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Harvey Grenville Ward (1927 — 1995) was Director-General of the Rhodesian Broadcasting Corporation, gaining notoriety for his anti-communism and for his support for Ian Smith's government in Rhodesia and South Africa.
Ward was born in Southern Rhodesia to an English father and a German mother. His parents settled in Africa and were engaged in enterprises such as the financing of railroad construction and the building of numerous hotels. They owned and resided in the Victoria Falls Hotel. He chose a career in journalism, eventually becoming Director-General of the Rhodesian Broadcasting Corporation which, in effect, put him in charge of government propaganda. Ward is said to have removed references to black sporting achievements from sports programs carried on state television.Cite error: A <ref> tag is missing the closing </ref> (see the help page).
In 1982 he wrote an article entitled Zimbabwe Today for the Monday Club's journal, Monday World, prophetic in its content.
His wife died in 1986 and he moved to Great Britain. Three of his four children remained in South Africa.
At the October 1988 Conservative Party Conference, Western Goals (UK) held a fringe meeting on the subject of "International Terrorism - how the West can fight back". Harvey Ward, Sir Alfred Sherman, Rev Martin Smyth, MP, and Andrew Hunter, MP, were the speakers. The latter spoke concerning top-level links between the Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA) and African National Congress (ANC).
In 1989 Ward was working for James Gibb Stuart at Ossian Books Ltd. in Glasgow. He continued to travel and lecture, and joined the Conservative Party. He became an active member of the Foreign Affairs Committee of the Conservative Monday Club, and a member of the Western Goals Institute.
In 1991 Ward is claimed to have worked in conjunction with South African security policeman Paul Erasmus to secretly leak false accusations against Winnie Mandela and her daughters, accusing them of being nymphomaniacs and drug abusers. The reports were described as having come from dissidents in the African National Congress, and were issued in an effort to divide the ANC's leadership. They were subsequently taken up by papers such as The Independent, the Sunday Times and Vanity Fair. Erasmus later acknowledged profound regret for his actions in this and other matters, and affected a reconciliation with Mandela. He claimed Ward's role in the propaganda campaign during the late 1990s, but after Ward had died.
In the early 1990s Ward's fourth child, who had been in the British Police Service returned to live in South Africa and Ward followed, taking up residence in Port Elizabeth, where he later had a heart attack during a game of bowls, and died.
References
- Monday News, journal of the Conservative Monday Club, October 1982, vol.2, no.5, p.2
- Monday World, October 1982, vol.2, no.5, p.2 - 3.
- Young European Newsletter, December 1988 edition, published by Western Goals (UK), London.
- Irish Times, March 27, 1999
- Young European Newsletter, December 1988 edition, published by Western Goals (UK), London.
- Interview in Neosho Daily News Missouri, U.S.A.,19 July 1990.
- Ward, Harvey, Sanctions Buster, Glasgow, 1982. ISBN 0-85335-251-8.