May, 1956 FIGHTING TALK Page Thirteen FAITH OF A PARTISAN " IM PA RT IA LIT Y is either a delu- from amongst the White supremacists of allies, some of the members of the sion of the simple minded, a all parties, where better documented, Congress movement. “He is defeatist,” banner of the opportunist, or a boast more scholarly but less pertinent they say of Huddleston’s conclusion of the dishonest.” treatises have slid by unnoticed. “He that he sees little immediate hope for Professor Gaetano Salvemini. does not tell his readers or his audi­ the salvation of South Africa except ences what has been done, and is by pressure exerted from abroad. “He 'TREVOR HUDDLESTON is a man being done for the Bantu in the way underestimates the potentiality of the of many gifts. But none so impres­ of education, social and medical ser­ Congresses,” they say. Perhaps so. But sive as his ability to slice through vices and agricultural training,” Huddleston is not a politician; he is a unessentials, to brush away side issues, accuses Eric Louw in a public out­ priest who is not afraid to pursue truth and come directly to grips with the burst. But this is precisely the point of into the political meeting-houses. heart of a problem. It is this gift which Father Huddleston’s message to South Others — politicians — have writ­ he has used with such devastating Africa. “What I shall try to avoid,” ten and will write more profound effect in “Naught for your Comfort,” he writes in his opening chapter, “is analyses of the trends and perspectives the book which has set South Africa that most common and persistent error for political struggles of South Africa. talking about itself and its future as ■— the attempt to be impartial. By Politicians will write the treatises that never before. There IS a central core this I mean that I shall write this will rear a generation of great political to the problem of this country’s book as a partisan ” And then again: campaigners against race-discrimination future; unlike so many other well- “It is always possible, I suppose, even and apartheid. But Huddleston and meaning writers about our country and in the most vicious enactments of the “Naught for Your Comfort” will do its people, Father Huddleston puts his most vicious governments to see ele­ more to batter down the ingrained finger—better, his two fists—squarely ments of potential good. But Wilber- layers of prejudice amongst the White on that core: citizenship! “As a force would never have succeeded in citizens of this country, to shake them Christian, I cannot believe either in abolishing slavery if he had listened out of the dead unthinking accept­ the right or the possibility of a to the arguments of kind-hearted but ance of apartheid and injustice, than Government (particularly when that wrong-headed slave-owners.” Father any political treatise yet written. Government is a minority group in its Huddleston is not interested in an “Between the Christian view and that own country) directing and planning impartial, scholarly weighing up of of the totalitarian — racialist — the destiny of a whole people and the good and the bad of South Africa. nationalist, there is an unbridgeable enforcing a pattern of life upon them He is engaged in a campaign against gulf,” he writes. There is. And no for all their years.” This is the heart slavery; there is in him neither the one will read his book and fail to be and core of the Huddleston attack on opportunism, the dishonesty nor the aware of it. It is written not for the laws and customs of South Africa, simple-mindedness to raise in his own the politicians, but for the ordinary, just as it is the heart of the Freedom defence the banner of “impartiality.” decent citizen, who up to now, has Charter— “The People Shall Govern.” His book is the testimony of a partisan stood by while “politics” has built the It is not to be wondered at that this who has taken sides. police state. It is a powerful plea for book has drawn such fire and outcry And in sparing no punches, them to act; it is a call to battle, written Father Huddleston has understandably with all the power and faith of a aroused the ire and condemnation of man whose name has become a house­ (Continued from previous page) the most pig-headed and self-righteous hold word in the good fight for the the police have ‘interfered with even of the White supremacists. rights of men. the peoples’ social activities. The But it must be said that his book “Naught for Your Comfort,” by decree had not been thirty days old has also disappointed some of those Trevor Huddleston. (Published by when the police in their hunting ex­ who are his stoutest protagonists and Collins, 15/-.) L. Bernstein. peditions for illegal meetings and processions shot Nangoza Jebe dead and wounded several others. This unfortunate incident gave the people an opportunity to demonstrate on the EXPLOSIVE EPISODE one hand their disgust at the fascist horror, and on the other their deter­ 'VTEVER was the sobering lack of Harry Bloom tells it well. His mination to march relentlessly forward real writing talent more apparent Episode breaks through the spider’s to freedom. As over 30,000 men and than in recent years when South Africa web of mediocrity like a well-aimed women, old and young, marched slowly hit the literary limelight; when good, punch. Admirably, he has managed ,nd silently behind the tricolour ban- earnest people were sending carefully- to concentrate the whole complex '?r of the Congress at half mast, for folded manuscripts to overseas publish­ machine of South African race politics time one forgot about the young ing houses in an effort to extract the into half-a-dozen streets of a Native Volunteer who lay mute in a coffin most saleable picture from a country Location in a little Transvaal dorp draped in Congress colours. The brimming over with dramatic situa­ he calls Nelspoort. All the national mood of the people was not sorrow­ tions. Our modern novelist has still ingredients we know so well — apart­ ful, but reflected a studied determina­ to learn that for his novel to be good, heid, oppression, political double-talk, tion to carry on Nangoza’s fight so he not only has to tell the truth — hatred, resistance and the fear that that ‘The People Shall Govern.” he has to tell it well. turns men into beasts — all these are Page Fourteen FIGHTING TALK Mayt 1956 reflected in their correct proportions by the characters who inhabit the story. LETTERS from READERS Ther are’ many such characters. The European administrators, the municipal intriguers, the police, the location lackeys, Three readers answer Patrick Duncan’s article (Fighting Talk, April the “good-boys,” the Congress people, the ordinary people, all play their parts in the issue) which argued that the Liberal Party was the only organi­ episode, the race riot, either actively or sation which has: (1) made no concession to the colour-bar; (2) passively. Mr. Bloom, who is no stranger to these situations, avoids the double-dyed not “ aligned itself with the Russians and Chinese in the Cotd War; villain and the cardboard revolutionary. (3) “ no desire or plan to get control of the A.N.C.; and (4) is D u Toit, the sensitive superintendent, Ngubeni, the “good-boy,” Nkomo, the “absolutely opposed to discrimination of any kind.” fearless schoolteacher, Swanepoel, the police officer, Sarah, the shebeen queen, and, above all, Andries Gwebu, the inter­ preter, with his poker face and educated Sir, malice, are all robust characters whose are supposed to have on some Con­ existence is undeniable. The last-named, Patrick Duncan displays confusion gress men. But if this influence is a incidentally, provides the book’s only of thought. He criticises Congress for fact, why should not Africans learn humour, the dearth of which I found an siding against America. Surely it is unfortunate and unnecessary shortcoming. from White socialists as from White natural for Africans to look with admi­ liberals? Surely Mr. Duncan does not The role of Walter Mabaso, the central ration to Russia and China where racial character, is less satisfactory. He has un­ want to keep educated Africans apart doubted qualities of leadership and moments equality is complete in practice as well from anyone they choose to consult. of real greatness, but as the instrument for as in theory. Is it merely “anti-Ameri­ Really, Mr. Duncan should think linking the Location riots with the nation­ can” to support China’s claim to a twice before starting a red witch­ wide defiance campaign he is ineffectual seat in UN? Is it anti-American to and rather pathetic. In the subsequent hunt. This is a dangerous game for violence, he is merely a helpless spectator demand that Portugal leave Goa, or Liberals to play. Our common enemy, and his end at the hands of the police must we agree with Mr. Dulles that the Nationalists, do not distinguish is somewhat theatrical. Goa is “a Province of Portugal” ? liberals from socialists or even from At the other end of the dramatic scale, The weakness of the Liberal Party militant Christians When the Liberal Du Toit is a curious mixture of hard­ lies in its complete failure to make Party was formed certain Nationalist hearted officialdom and a highly-developed, almost naive set of scruples. It is pre­ any effort to formulate a policy on M.P.s believed that it was only the cisely these contradictions that make him world affairs. Once it attempts the former Communist Party in disguise! a living, feeling man and not just a task, Mr. Duncan and his new friends In his present mood, Mr. Duncan symbol. will have to tell us where they stand stands on the edge of a slippery slope. But it is in his description of the riot on a variety of issues which they now Those of us who respect him because that Mr. Bloom excels. The reader is prefer to avoid. he went to prison (after breaking the transported to this place of destruction and given a ring-side seat. Here the electric Mr. Duncan really has no right to law in the good company of Con­ atmosphere hangs like a pall over the say that the ANC has “ceased to be gress), hope that he will yet turn out Location inhabitants until it finally breaks a body of Africans led by Africans.” to be a true liberal and not a fellow- into a frenzied eruption of murder, arson, What he really means is that he, in traveller of Mr. Swart’s. rape. The indiscriminate shooting by the fear-crazy police and the vengeful retalia­ common with most liberals, resents the Yours faithfully, tion which it brought forth from the tsotsi influence which some White socialists “Socialist.” gangs is a piece of descriptive writing which I shall not easily forget. In the final chapter D u Toit decides he has had enough, and prepares to go. If that were all the riots achieved, they Sir, original copy of the Communist party would have been meaningless, and mob Mr. Duncan’s letter illustrates how report, but from the place where I outbursts, although senseless, are never much easier it is to jump to con­ found it — in the report of the Select meaningless. They are motivated by some­ clusions than to prove them. In fact, Committee which deprived Brian thing considerably more than lust or ven­ geance and their consequences are usually he . scarcely takes the trouble to Bunting of his seat in Parliament. Such more far-reaching than the participants attempt any proof. He bases his con­ documents can scarcely be taken as realise. Here we find Du Toit reverting clusions on a quotation of alleged authoritative on the subject of com­ from an individual to a symbol -— a symbol Communist aims, which has been torn munism, as anyone who has troubled of White supremacy at its most jittery; at its least supreme. from its context, and carefully shorn to read them will know. But in quot­ of everything that does not bolster ing from even this dubious source, Mr. Episode is much more than an epi­ sode. The tale it tells is part of a pattern his case. From this he decides that the Duncan omits the sentences which with which we are all familiar, but which character of the African National follow directly on the one he has we seldom bother our heads about. That Congress has been magically adapted chosen; namely: is, until something like this novel comes to fit the quotation. And then — “Such a party would be dis­ along and we receive a nasty jolt. There can be no question but that everybody ‘presto’ — the ANC has ceased to tinguished from the Communist who reads this book will react to it, either be a body of Africans controlled by Party in that its objective is nation sympathetically or with hostility. Harry Africans. The act is as neat as any liberation, i.e., the abolition of ra Bloom richly deserves the praise which has magician’s pulling of rabbits from a discrimination . . . In this part greeted his work, and I have no hesi­ tation in endorsing it. hat. And just as deceiving. the class-conscious workers and JP. I cannot vouch for the validity of peasants of the national group EPISODE, by Harry Bloom. (Published the quotation. I imagine that Mr. concerned would constitute the main by Collins.) Price 13s. 6d. Duncan has taken it not from an leadership.” (My emphasis.) June, 1956 FIGHTING TALK Page Thrt*

