Southern Rhodesia was a self-governing British colony that existed from 1923 to 1953, from 1963 to 1965, and from 1979 to 1980. On 12 September 1923, Southern Rhodesia was annexed from the British South Africa Company by the government of the United Kingdom, and Southern Rhodesia was ruled as a self-governing colony from Salisbury (Harare). In 1965, Southern Rhodesia unilaterally declared independence from the United Kingdom following a decade of being a part of the Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland, as the entrenched white elites were not willing to hand over power to the African majority of the nation. Discontent with minority rule led to the start of the Rhodesian Bush War, during which the ZANU and ZAPU guerrilla organizations waged war against the white minority government from the "bush" of Rhodesia. In 1979, after years of warfare and international pressure, the government agreed to be ruled by a British transitional government, and Southern Rhodesia gained full independence as "Zimbabwe" in 1980, ending almost 60 years of colonial rule.
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