck in a car crash before an election and I never returned to politics. It's a pastime I would recommend for some British politicians to-day")..
This is not the place for evaluation of the merits and demerits of Mr. G. M. Huggins (later Sir Godfrey and now Lord Malvern), as surgeon or Prime Minister, but he undoubtedly gave Rhodesia a shot in the arm and set a breezy example of confidence in the country which Inspired many
people. If his critics jeered, "Rhodesia' is run by Huggie and the omnipotent African nannies," at least it was run successfully.
The Depression which struck in 1929 and infected most of the world by the early 1930s did not bypass Rhodesia. Commerce and agriculture languished. Farmers went bust. White men worked on the. roads for five bob a day. The Rhodesians were beginning to think that their lot was only a little and that endless hardship was more than a bad joke.
On to ,the political stage strode a perky surgeon from Kent, Godfrey Martin Huggins, who had practiced medicine in Salisbury from 1911 and had then returned to England I for World War One, where he sharpened his skill in the hardest theatre of all -the theatre of war.
Non-stop surgery on the battlefields of France, after medical work in Malta and Gallipoli, meant quick decisions and even faster work. It was a training which shaped his outlook for the political years which were to "follow.
Back in Rhodesia, Huggins entered politics in the country's second general election since the grant of responsible government and became a vociferous back-bencher.
Top Right: Godfrey Martin Huggins as a young surgeon.
Bottom Right: The visit of King George and Queen Elizabeth in 1947
Left: British Opposition Leader Clement Attlee visits Northern Rhodesia in 1951.