TREASON! By HILDA WATTS T DREAMED we were on trial, my friends and I. E judges banged their gavels on the bench. “State The Court was a special one. Two black-robed the evidence!” they cried. judges presided on a bench high above us at one end The Prosecutor fumbled through his papers. “In the of the room. We could not see their faces. The Prose­ year 1950,” he said, “the Minister for Justice, Mr. C. cutor, tall and thin, was also robed in black. In his hands R. Swart, told the House of Assembly about a secret he held a sheaf of papers, and from these he read :— organisation among Natives, led by Communists. He did “The charge,” he declared in a sepulchral voice, “is so with trepidation, because he did not want to cause that the defendants did organise opposition to the law­ panic, but the Government had been accused of over­ ful government and its policies; that they did oppose estimating Communist acts. beneficial laws enacted in the interests of the people, “That organisation,” declared the Minister, “was such as the Western Areas Removal Scheme and the preparing a great coup on a date to be named. The Bantu Education Act; that they tried to arouse other members were trained and distributed and placed in all people in opposition to these laws; that they sought to the most important departments of public life. On the discredit the benign and well-loved principles of apart­ given date, when the secret sign was given, one would be heid; that they did organise, or support, or signify their ordered to poison the water supplies. Another would cut approval of a gathering known as the Congress of the off power and light at the power station. Others had been People, at which a document known as the ‘Freedom trained to murder people whom they wanted out of Charter’ was adopted, containing these words: THE the way.” PEOPLE SHALL GOVERN.” The Counsel for the Defence leapt to his feet: “Your The voice continued for a long time, listing similar Worships!” he cried, “I maintain that is not proper charges; finally he paused, and turned towards us, point­ evidence! In the six years that followed, there were no ing a trembling finger. arrests. Yet the coup did not take place; water supplies “The charge, therefore,” he thundered, “is remained unpoisoned and power and light undisturbed. TREASON!” There were no political murders, in spite of great pro­ vocation; and the unspoken deeds, the very mention of FROM THE SIDE LINES ( Continued ) which would cause a strong nation to panic, did not take partition China but were hampered by their own differ­ place!” ences. This gave the Chinese national movement an op­ The Prosecutor smiled. “It is not in the public portunity for early progress. From the beginning the interest to reveal the source of the information given Chinese revolution developed along the lines of an armed by the Minister for Justice,” he said, “but since this struggle in which an armed revolution was confronted statement was made in Parliament by the Minister him­ with armed counter-revolution. Unlike India, there was self, it must stand.” apparently nothing like a middle class exercising effective “Proceed,” said the judges. political influence. The main result of the British impact “Two years later,” went on the Prosecutor, “it was on India was the emergence of a strong middle class necessary to bring heavy concentrations of police to Cape which has remained a considerable factor to the present Town from the Witwatersrand and other centres. When day. members of Parliament asked questions in the House, None the less, Mr. Dutt, tracing the course of recent the Minister for Justice, Mr. C. R. Swart, declared : events, is able to show that India’s foreign policy has ‘Take my word for it that, according to information and been driven to abandon its reliance on the West, which advice from the best sources I have, it was necessary was still visible when the Korean war started in 1950. to take this step, to bring a number of policemen here. This process will continue as India finds that Russia and What the information and the circumstances are I am China can offer her genuine help without the strings not prepared to say in public. I ask you to accept that that America and Britain always attach to their offers. assurance from me. I have been asked why the police E treatment of Natives in South Africa fills one are armed. I will not tell you. It is for reasons I think with shame and horror. I hope the day will good. I will follow my own sense and will not be chased speedily come when your race will be able to defend .... I did it only for public security.’ ” itself against the barbarities being “But nothing happened—nothing was ever revealed!” W H O WROTE perpetrated against it by hypocri- declared our lawyer. THIS? tical men who regard the black “The Minister did not think it was in the public man as having been created in interest to reveal what might have happened,” said the order that they might exploit him for their own advant­ Prosecutor, with a smirk. age. The press and politicians for the most part keep “Proceed!” cried the judges. the people of this country in ignorance of the real treat­ “Early in 1954,” went on the Prosecutor, “there ment meted out to the Natives, and not until they, the were serious veld fires on an unprecedented scale through­ Natives, are in a position to hold their own can they out Natal. At that time, the Minister for Justice, Mr. C. expect to be treated as human beings.” R. Swart, declared: ‘The possibility could not be excluded I bet that you will never guess who wrote this and that the present series of veld fires and other fires in the when. I came across the passage in a letter written just Union were related to the threats of arson received since 50 years ago by Keir Hardie, the British Labour leader, the beginning of the year from the Cheesa-Cheesa. I to Mr. Bankole Bright. I don’t know who this African, have ordered the police to investigate whether the fires Mr. Bright was. The letter appeared in the Central could have been caused by an organised group. I have African Times on August 25, 1906. received numerous letters from many parts of the country Page Four FIGHTING TALK June, 1956

in which mention is made of arson towards the Euro­ as armed police surrounded the Congress of the People. peans.’ ” While constables with fixed rifles cordoned off the con­ Our lawyer intervened. “I protest!” he said. “Later ference, Special Branch men searched every delegate on the police themselves declared that the fires had been until late into the darkness, in their investigation of a caused accidentally by unusual winds, that sent seasonal charge of treason. veld fires blazing up into serious proportions. As for the “Three months later the police were forced to raid Chesa-Cheesa, that mysterious organisation of strange hundreds of homes and offices throughout the Union origin faded away with the poisoned water supplies.” continuing their investigations into treason, and in the The Prosecutor seemed to give a laugh. “It is my course of the raid seized documents, magazines, papers duty to lay before you the evidence put in my hands and books, some of which will be produced here in by the Minister for Justice,” he said, “and the Minister Court.” says it is not in the public interest to give further in­ He waved a paper in his hand. “Here is a copy formation on this subject.” of the document known as ‘ The Freedom Charter,’ ” “Proceed!” shouted the judges. he declared. “Copies were found in the homes of the The Prosecutor continued: “Later in the same year, accused. The document proclaims that all shall be equal in June 1954, over 100 police armed with automatic before the law, and other treasonable things. weapons were forced to break into a mass anti-apartheid “This is a magazine known as ‘ Fighting Talk’,” conference in Johannesburg, and the 1,200 delegates pre­ he went on, “and here is one called ‘ Liberation.’ Both sent rose and sang ‘Nkosi Sikelele Afrika.’ The Chief these seditious papers, in addition to the weekly paper of the Special Branch of the C.I.D., Lt.-Col. W. C. E. known as ‘ New Age,’ openly spoke of opposition to the Prinsloo, said investigations into an allegation of high present government, opposed the Bantu Education Act, treason were the reason for the presence of the police.” and spoke of our beloved Ministers with scorn and dis­ Without pausing, he went on hurriedly : “Then in respect. February 1955, the government was forced to send 2,000 “Here is a sheet of signatures taken from a table in police armed with sten-guns to supervise the first re­ a street in Hillbrow. Some of the accused were collecting movals from the Western Areas to Meadowlands. The these signatures for the Freedom Charter. reason for the police was given by Mr. C. R. Swart, the “Many of the accused were interested in art and Minister for Justice. He stated that the police had in­ music, and some even had many musical recordings in formation that volunteers of the African National their homes, including records of such people as the Congress would use the following methods to prevent Negro singer Paul Robeson. We discovered these facts the removals : attacks with firearms; explosives in old about the accused by constant police raids, by armed motor tyres which would be rolled towards the police; interference at their meetings, by phone-tapping and in­ old cars loaded with explosives which would be crashed terference with their correspondence, by taking car num­ into police cars or lorries to be used for removal; holding bers and visiting individuals to persuade them not to of demonstrations in adjacent areas to divert the attention associate with the accused, and by similar means. of the police; and holding meetings in the Western Areas ‘The charge is therefore clear!” he cried, and as he themselves to persuade people not to move. turned towards us once again his features seemed to merge “They were going to use mass pickets to try to pre­ with the bony countenance of C. R. Swart. “The accused vent the movement of lorries; they would attack neigh­ are here because they believe in equal rights for all bouring European areas; they would attack municipal people, because they have faith in human dignity; be­ vehicles; and would blockade the new areas in Meadow­ cause they do not recognise colour barriers; because they lands with pickets. want equal justice for people of all races in South Africa; “It was known that tsotsis were in possession of fire­ because they want to give our rich farming lands to the arms; natives were in possession of machine-guns, pistols, African people; because they think Non-White people home-made “pipe-guns,” hand-grenades and dynamite should be allowed to vote!” His voice was a shriek. “They bombs, and were being urged by agitators violently to are here because they conspired for the purpose of— ” resist removal from their homes. Also it had been estab­ Just for a moment, I thought he screamed at us lished that it was the intention to set fire to certain TREASON! But then I realised the word was not Indian shops and other buildings.” TREASON but FREEDOM! “They are charged with Our lawyer was frantically waving his arms at the believing in FREEDOM !” he cried once more. judges. “Your worships,” he cried, “none of these things “You said the charge was to be TREASON,” took place. There were no weapons, no disorders, no shouted our lawyer above the noisr;. motor tyres with explosives, no attacks on European or “It’s the same thing!” cried the Prosecutor. “In this other areas . . . who supplied the information to the country it is treason to advocate freedom!” ★ ★ ★ Minister? Where is the evidence?” Once more the Prosecutor laughed. “The informa­ "DANDEM ONIUM broke out in the Court. The Pro­ tion was supplied to the Minister by the police, and the secutor and the two judges all seemed to merge into police obtained it from their informers. Naturally, it one, and this one person became the Minister for Justice, is not in the public interest for the police to reveal the Mr. C. R. Swart. “ Treason!” he screamed through dis­ identity of their informers, nor are they prepared at this torted lips, pointing his trembling hand at us. And stage of the investigation to produce any material evi­ '' Freedom! Freedom!” we cried, until the cry grew dence. But for the protection of the public, we must louder, was taken up by hundreds, and thousands, and accept the Minister’s statement.” millions outside the Court, and echoed round and round “Proceed!” yelled the judges. our land with strength, and passion, and triumph. “Only a few months later,” went on the Prosecutor, All the statements in this article attributed to Mr. C. “three thousand agitators from all over South Africa R. Swart are direct quotations from newspaper or rose to their feet once more to sing ‘Nkosi Sikelele Afrika’ Hansard reports of his speeches. June, 1956 FIGHTING TALK Page Thirteen How is the Empire ?

