William Michael Campbell (12 October 1932 – 8 April 2011) was a

white African White Africans of European ancestry refers to people in Africa who can trace full or partial ancestry to Europe. In 1989, there were an estimated 4.6 million white people with European ancestry on the African continent. Most are of Dutch, Portugu ...

farmer from the district of

Chegutu Chegutu (formerly Hartley) is a town in Mashonaland West Province, Zimbabwe. Location The town is located in Chegutu District, Mashonaland West, in central northern Zimbabwe. It lies in the Hartley Hills , southwest of the capital Harare at a ...

in Zimbabwe (formerly

Rhodesia Rhodesia (, ), officially from 1970 the Republic of Rhodesia, was an unrecognised state in Southern Africa from 1965 to 1979, equivalent in territory to modern Zimbabwe. Rhodesia was the ''de facto'' successor state to the British colony of S ...

). Together with his son-in-law

Ben Freeth Benjamin Freeth, MBE (born c. 1971) is a white Zimbabwean farmer and human rights activist from the district of Chegutu in Mashonaland West Province, Zimbabwe. Together with his father-in-law, Mike Campbell, he rose to international prominence af ...

, he rose to international prominence for suing the regime of

Robert Mugabe Robert Gabriel Mugabe (; ; 21 February 1924 – 6 September 2019) was a Zimbabwean revolutionary and politician who served as Prime Minister of Zimbabwe from 1980 to 1987 and then as President from 1987 to 2017. He served as Leader of the ...

of violating rule of law and

human rights in Zimbabwe There were widespread reports of systematic and escalating violations of human rights in Zimbabwe under the regime of Robert Mugabe and his party, ZANU-PF, between 1980 and 2017. According to human rights organisations such as Amnesty Internati ...

, in the case of '' Mike Campbell (Pvt) Ltd and Others v Republic of Zimbabwe''. His struggle was the subject of an award-winning documentary, ''

Mugabe and the White African ''Mugabe and the White African'' is a 2009 documentary film by Lucy Bailey & Andrew Thompson and produced by David Pearson & Elizabeth Morgan Hemlock. It has won many awards including the Grierson 2010 and been BAFTA and Emmy Nominated. The film ...

''.

Background

Campbell's family have been farmers in Africa since 1713, when an ancestor of his, a German-born sea captain, started farming in the present-day

Western Cape The Western Cape is a province of South Africa, situated on the south-western coast of the country. It is the fourth largest of the nine provinces with an area of , and the third most populous, with an estimated 7 million inhabitants in 2020 ...

. Campbell considered himself to be an African.

Mount Carmel

During the early 1970s, Campbell, a

SADF The South African Defence Force (SADF) (Afrikaans: ''Suid-Afrikaanse Weermag'') comprised the armed forces of South Africa from 1957 until 1994. Shortly before the state reconstituted itself as a republic in 1961, the former Union Defence F ...

captain, was involved in the

Rhodesian Bush War The Rhodesian Bush War, also called the Second as well as the Zimbabwe War of Liberation, was a civil conflict from July 1964 to December 1979 in the unrecognised country of Rhodesia (later Zimbabwe-Rhodesia). The conflict pitted three for ...

that pitted

's predominantly white government against communist-backed nationalist guerrillas. He moved to Mount Carmel farm in 1974. He added a neighbouring plot of land in 1980, following the end of the war and the country's reconstitution as black-ruled Zimbabwe. As well as farming, Campbell set up an extensive nature reserve on the property, replete with giraffes,

impala The impala or rooibok (''Aepyceros melampus'') is a medium-sized antelope found in eastern and southern Africa. The only extant member of the genus '' Aepyceros'' and tribe Aepycerotini, it was first described to European audiences by Germa ...

and other indigenous animals. He also created the Biri River Safari Lodge, which became a popular tourist attraction.Mike Campbell Obituary – ''The Telegraph''
/ref> The farm near Chegutu (named Hartley until 1982), located south-west of Harare, employed around 500 people and was a centre of agriculture, wildlife and tourism. Campbell was an early conservationist, concerned with maintaining the African wildlife. In 1999, 19 years after Zimbabwe's independence, the government declared that it had "no interest" in the Mount Carmel estate, and granted Campbell full ownership of the land. The following year, however, as

's land reform programme gathered pace, between 20 and 30 black men entered the estate, and refused to leave. Anxious that they might cut down trees on the estate to build homes, Campbell gave them a shed to sleep in. Over the following decade, invaders gradually took over Campbell's farm; they burned down the safari lodge and farmstead, and killed all the cattle and wildlife on the farm. Malaria then spread into the region and killed 11 workers, as well as Campbell's pregnant daughter-in-law. Hundreds of Campbell's workers lost their jobs. Campbell's farm manager and other workers were arrested and tortured by the police after they attempted to defend the farm. Campbell and his wife and son-in-law were also violently assaulted when they returned to their estate while their trial with the SADC was in process.

Death

Campbell died at his temporary home in

Harare Harare (; formerly Salisbury ) is the capital and most populous city of Zimbabwe. The city proper has an area of 940 km2 (371 mi2) and a population of 2.12 million in the 2012 census and an estimated 3.12 million in its metropolitan ...

on 8 April 2011. He is survived by his wife Angela, his children Bruce, Cathy and Laura, and 6 grandchildren. Campbell's family stated that he died from complications of the 2008 assault.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Campbell, Mike 1932 births 2011 deaths Zimbabwean people of British descent Zimbabwean farmers Zimbabwean human rights activists Zimbabwean torture victims Zimbabwean people of South African descent Zimbabwean people of Scottish descent Rhodesian farmers White Rhodesian people South African emigrants to Rhodesia Foreign volunteers in the Rhodesian Security Forces Rhodesian military personnel of the Bush War People from Mashonaland West Province People from Klerksdorp Zimbabwean people of German descent Zimbabwean people of Austrian descent Rhodesian people of British descent