While acknowledging the privileged position whites had under Smith, several commentators have latterly agreed with his claims that many black Zimbabweans preferred him to Mugabe with hindsight, albeit a very low bar. "Smith's image improved inversely as Mugabe's plummeted," Johnson wrote. "When he walked the streets of Harare, Africans would almost queue up to grasp his hand and wish him well." "If you were to go to Harare today 2007 and ask ordinary black Zimbabweans who they would rather have as their leader—Smith or Mugabe—the answer would be almost unanimous", Boynton asserted; "And it would not be Mugabe."