TOHN HATCH was the British ably on Britain and particularly the European people in a long-term fight ** Labour Party’s special envoy in a British labour movement . . . We hold for genuine democracy.” seven-week tour of ten African count­ in our hands the lives of 60 million But it is genuine democracy itself ries and in “New from Africa” (pub­ people . . . It is nothing less than which is absent from all Hatch’s solu­ lished this year) he tells with naive British honour which lies at stake.” tions for the rest of Africa. He finds pride of a speech he made to 15,000 (p. 18.) indirect rule outdated, so the Protec­ in Dar-es-Salaam. “I told them . . . Neither Honour nor Labour prin­ torates should be transferred to the how the British labour movement had ciples counted for much when the Colonial Office, but of independence grown out of the poverty and struggles British Labour Party steered colonial or self-government, never a word. For of the British working class . . . I told policy; and the truth is that if there other African countries the solution is them of the feelings of the British is any distinction between Tory and “multi-racialism” (vague enough to labour movement . . . about the con­ Labour goals for the colonies is has mean anything), but never equal ditions and aspirations of the peoples been difficult enough to discern. rights. But it is this book’s final for­ in the colonies. I assured them that Hatch’s longest chapter “When Black mula which takes the prize. Writing we recognise the great debt which Chief Marries White Girl” deals with of the Gold Coast, Hatch looks to British people owe to colonial subjects the Bamangwato crisis and the un­ these people to prove themselves who have contributed so much to our animous demand from all (including worthy leaders of “colonial demo­ standard of life . . (my startled Tshekedi, says Hatch) for the return cracy”. This is indeed a new animal italics!). King George whose last of Seretse. Yet nowhere is it mentioned for Africa! The effort to hold on to death-bed murmur is rumoured to that it was the Labour Party govern­ the colonies without appearing to do have been: “How is the Empire?” ment which tricked Seretse into exile so has inevitably produced new me­ could not have shown more concern in what Churchill termed that thods and a new vocabulary but im­ for and gratitude to his colonial sub­ “disreputable transaction.” perialism remains imperialism even jects. The chapter on Kenya could almost when steered by Labour, and even These 123 very topical pages, with have been written by any of the when colonial exploitation is acknow­ footnotes to some chapters that bring government information officers Hatch ledged and receipted with touching them ever more breathlessly up to met. gratitude. date, are offered as a primer on the Hatch’s best chapter deals with R F colonies for Labour party members South Africa and he offers our Labour “ NEW FROM AFRICA,” by John who are- reminded more than once Party sound advice to “look to the Hatch. Published by Dennis Dob­ that “African eyes are turned inexor- future and play its part with the Non- son. Price 12/6.

his trouble he was declared a “pro­ hibited immigrant” and arrested for deportation. But Evans is not one to let go Law ancf Disorder easily. He fought the deportation order from inside a Kenya gaol, making of himself a very painful IT is not difficult to understand why Evans sat in on the case, summing thorn in the flesh of the Kenya the Kenya Government should go up the prosecution, the magistrate and Government. Force finally triumphed to great lengths—legal, semi-legal and the accused in the cold light of many over law. But Evans gets the last word plain illegal—to deport Peter Evans. years of legal experience at the British in his book, in which he flays the For this mild-sounding man has a Bar. He describes it more intelligibly Kenya and the British Governments powerful knack of firing deadly and interestingly than did Montagu for their “ Law and Disorder.” pointed barbs with an air of great Slater (The Trial of Jomo Kenyatta) His allegations are those of an eye­ innocence. His book “Law and Dis­ though in less detail; and he does witness, and one with an unusually order” abounds with them, starting on what Slater failed to do. He passes keen eye and an extremely sharp the dust-jacket which innocently sub­ personal judgement on the character tongue. Typical of Evans feelings and titles his book “ Scenes of Life in of the case, and on the verdict given. judgement on “Life in Kenya” is the Kenya.” Don’t let it mislead. From spectator, Evans turns to in­ dedication of his book to the former For this is something more than it vestigator in his own right. Disturbed Colonial Secretary. Oliver Lyttleton. sounds. Peter Evans dissects the body by repeated tales of outright brutality Underneath the dedication, there is social of Kenya with the fine judicial and murder done by the so-called solemnly quoted Mark Twain’s epi­ perception and the dry wit which is “security forces” — especially those gram on Rhodes : “ I admire him, I the best tradition of the British bar­ drawn from the ranks of the settlers frankly confess it; and when his time risters-at-law. The time chosen is the themselves — Evans decided to check. comes I shall keep a piece of the period of the rise of the Mau-Mau. His investigation produced evidence rope for a keepsake.” Evans, who had lived in Kenya that African prisoners taken for L.B. twenty years before, returned for a “questioning” had been cold-blood­ “ Law and Disorder,” by Peter Evans. visit at the right time. Kenyatta and edly done to death He laid the evid­ Published by Seeker & Warburg. others were charged and on trial. ence carefully before the police. For Price 18/-. Page Fourteen FIGHTING TALK June, 1956

Mr. Thompson shows too that William Morris Morris was not a special brand of j* “British socialist” but that he stood T X ) MOST OF US the name of written a whole book to show that firmly within the Marxist tradition William Morris evokes a mental Morris was not really a socialist at from which the present generation of picture of the Victorian artist and all, but a sort of Roosevelt New- Labour leaders has strayed. Yet Wil­ poet in revolt against the ugliness of dealer. liam Morris, by his very nature, was the commercial age; the creative genius Such distortions of the truth about the implacable eremy of any sort of who came out of the studio into the William Morris have been dealt a doctrinaire dogmatism. Everything he workshop and designed and made death-blow by the recent publication touched was filled with the original beautiful things — furniture, wall­ of E. P. Thompson’s brilliant study stamp of his own leonine personality; papers, typefaces — for everyday use. “William Morris—Romantic to Revo­ his very mistakes (and as Mr. Thomp­ Now Morris was all of these, but over lutionary,” published by Lawrence and son shows they were not a few) bore and above that he was a great pioneer Wishart. Here for the first time we the stamp of his noble generosity and of the Socialist movement in Britain. may read the full story of Morris’s his revolutionary ardour. A deliberate attempt has been made contribution to the British labour This is a fine book. I advise you to cover up this side of Morris’s life, movement. And Mr. Thompson proves to get hold of it and read it. And and to present it in a false light. The beyond a shadow of doubt that Morris then read (or re-read) Morris’s “News leaders of the British Labour Party, was no dilettante sympathiser on the from Nowhere,” Morris’s fine story of for example, sometimes claim to be fringes of the movement, but a full the socialist Britain of the future, and followers of a special brand of and active participant and leader; a still, in my opinion, the grandest piece “British” socialism, quite different founder of the Socialist League and of imaginative writing about socialism from the explosive “continental” brand for many years editor of its paper, ever produced. of socialism which follows Karl Marx. “The Commonweal” ; a man whose And they not infrequently accompany entire leisure was occupied with the “WILLIAM MORRIS—ROMANTIC endless round of party meetings and these claims with praise of Morris, TO REVOLUTIONARY,” by public lectures; a familiar figure on E. P. Thompson, published by who is supposed to have been an the open-air platform in London and Lawrence and Wishart. Price originator of this sort of socialism. in tours which took him the length 57/6. Recently an American professor has and breadth of Britairl. ALAN DOYLE

