Word: verwoerds
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Macmillan's plain talk must have startled South African Prime Minister Hendrik Verwoerd, who arrived home from London prepared to boast about, not apologize for, leaving the Commonwealth. Verwoerd found many of his countrymen confused and uneasy. The morning of Verwoerd's return, police made predawn raids on the homes of eight African leaders, hauling them from bed to jail; in Johannesburg white hoodlums began beating up Africans in front of the city hall...
Landing at Johannesburg, Verwoerd was greeted by a premature 21-gun salute. (Until May 31, when South Africa formally becomes a republic, Britain's Queen Elizabeth will still technically be South Africa's chief of state.) At the airport Verwoerd reassuringly told a crowd of 20,000 Afrikaners that what had occurred in London had actually been a South African "victory." Obviously relieved by Macmillan's assurances that Britain did not intend to end its preferential tariff agreements with South Africa despite the Commonwealth split, Verwoerd seemed to have changed overnight from a lifelong Anglophobe...
Prime Minister Hendrik Verwoerd's walkout from the Commonwealth sent a tremor through the Union of South Africa. Many of the English-speaking minority felt a sinking sensation as their last link with Britain was severed. Diamond Magnate Harry Oppenheimer called the news "appalling." Said Johannesburg's Englishlanguage Star: "A time of deep sadness for all South Africans except the Afrikaner extremist whose hostility to all things English was not appeased by the break with monarchy." The Cape Times said: "Now we are a lonely little republic at the foot of turbulent Africa...
World's Polecat. Nonwhites reacted delightedly to what they saw as a crushing Verwoerd defeat. On trains and buses carrying them from their "locations" to jobs in Johannesburg, Africans cried to each other. "Marvelous!" "Wonderful!" In house arrest at Groutville, 35 miles from Durban. Tribal Chieftain Albert Luthuli was "overjoyed" to know that "the Commonwealth stands for emancipation of all people everywhere, and especially in a former British colony." An exultant black told a rally, "South Africa has been publicly declared the polecat of the world...
...London, Verwoerd. made it clear that South Africa will remain in the sterling bloc,, and he was eager to work out bilateral agreements to retain his country's Commonwealth trade preferences. He was also ready to continue coordinating defense policies with Britain. His offer of cooperation was cordially received by Prime Minister Harold Macmillan, who rose in Parliament to say he hoped that, in years to come, "it will be possible for South Africa once more to play her part in the Commonwealth." At week's end English-speaking South Africans were feeling vastly reassured, and panicky Afrikaner...