SHAKA (Continued from page 12) forced them to return. At the same time he formed the “Shaka was cruel at times,” says Ritter. “What great idea of sending two of his choice regiments overseas to soldier is not? Titus, most ‘humane’ of Roman con­ learn reading, writing and the arts and crafts, practised querors, crucified 1,000 Jews a day at the siege of Jeru­ by the subjects of his brother king. On their return these salem. Shaka burnt sixteen women alive. Crassus, after soldiers would act as a nucleus for educating the whole defeating Spartacus, crucified 6,000 of the revolted nation. slaves. When Tilly sacked Magdeburg in 1631, the women Shaka was greatly disgusted when the emissaries of the town were raped. Shaka’s troops would have been returned with coloured cloth, beads and geegaws, and put to death for this crime. Before judging the Zulus dismissed these trifles as contemptible rubbish; what he we must recall the behaviour of all the belligerents in wanted from the British was knowledge, not worthless the last war.” ornaments. TN several notable respects Shaka had, in his context, Up to the time of his mother’s death Shaka was progressive ideas. He strove continuously to curb the “without doubt the most popular and respected king and power of the witch doctors and to destroy his people’s con­ national hero of the Zulus” (Ritter). His brilliant victories fidence in their occult craft. Once he exposed the smelling had secured peace and wealth for his people; the strict out ceremony as a fraud by secretly sprinkling blood enforcement of all laws meant security for law-abiding outside his kraal and then calling on the witch doctors citizens; his dauntless and resourceful courage had won to divine the culprits. After a protracted witchhunt in the him the undying devotion of his army course of which numerous respected citizens had been But now a curious change came over Shaka’s per­ singled out for execution, Shaka revealed that he himself sonality. People who failed to show appropriate grief at was responsible, exposing the witch doctors to the his bereavement were summarily executed; he became ridicule and hatred of the tribe. Although he may not morose and irritable and vindictive. have laid too much store by the witch doctors, Shaka Soon murmurings started in the tribal councils, and on the other hand observed many of the superstitious a group of ambitious men decided to make a bid for customs of his nation, and when it suited him used witch­ power. At 42 years of age Shaka died at the hands of craft to scare his enemies. Dingane, his half brother. There was no superstition in his attitude to the Euro­ The nation and military machine which Shaka con­ peans whom he met. Shaka grasped immediately that structed survived many years after his death. He died they belonged to a civilisation whose arts the Zulu nation before the affairs of Zululand were complicated by the could profitably acquire. He conferred on the early coming of the Boers and later the British. When the European traders in Natal the status of sub-chief, and did inevitable showdown came it took the British six full all possible to make them comfortable. months of incessant and bloody fighting to subdue the Shaka even had a ship constructed to take his emis­ Zulu nation. The fact that it required more than 20,000 saries to his “brother” King George with instructions to redcoats armed with the latest artillery to defeat the Zulu conclude a pact of friendship; but, unhappily, they got impis 35 years after Shaka’s death is striking testimony no further than Port Elizabeth, where local officialdom to the enduring quality of his achievements. July, 1956 FIGHTING TALK Pagt Five

Griquas are said to have White forefathers, and so are excluded All this is confusing and upsetting. The courts don’t from the “ Native ” category. like the vagueness and abiguities, and often show sym­ If Parliament, however, includes appearance, habits, asso­ pathy for the unfortunate people whose ancestry and pri­ ciations' and mode of life in the definition, a Coloured or even vate life are dissected in public. They have even been European may be declared to be a “ Native.” Thus the Native known to classify as “ European ” persons whom the Administration Act of 1927 states that “Native shall include racialists “ know ” to be “ Coloured.” any person who is a member of any aboroginal race or tribe of Africa : Provided that any person residing under the same Registration conditions as a Native in a scheduled or reserved native area The Population Registration Act was brought in to shall be regarded as a Native for the purpose of this Act.” He stop this intolerable meddling of liberal judges like Justice too has the Governor-General for his Supreme Chief. Fagan with the race laws. Register every person’s race, This shows that a person may be a “Native” ‘ under issue him with a card showing whether he is White, one law and not under another. He may even be given Coloured or Native, make it a crime for him to marry a choice, as under the Representation of Natives Act, or make love outside his caste—and the Colour Line will which includes under “ Native ” “ any person, not being have been made impregnable for ever more! a European, who is desirous of being regarded as a Native for the purpose of this Act.” The first difficulty is to sort people into their proper places. This is the duty of the Director of Census. He is “ Uncivilized Tragedies” told that : Disputes over the definition of “Native” nearly always “Coloured person” means a person who is not a White involve persons who want to be classed as Coloured. person or a Native; Disputes over the definition of “ Coloured,” however, “Native” means a person who in fact is or is generally usually arise when persons claim to be “ White.” This accepted as a member of any aboriginal race or tribe of is an even more difficult and delicate question, for it Africa; and affects also some of those already classed as White. How “White person” means a person who in appearance ob­ many— including some in high places—would not be cast viously is, or who is generally accepted as a White per­ out from the White group if it and the Coloured were son, but does not include a person who, although in defined in terms of descent? appearance obviously a White person, is generally accepted In this situation, therefore, the definition gives pride as a Coloured person. of place to appearance, association, and way of life, with If a person objects to the Director’s classification of descent pushed into third place, or receiving no mention either himself or anyone else, he may complain and, if he at all. Parliament may even fight shy of defining the deposits £10 with the complaint, it will be submitted to words European and Non-European, as in the Mixed a Race Classification Appeal Board. Marriages Act. For, suggested Mr. Justice Fagan, the legislature The Board is designed to take over the function of the “no doubt recognises that any attempt to draw a definite courts in deciding disputed cases. The courts are guided dividing line when the Creator himself has blurred it will by judicial reasoning; the Board by intuition and un­ not merely be unreal and artificial, but will also— since disclosed standards. That, of course, is why the racialists the mating urge is a natural attribute of human as of all prefer the Board to the courts. other life— result in such tragedies as no civilised com­ When, recently, Mr. Goliath, a Pretoria citizen, munity would care to contemplate.” (1950 (4) S.A. 199 appealed to the Supreme Court against a ruling that he (C) at p. 204). and his family were “ Natives,” Mr. Justice Hiemstra The absence of a definition may protect the Coloureds told the Director and the Board that the onus was on who have already crossed the colour line, but it also opens them to show that the Goliaths were “ Natives ” and the way to others to follow this example. This is the ordered them to be classified as Coloured. dilemma that has forced the legislature into some extra­ Following its usual tactics of breaking down the judicial ordinary verbal gymnastics. Take, for instance, the defi­ barriers to absolute dictatorship as fast as they are nition contained in the Immorality Act of 1927 as sub­ erected, the Government without delay introduced a Bill stituted by Act 21 of 1950, which extends the ban on to amend the definition of “Native” by adding a new lovemaking also to Europeans and Coloured : clause : “Any person who seems in appearance obviously to be a A person who in appearance obviously is a member of an European or a Non-European, as the case may be, shall aboriginal race shall for the purposes of this Act be pre­ for the purpose of this Act be deemed to be such, until sumed to be a Native unless it is proved that he is not the contrary is proved.” in fact and is not generally accepted as such a member. If it seems obvious (that is to say manifest, evident) that a person is in appearance a European, then by de­ The test of appearance is subjective and arbitrary. finition he is a European. Yet the Act says that he can By placing the onus on the individual, the government be proved to be not a European, that is, that he is not has virtually freed the Board of the need to be judicial obviously, manifestly, evidently a European-—which he, and fair-minded. It has also made appeal to the courts of course, is! useless in most cases. What happens in practice is that evidence is brought Mr. Justice Fagan, it seems obvious, underestimated the to show that, in spite of appearance, the person’s asso­ malevolence of the racialists in the legislature. They ciations and descent— though not mentioned in the de­ certainly are not restrained by the knowledge that their finition—are those of a Non-European. Usually it turns Rassenkampf “results in such tragedies as no civilised out that he or she is accepted as a European in some community would care to contemplate.” But then it is circles and Non-European in other circles, and that one a moot point as to who form the civilised community parent is European and the other Non-European. in South Africa. Page Six FIGHTING TALK July, 1956 BEHIND THE LINES IN ALGERIA

By TABITHA PETRAN

Since 1954 a French army has been held down in and battles, the fiercer the war becomess. This Algeria, trying to put down the independence move, article describes the background to the Algerian ment. The more French troops, the more skirmishes freedom fight, how it began and who leads it.

A CORDON of black steel-helmeted CRS (tough How it began political police used to break strikes, etc.) guarded The revolution in Algeria was launched following a the Chamber of Deputies the day the French parliament split in the Messali movement which broke into the open debated the “extraordinary powers” demanded by the at the party’s Congress in Brussels in August, 1954. Socialist Government to deal with the Algerian situation. Militants insisted the time had come to fight, but the Across the Seine, in the huge Place de la Concorde, 50 leaders were unwilling. Read out of the party, this right or more truckloads of CRS waited. Big caged police vans, wing remained in the cities, while the militants decided drawn up near the Tuilieries Gardens, were empty except to begin the armed struggle on February 1, 1955. for a few “flics” (cops) playing cards. Near the first in line, three small and very young-looking Algerian stu­ Their hand was forced, however, by a group of 300 who, without preparation or planning, and on their own, dents were searched, prior to being pushed in and carted launched the revolution on November 1 by declaring war away. This vast CRS-police turnout was designed to head off on France. Of these 300, 150 were arrested by the French the next day. The resolution thus promptly came under Algerians (there are 90,000 in the Paris region) bringing petitions to parliament. All morning trains into Paris from the direction of the Messali majority. Faced with an the poorer suburbs had been crowded with Algerian accomplished fact, they ordered their followers into the fight. At the same time, Messali in exile proclaimed workers on their way to the Mosque for a religious ser­ vice. By noon the Mosque had long been filled and MNA’s conditions for a cease fire : (1) recognition of thousands stood silently in neighbouring streets. A few Algerian independence; (2) liberation of all prisoners; (3) withdrawal of all troops. hours later, led by a girl in white carrying the nationalist flag, more than 10,000 began to walk slowly toward the Progressive Starvation Chamber of Deputies. They did not get far. At the Hotel de Ville, a massive The Messali revolt coincided with uprisings at a village charge by CRS and police broke their ranks; many were level throughout the mountain areas. Messali spokesmen hurt; more than 2,000 were arrested. claim these were sparked by revolutionary committees and Messali agents located in every village. Others pic­ Terror Tactics ture the village uprisings as spontaneous, born out of the The strength and cohesion of the nationalist move­ misery of a people who had waited years for France to ment among the half million Algerians in France — as fulfil its promises of land reform and first-class citizen­ ship. demonstrated in this march and in strikes by Algerians that same day throughout the country—has greatly wor­ Under French administration Algerians have been ried the French government. Subsequently, Algerian progressively starving: each individual has less than half workers struck east, north and west, and planned a de­ of the amount of local grain to eat than he had in 1871. monstration in Paris. On its eve, however, motorcycled Rapid industrialization of farming since Worid War II police units swooped down on workers’ districts—from has created a new army of landless, with European the Latin Quarter to Montmartre and beyond—arresting settlers pushing Algerians to ever worse land or off the anyone who looked Algerian. Soon 3,000 were in custody. land altogether. After nearly a century and a half of These terror tactics have not weakened the determina­ French rule, only 5% of Algerians can read and write, tion of Algerians to continue their strikes and protests and the number of children receiving no education at until the government frees Messali Hadj, leader of the all has almost doubled in the last ten years. Malaria Algerian nationalist movement, now held in solitary exile and trachoma are rife: one child out of eight has tuber­ on Belle He in the Atlantic. Unlike nationalist leaders culosis. Except for the big cities of Oran and Algiers, in Morocco and Tunisa, who are men of property, there is but one doctor to every 10,000 inhabitants. Messali was a worker before he became leader of the independence movement. No Class Struggle In the early 1920’s he worked at the Renault works Whether the revolt was spontaneous or inspired by the in Paris—in the same shop with Chou En-lai and Ho Messali, or both, it is certain that the MNA now has Chi-minh, who were his friends. Since 1937 his life has the full support of the villages and the peasants. In the been one of imprisonment, forced residence (after the mountain regions where the liberation movement took allies landed in North Africa in 1942) and exile— the hold, soil is too poor to have attracted European settle­ Sahara, Equatorial Africa, France and now Belle lie. ment: communal ownship of land still prevails; chief­ The independence movement he has headed has been tains, charged with practical jobs of irrigation and crop called by half a dozen names. Since the revolt in Novem­ rotation, are traditionally chosen by the people. ber 1954 it has been known as the MNA (Mouvement Here there was no struggle of class against class—the Nationalise Algeriene). chieftains went with the people into the fight for libera- July, 1956 FIGHTING TALK Page Thirteen

demned in theory by humanists, com­ actionary and the liberal are able to munists and most Christians. In this extract ideas pleasing to themselves. By respect the humanists and communists One need only mention the predi- Dr. E. ROUX have been more consistent than the kants of the Dutch Reformed Church Christians in putting theory into prac­ on the one hand and a man like tice. Trevor Huddleston on the other. In in fact are. National or racial dogmas When it comes to the Christian attitude his book Huddleston says that he often of superiority or exclusiveness are un­ on racial matters we are dealing with doc­ felt he had more in common with likely to find favour in the minds of trines less clearly defined, and there is agnostics than with some members of those who have already rejected the so often such a wide divergence between his own church. May we not conclude claims of the hundred and one dog­ theory and practice. We may distinguish then that Christianity as such does not matic religions. The idea of a chosen between “automatic” Christians whose provide an antidote to racialism but race seems to them as ridiculous as Christianity is merely conventional, and that humanism does; that the Michael the idea of a special revelation. “true” Christians, who take their Christi­ Scotts or Trevor Huddlestons are anity seriously. Automatic Christians in Rationalists, of course, have emotions, products of a liberal political educa­ South Africa, if they are Whites, usually though the scientific outlook is not asso­ tion who happened incidentally to be share the prevailing colour prejudice. ciated with emotion apart from a per­ active members of the Anglican Many of the “true” Christians do also. The vasive hankering after truth and objec­ Church? man who takes seriously may tivity. If he must have emotions, the Christianity One wonders finally whether the be more concerned with his soul and his rationalist would like them to be as broad case against racialism benefits in the personal relations with his god, than with and tolerant as possible. This may explain long run from being stated in terms social matters like the “colour problem.” the expression “scientific humanism” which of the scriptures. The body and blood This applies to many a fanatical Bible many rationalists are now adopting as a of Christ, the vicarious atonement, the thumper. Recently an African journalist description of their social creed. mysteries of the sacrament — these who entered a Seventh Day Adventist things may mean something to some Just as he rejects dogma and authority Church met with a hostile reception, and Christians. To rationalists they sound in the realm of religion, the rationalist no one will deny that the Adventists take like so much mumbo-jumbo. The ap­ is equally sceptical and dogmatic and autho­ their religion seriously. peal to reason and to our common ritarian political beliefs. Thus scientific humanity, the scientific debunking of humanists would, in most cases, regard Doctrines conflict racial chauvinism— these may equally Marxist communism equally with Catholic­ fall on deaf ears, but at least there ism as undesirable and dangerous) to free One of the main troubles with is no suggestion that the man to be human development. Christianity is that its book of words converted must be prepared to accept As far as racialism is concerned it is a pot pourri of conflicting views one set of myths as the price of rid­ is interesting to note that it is con­ and doctrines. From it both the re­ ding him of another.

A REPLY CHRISTIANITY AND by FATHER MARTIN RACIALISM IARRETT-KERR, CR. 'T'HERE is a war on— a war for test to Parliament; a priest who had, tive. But, Dr. Roux will rejoin, perhaps Justice — and we don’t want to almost singlehanded, smashed a this group he got it from was itself a waste bullets or energy sniping at our “Cement Ring” (building firms who “product . . .” etc. Again, a historian allies. So I am not going to engage had held up the distribution of ce­ must answer (so far as one can with in polemic with Dr. Roux. But there ment, to increase costs and their pro­ certainty identify human motives, influ­ are, I think, certain misunderstand­ fits, at a time when slum-clearance ences and inheritances): “ No.” For a ings or misrepresentations in his other­ was causing a desperate housing short­ study of the Christian Social Movement wise fair and interesting article which age) ; another priest who started the from (say) F. D. Maurice to our time will I should like to reply to. “St. Pancras Housing Association” in show how very little political “liberalism” or “radicalism” was lying round the place Theology and Action East London for the very poor . . . About twenty-five years ago a young and so on. The young aristocrat be­ to influence this movement: rather, the aristocrat went up to Oxford, and came a convinced member of the secular radicals) learned from, or vigorously joined all the ‘“correct” societies— “Christendom Group,” whose central criticised, or still more frequently mis­ correct for those with adequate pri­ tenet was—and is—that social action understood, Christian social teaching. (To vate means if not with opulence. without theology may be directionless, justify such a dogmatic statement, I refer While in Oxford, however, he came but theology without social action is to, e.g., M. B. Reskitt’s “Maurice to cross a small and little-known group hypocrisy. The young man’s name was Temple,” or J. S. M ill’s celebrated essay Anglican-Catholic priests and lay- Trevor Huddleston. on Coleridge.) n who used to meet to discuss the Dr. Roux’s question, whether such people Pitfalls eology of social action.” There he may not be “products of a liberal political What is the difference, if any, be­ t a Cathedral Canon who had led education who happened incidentally to be tween the social teaching of a Christ­ nger-march” of the unemployed, active members of the Anglican Church” ian of this brand, and of a “secular petition about the “means” may be answered, then, with a clear nega­ (Continued on following page) Page Fourteen FIGHTING TALK July, 1956

humanist?” Often not much, so as you’d notice it, in practice. But a great deal if you could look round TROUBLE the back. For the Christian socialist will claim that the secular humanist is much more open to (a) despair when the job doesn’t seem to be getting WITH COPS anywhere; b) the swing of the pen­ dulum when the first optimistic ana­ A ILRO ADIN G” is the character­ jurers, sadists, liars and false witnesses, lysis of human brotherhood breaks istically vigorous American slang which embraces everyone connected with down on the rocks of human wicked­ for what is known elsewhere as “ a the case, F.B.I., witnesses, judge, pro­ ness; and c) the ordinary pressures frame-up.” For such travesties as the secutor, “experts” ? But it is real; Julius which tempt man to subject the very trial of the Scottsboro boys or of and Ethel Rosenberg are dead, exe­ reason he exalts to the passion or com­ Sacco and Vanzetti, it is an apt de­ cuted; that is the reminder that this mon selfishness he thinks he has grown scription. For here, frame-up was horror is true. Wexley is not impartial. out of. I say, much more “open” to neither subtle nor concealed. Scape­ He has done the research which proves these dangers: I am not claiming that goats for the venting of ruling-class the Rosenbergs innocent, their tra- the secular humanists can be proved, political passions had been found; and ducers guilty of murder and suborning statistically, to have given way to trial and conviction rolled ahead with perjury. He is not afraid to say so. these dangers more often than Christ­ all the public clangour, fire and thun­ But never does his bias master his de­ ians. The evidence that could be der of an express loco, and with as termination to let the facts — facts marshalled for such an examination little attempt at concealment of fraud. quoted with the most painstaking re­ could probably be interpreted, like “Railroading” is under way; let those ferences to official records and docu­ most historical factors, in any way the who wish to get hurt stand in its path ments— speak for themselves. This is examiner likes. But the works of social and argue legal niceties! the last word on the innocence of the philosophers like Niebuhr or Demant But for the case of Julius and Ethel Rosenbergs. After this, only charlatans which analyse these “swings of the Rosenberg, “railroading” is not the and fools will dare claim them guilty, pendulum” are worth careful consider­ apt term. This was something more or defend the frame-up which sent ation. (See, e.g., the former’s “The horrifying, because it was more care­ them to their deaths. Irony of American History.” ) ful, more subtle, more deceptive. John Perhaps it is the sheer horror Wexley traces every smallest move and created by this factually told analysis Charter for Equality minute of that trial in “The Judge­ of evidence that makes Harvey Matu- On the other hand, the Christian ment of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg,” sow’s “False Witness” seem dull, pede­ claims that in the doctrine that man just released in an English edition. He strian, almost commonplace by com­ (not White man, or Black man or misses nothing. He traces the characters parison. Matusow is the professional bourgeois man or proletarian man, and plot back to the earlier trial of witness against “Communists” whose but man) was made in the image of Klaus Fuchs in England; he follows conscience revolted after he had helped God lies an original charter for equ­ through the grim, F.B.I. process of to railroad an untold number of ality—a charter that is “ given,” not blackmailing men and women into American citizens. He resolves to tell merely agreed upon by human con­ agreeing to give evidence for the state it all. What he has to say lends cre­ vention; and that in the doctrine of in order to avoid prosecution them­ dence to Wexley’s portrayal of the redemption lies a charter for respect selves; he traces the devious turns by F.B.I. process of procuring perjured for human personality above every which the F.B.I. coerce the witness into testimony. Matusow tells it from the other consideration (social, economic, improving on truth to concoct an inside, from the position of one of national, scientific, etc.). Of course, acceptable story by a subtle combina­ Senator MacCarthy’s experts, who those who don’t believe these doctrines tion of bribery, flattery and tightening testified as an expert and as a “finger- find them irrelevant; but they mustn’t the thumbscrews. man” time and time again. state categorically that they are irre­ As Mr. Wexley moves deeper and There must be something about levant to those who do believe them. deeper into his researches, one begins such slimy perjurers which makes even And put it in simple human terms: to feel incredulity creeping on. Is it their repentance and their confessions if I see an African shivering with possible, this fantastic network of per- ring counterfeit. Publisher Albert cold, and I know I’ve got a spare coat Kahn, in a foreword, voices the doubt. I don’t need; and then I don’t give Can a professional liar tell the truth? it to him; don’t you see that it makes Butterfield, M. B. Hesse, etc.), even White­ Kahn concludes that the revelations the offence even more serious when, head’s Science arid the Modern World in the book are completely true; and my conscience pricking me that night, should have made him modify his use of he has had the advantage of studying I seem to hear the voice of someone “ rationalist.” fully all the documents Matusow has saying “Inasmuch . . . etc.” (in other Finally: if I have talked about to prove them. But of Matusow him­ words “it wasn’t only that African what Christians ought to hold, and self, Kahn has reservations. Not sur­ you didn’t clothe— it was Me,” )? have not discussed the actual failures, prisingly; for about Matusow’s breast- Dr. Roux’s simpliste account of “ration­ stupidity, prejudice of Christians as beating there is still something that alism” and of the tussle between science they are— that merely means I have doesn’t ring true, something he and religion is a little surprising at this not discussed the one factor that more keeping up his sleeve. Perhaps it date. Let me be as dogmatic as he, and than any other distinguishes the hu­ that he portrays himself as a rat say that he seems to have ignored all the man animal from all others of the weak, mistaken, but almost no recent work in this field (M. B. Foster’s species: his infinite capacity for self- human being, whereas, in fact, not famous articles in M ind on the origins of deception — called by Christians, he says so slickly about himse'r the scientific movement; Lynn Thomdyke, “ Original Sin.” drown the feeling that he FIGHTING TALK Page Fifteen oughly unbalanced monster, with much This could be a good starting point of his personality still hidden beneath for an investigation of the mortal sick­ the slime in which he moves. ness that is in a society which can South Ab'W s! From these two books, there is ma­ railroad the Rosenbergs and yet pay terial enough to start a thesis on Ame­ good hard dollars for the testimony W ORK FOR APARTHEID rican justice—more properly injustice of a Matusow. But, for Deutsch, this Bloemfontein.— Because Non-Europeans — and what makes it the travesty it is, is not the starting point but the end. were not allowed to enter the Free State at least on matters of radical political For whether he knows it or not, Sports Stadium in Bloemfontein, special opinion. Albert Deutsch essays an in­ he is shut into the iron limits of the arrangements have had to be made to send press reports on the soccet match between vestigation into a part of the problem, discipline that Senator MacCarthy has the Football Association and the Free State. the state of the American police force. imposed — the limits which make A European messenger had to take mes­ Was it discretion more than valour any serious discussion of social and sages from the Press box to the gate. There Non-Europeans took the reports and that led him to omit any mention or political change taboo, and which ele­ delivered them to the post office. study of the F.B.I. in “The Trouble vate the clay-footed American demo­ (STAR, 22/6/56) with Cops?” As a result, this study cracy into a sacred cow to be wor­ which could be so timely, is strangely shipped blindly by the multitude. TREATMENT FOR SHOCK? insubstantial, insignificant. Deutsch L. BERNSTEIN. knows that there is much wrong with The Judgement of Julius and Ethel CAPE TOWN. — A memorandum sub­ mitted by a nursing sister in her personal the cops; there is corruption, graft and Rosenberg, by John Wexley. Pub­ capacity says that "the parents of the vast common-or-garden crime amongst lished by Bookville. Price 35/-. majority" of nurses would be shocked if them, in good measure. But when he False Witness, by Harvey Matusow. they knew that the names of their child­ tries to grapple with the question of Published by Cameron & Kahn. ren appeared on the same register with Non-Europeans and that they wear the how to clean up the police force, he Price 10/6. same uniform and insignia. comes down to mountainous platitudes. The Trouble with Cops, by Albert (SAPA, 21/6/56) The police, he says, will only be as Deutsch. Published by Arco Pub­ good as the society that employs them. lishers. Price 15/-. at our own achievements. But the Scottish miners know their strength : Robert Brown, a miner, speaking at a branch meeting called to discuss strike action in order to force an agreement Battles of Scottish for a minimum wage, said : “No one else can go below and take the posi­ tion of the miner. The Government Miners may interfere, but they cannot pro­ duce coal,” and he called upon the A hundred years ago boys and girls within their own ranks as well as with members to stand firm in a general of seven toiled in the dark and their bosses. It took years of effort strike (which they did). Here, too, stuffy pits of Scottish coal mines; by before the local or county unions were the Government can, and does, do a 1954 when R. Page Arnot’s “A able to form one national union for lot of interfering, but they cannot pro­ History of the Scottish Miners” ends, Scotland, and then to bring about duce the goods. Only the workers can the industry was struggling to make unity with the coal miners of the rest do that, and the day must come when conditions sufficiently attractive to of Great Britain. Having achieved our masses of low-paid, Non-European draw youths of 14 into the pits. unity, the miners were faced at times workers will realise the power that lies South African readers will find in with a reactionary union leadership, in their own united hands. this book many points of similarity which tried to collaborate with the N.D. between the struggles of Scottish and employers or appease the government. our miners. At times the Scottish A new militant body was formed to (Continued from page 10) cater for the miners’ day-to-day prob­ miners looked to a sympathetic Labour the last 15 years or more. We need lems, and to prod the leadership into government to improve their working an academy to set up music schools action. Often when negotiations were conditions, but time and again it was and provide itinerant teachers for protracted rank and filers expressed through strike action, and strike them. We must surely have hundreds their feelings in unofficial strikes. action alone, that improvements were of potential composers looking for won. Legislation for an eight-hour day The Union is organised on a demo­ training and encouragement. And what was enacted in 1908 but only after cratic basis: meetings are held at the richer material could the music com­ 40 years of struggle, beginning with pit heads, rank and file workers are poser want than that which he can the heroic strike of the Fife miners circulated with information on any draw from the present conditions of who in 1878 were the first workers in issue concerning them, week-end turmoil and strife? urope’s mining industry to win an schools are held for them and summer There is a new body called the Arts eement for a reduction in hours. schools for their leaders, and when Federation of South Africa under the ?s were long and bitter, some necessary a vote is taken of all mem­ chairmanship of Fr. Martin Jarrett- r>st, some were victorious. The bers as they come up from work. Kerr which wants to knit together as -ners made use of police, baton Our Scottish brothers have had ap­ many cultural organizations as possible nass arrests, the army, scabs proximately 140 years of Trade Union —Black and White. It is now inviting under police protection, organisation, and considering that our such organizations to join it. An ■>r relief to miners’ fa- Non-European workers here, generally academy such as the one I propose ^stile press. speaking, have had but a fraction of would be a fitting item on the pro­ ’ their own troubles that time, we need not be disheartened gramme of the Arts Federation. Page Sixteen FIGHTING TALK July, 1956

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GROUP AREAS PLUNDER • • DORIS LESSING ON CENTRAL AFRICAN FEDERATION • • r i f THE SUEZ CRISIS

AFRICA BEFORE 1652 • • Articles by CECIL WILLIAMS— PHYLLIS ! ALTMAN — DIEGO RIVERA

MOTHER AND CHILD (A drawing by Kaethe Kollwitz)

A MONTHLY JOURNAL FOR DEMOCRATS Page Two ■ FIGHTING TALK September, 1956

By “ FIGHTING TALK” FROM THE SIDELINES L. BERNSTEIN

Published monthly by the "Fighting T H E SIGNIFICANT thing about the Nationalists’ apologists who staff the Talk" Committee, P.O. Box 1355 Johannesburg. ' State Information Offices is not so much what they say as what they • hush up. Take the Group Areas Act as an example. Since 1950, there Annual Subscription: 7/6 has been a steady outpouring of “ explanations ” to THE BIG persuade the world the whole thing is honest, above STEAL ■*' ^ V. board and desirable, and imposes equality of sacrifice Editor: RUTH FIRST and opportunity on all racial groups. The flood has dried up. since the publication l£st week of the first instalment of Johannesburg’s COMMENT scheme. Understandably so; for this is the reality of a big steal which makes Chicago gangsterism look like small potatoes. Sacrifices there are, in plenty. But they will all be made by the Non-White people. Indians, Africans and Coloureds will be expropriated from Newlands, Newclare, Sophiatown, Mar­ THE farmer is still the back- ti ndale, Pageview, Albertsville, Albertskroon. For the Coloured people there 1 bone of the country, Strijdom will be a ghetto in Coronationville; for the Indians exile to Lenasia, twenty- two miles from the City; for the Africans ‘"ethnic grouping” in the vast told the conference of the Trans­ South-Western location complex. Europeans—what the Act calls the “White vaal Agricultural Union. So he Group”—will fall heir to property, with as little pricking of conscience as added, the State would go on troubled the brigands who collected the gold-filled teeth from the corpses at doing everything to help him. Dachau’s gas chambers. By the law of the land it is, one regrets, legal. But morally it is burglary. Let the State Information Office whitewash as it No wonder it’s” a case of may. This is something that will be chalked up for the settling by the curvature of the spine, with South African people when they place their own criminals before the every aspect of the national life tribunal of the people at the day of their liberation. Strijdom’s conquests buckled, twisted and contorted by force, though they take place within the country’s borders, are as morally reprehensible as Hitler’s. That they will be set aside when the people come to fit into the farmers’ frame. into their own goes without,.saying. But that is no reason for silence now, and no justification for acquiescence by the White citizens of Johannesburg. The airy Tomlinson talk of Those who receive the spoils of burglary make themselves as guilty as those separate development for Afri­ who commit it. It is time for White Johannesburg to speak out—or become cans is the sheerest cant while accomplices by default. the farming community raises its voice for the removal of T H E CASE of Mr. Duma Nokwe has gained a lot of publicity in the “black spots,” the little land Johannesburg press. He is the fall guy of the Urban Areas Act, stable Africans do own, and vetoes every mate of the Group Areas Act. Mr. Nokwe, the only African barrister in single attempt to acquire the Johannesburg, has been refused permission to occupy an land for Africans which was a FALL CUY office in His Majesty’s Buildings, where all the other solemn undertaking of the legis­ barristers work. His presence, we are told, would be lation of two decades ago. “contrary to Government policy” — Group Areas Act policy. Mr. Nokwe is bluntly told-to seek premises in an African residential The platteland demands for area. That this would mean in fact that Mr. Nokwe would be cut off labour: convict labour, forced from contact with lawyers, clients, courts and other barristers is clear enough labour, shanghaied, labour, any to move even the editors of the daily press to protest. The callous and labour so long as its cheap, jolts casual fashion in which Government policy becomes the excuse for wrecking the arm of the state into one new a career is shocking and intolerable. But is Mr. Nokwe’s fate any different law after another to fill the farm in principle from the fate which awaits thousands of Indian shopkeepers prisons, uproot African labour in if they are moved to a single Indian ghetto at Lenasia, where there will be the cities, keep wages down. neither work nor livelihood for them? Those who are moved so easily to -**»- So the people assail together pity by a single case of brute injustice should ask themselves the question : "the land monopoly ownership of are their protestations about Mr. Nokwe genuine? Or are they cheaply .the big farmers and the tyranny salving consciences which are burdened with guilt of indifference to the of the government that legislates vast and multiple injustice of every application of the Group Areas Act? for them. OUR COVER DRAWING

The old forms are mishappen KAETHE KOLLW ITZ'S drawings depict and are deeply imbued with sympathy and in. their struggle against for the suffering. Born in Koenigsberg, Prussia, her art went unrecognised and she was silenced by the Naiis when they came to power in an attempt to still her them the people will mould the cries for social justice. new. ■*- September, 1956 FIGHTING TALK Pag* Thrtt

GROUP AREAS “A national act of robbery drags every citizen into PLUNDER its complicity . . . This is the time for anger . .. this

is the time to speak out!” By L. BERNSTEIN

HEN the air is heavy with the smell of pogrom, vul­ Act—could not stoop to such bestiality. No? Consider the W tures begin to gather. So it was in Hitler’s Germany. evidence. Big vultures— the Schachts and the Goerings— killing by The Golden Plum remote control, pogromists as a matter of state policy, killers in the cause of aryan 'survival. Middle vultures, In 1887—when Johannesburg was a tiny wood-and- the pretty bureaucrats, office-bearers and administrators, iron mining camp, an area was set aside for occupation planning, promulgating and codifying the killing, pogro­ by Indians; these were the nameless pioneers, con­ mists in the line of duty. Small vultures, the black-jack tributing as much in their way to the building of the and knuckle-duster squads, the end-of-the-line little men, town as those others, Von Brandis, Jeppe, Eloff, whose with blood on their hands. names are recorded on the map. In 1937, the legality of Indian ownership and occupation was reiterated by Act of Parliament, and again in 1941. That area is SO it is in South Africa. The Group Areas Act gathers Pageview. In it live about one third of Johanesburg’s the vultures together for the day of pogrom—sancti­ Indian population of some 15,000 souls. They share the monious Cabinet Ministers preaching mediaeval concepts overcrowded area with perhaps three thousand Coloured of race purity; bigoted public servants and sycophants, people, and some two thousand Africans. For years the turning those concepts into grinding, body-and-soul- pressure on space has grown worse; there has been no destroying schemes of zones and buffer strips and barriers; municipal housing for Indians at any time in the history pinch-penny speculators and grave robbers, scratching of the City. And over the past fifteen years, the segre­ in the foulest muck of Nationalism for the slimiest pen­ gationist bug of Group Areas has crept in. A City nies. An unholy alliance of the most depraved and in­ Council, alternately right-wing Labour and right-wing human forces of the land, for the most depraved and United Party, has gradually coralled the Indian popula­ degrating act in our history—armed robbery in the name tion into Pageview, by the simple and effective device of law—the Group Areas Act. of “planning” industrial rights in all those townships Mad Dog Racialism where Indians and Coloured people live, raising the value of ground beyond the capacity of private tenants to pay. To creatures such as these, I have nothing to say. Gradually Pageview has become the last unsubmerged Words—honour, decency, principle—words do not touch island of Indian occupation in a rising flood of racialism. them; silver is their token, loot and power are their To a desperate, beleagured group it has meant many lodestar. Their palms itch for the large stakes—not for things—a roof over their heads; a community where they the Rembrandts of a Goering or the Ethiopian empire feel neighbourly and at ease; an investment, a place of of a Ciano, but for the sites, the shops, the goodwills and business, a slender straw of security in an insecure life. the buildings of the “unassimilable” three-hundred- Last month, by single decree in the Government Gazette, thousand South African Indians. To them, I have nothing all that changed. The law is not what Kruger said it to say. Let history deal with them as it dealt with was in 1885, or Hertzog in 1937, or Smuts in 1941. The Mussolini, swinging dead by the heels for his victims to law is what the Minister of Interior Donges says it is spit upon. Let me speak rather to the good neighbours, in 1956. And Donges says that Pageview is the property to the good citizens, to the quiet people of all races, who and heritage of what current officialdom calls “the White neither covet their neighbours property nor sharpen long group.” By August 1957 a large part of it is to be vacated knives to get it. Why do YO U not speak out? How long by its present occupiers, sold by its present owners; the can you stay silent and not become accomplices to the rest of the area remains under suspended sentence, the crime? Must you wait till they pull the gold-filled teeth White man’s plum which will be plucked when the mood from living people before your conscience revolts? takes him— a golden plum, worth perhaps £4, perhaps I am told I go too far; South Africans, I am told— £5 million, now going cheap to the vultures who are even the mad-dog racialists .who devised the Group Areas not dismayed by the smell of charring flesh. Page Four FIGHTING TALK September, 1956

Squeeze to Lenasia 156,000 Africans, Indians and Coloureds, for the expro­ priation of almost seven thousand acres of Indian owned I am told I go too far. Zoning Pageview for “the .land and some £9 million of land and buildings. If White group” is no parallel for Dachau’s gas chambers. Not yet. But there is more to come. From Pageview there Johannesburg gets Lenasia, is it too much to suppose that is only one retreat for Indians — Lenasia, a township Durban might get Belsen? which lies twenty-one miles outside the city, a privately I am told I go too far. Perhaps so. Forget Durban. owned township, in which more than one City Father and more than one Indian speculator has a finger, a Even there, self-interest rose superior to jingoistic racial­ derelict white elephant of a township, doomed to bank­ ism; even those City Councillors recognised that Durban rupt its promoters until the Group Areas Act — con­ could not survive without the 145,000 Indians who live veniently — empied the jackpot into their outstreched and work within its boundaries. But what can one say palms. Here, it is said, Indians will live. How they will of Lydenburg, Wolmaransstad, Nylstroom, Nelspruit and live, under what roofs, by the grace of which landlord, working at what occupations— these trivia remain un­ Carolina? What can they expect, where Dutch Reformed explained by officialdom, which concerns itself only with Church and Town Councillors combine to urge that the the broad principles of robbery, not with its victims. It tiny Indian communities be driven out, miles outside, to is said that Lenasia will put an end to the rent profiteer­ sewerage farms, to wasteland, to anywhere so long as they ing which flourished in Pageview. Lies. The worst of were well outside the built-up limits of the town. Pageview’s rackrenting landlords have secured themselves a corner for operations in Lenasia. And this time the And still you will say, “Better than the gas chambers.” squeeze will be bigger, because there is nowhere for the Maybe so. But madness has a motion of its own. What tenant to go; here he either stays and likes it, or he just seemed outrageous in Durban appeared like the voice of stays. And yet they will live. Some few will live by trade. reason and sanity at Wolmaransstad. And what seemed And the rest? They will live, somehow, so we are told. outrageous at Wolmaransstad becme the voice of reason It is said, officially, that this predominantly mercantile and sanity at Ventersdorp. Here the real Belsen madness community will have to change “their way of living.” showed itself. Ventersdorp Municipality, at a public Perhaps they will have to stop eating. But somehow, it hearing of the Group Areas Board, demands no Group is said, they will live. Area for Indians. Let the Indians disappear! Let them go somewhere else! Ventersdorp does not want them! To And st'll I am told this is better than being bludgeoned the bottom of the deep blue sea! into Hitler’s gas chambers. Perhaps so. But this is Johan­ nesburg, the liberal storm centre of South Africa, the This is the demented logic that led six million Jews home and castle of the radical and progressive cause— through the doors of the gas chambers at Belsen and Johannesburg, which once elected a Communist Coun­ Auschwitz. Let no one tell me I go too far! cillor but which has voted Nationalist only in 8 of 42 wards. Johannesburg’s City Council pleaded Stolen Property before the Group Areas Board for the Indian traders of Pageview to be allowed, at least, to keep their trading I speak to the decent, the neighbourly, the just and licences and trading sites. And because this is Johannes/ the upright South African citizens of all races! But above burg, we will have Lenasia, which is better than the gas all I speak to my White compatriots, because you— chamber. But Lenasia will not be the pattern for the whether you wish it or not—are in on the share-out of country. It is the concession to the almost un-South African radicalism of Johannesburg, a sop to its uneasy the spoils of the pogrom. You are inheriting the stolen conscience, and a bribe with which to buy its silence wealth and property, and the right to occupy that pro­ while worse crimes are committed elsewhere. perty, to corner that wealth, whether you exercise that right or not! 476 stands in Pageview; 1600 stands in Blood and Soil Myths Sophiatown; 322 stands in Martindale, 600 stands in Newclare, 1500 stands in Albertsville. And this is only What can Durban expect? The Durban City Council the start of the haul. This is only the beginning of Johan­ ran ahead of Nationalism, agitating for a Group Areas nesburg’s grand larceny. And you, my White compatriots Act for the very purpose of expropriating the Indian community. It was the first to propound the new blood- —you and I—acquire the right to live, occupy and spe­ and-soil mytholdgy of South Africa in March 1953: culate in the fruit of that larceny; we share in the spoils, and become parties to its theft. A national act of robbery “Residential neighourhoods should, therefore . . . be such as to reduce the possibility of one group with violence drags every citizen into its Complicity. It spilling into another’s area, or of cdsually crossing the is small solace to say that we are not among the gathered border. Effective segregation therefore demands effec­ vultures. No. They have blood . on their hands. But we tive boundaries. Some natural features, e.g., rivers, are only being stamped with the mark of Cain. steep valleys, cliffs and hill tops are very effective barriers, whereas a narrow vacant green belt tends How can we now keep quiet, and keep calm? This is simply to become a communal park and thu's encour­ the time for anger, for impassioned action before the foul age contact.” deed is done and finished. This is the time to speak out! The Durban City Council proposed to the Group Areas A crime is being committed in your name! If you would Board a “plan” for Durban. It called for the eviction of sleep at night, now you dare not keep quiet! September, 1956 FIGHTING TALK Page Thirteen The Depression — Back to Normal ? By M. MULLER

HAT the New Year bells in Ame­ What is Normal? Nor should we believe that African rica saluted was People’s Capital­ workers, who will be deprived of even W Yes, the capitalist world is getting ism. This is the force which lifted the the “dole” (unemployment insurance) back to normal. While experts say that United States in 1955 to the highest will be immune to the racial appeal. half the earth’s population is under­ peak of prosperity yet achieved on fed, American farmers are once again The danger of the rise of demagogues earth . . . wrote the Rand Daily Mail will be great—and demagogues direc­ being paid, not to produce food, but in January this year. tly or indirectly always serve the ruling to plough their crops back into the class. Just about 28 years ago Coolidge, lands. In Britain, 6,000 motor workers who was then the President, told the were retrenched on a single day and To ensure that the struggle for United States Congress : in the American motor industry there bread and freedom is not sidetracked “No Congress of the United States are 214,000 unemployed workers. into racial strife and quack-remedy ever assembled on surveying the state dead-ends, requires a widespread We have seen some of the effects of the Union has met with a more understanding of the workings of the of such normal capitalism here in pleasing prospect than that which ap­ capitalist system and why it breaks Johannesburg. Once large and pros­ pears at the present time. In the dome­ down. perous firms have closed down. In stic field there is tranquility and con­ several industries there have been tentment . . . and the highest record If we are to have work and bread wholesale sacking. Short-time has be­ we must have the unity of workers of of years of prosperity.” come a very common thing. And this all races: the policies for which the Less than one year later America is still only the beginning. S.A. Congress of Trade Unions stand and the whole capitalist world was —not the divide and perish policies For the past seventeen years, thanks well into the Great Depression. During of the Trade Union Council and Mr. the next ten years there were never to World War II, and to the cold de Klerk. less than 8,000,000 jobless people in war and re-armament, capitalism has the “land of prosperity.” In 1933 there not been normal. A new generation of NEXT MONTH: The Causes of were 13,000,000 unemployed, or one workers has entered industry who do ______Depressions not know the misery of the able- in four of the working population. In TH EATRE IN 1938 one in five workers were still bodied man for whom there is no job without jobs. Only with the war in at all. In South Africa, with its rapid SOUTH AFRICA ( Continued from previous page) 1941 did the value of goods produced war-time and post-war industrial They felt, too, that all people in America again reach the value pro­ growth, thousands of new workers have should have the opportunity of being duced in 1929. entered industry. To all these people, ‘‘normal” capitalism, not to talk of enriched by the dramatic culture of “ Back to Normal” depressions, will be a great shock. the world. A Culture Enriched These facts are not recalled idly. During the past few weeks we have A New Struggle What, perhaps, some of them did had a number of ominous reassurances A new element,, a new dimension, not realise is that such a throwing from our local capitalist prophets : will increasingly enter into the struggle down of cultural barriers will not only “. . . There would not appear to be of the workers and liberation move­ enrich the lives of Non-Whites, but any justification for regarding recent ments: a struggle for the right to will make possible the enrichment of economic developments in the Union as work. Periods of depression have al­ the White man’s culture by the infu­ evidence of an incipient depression . . . ways been times not only when the sion of the existing and potential cul­ In point of fact, however, the change working-class is steeled, but also times ture of the African, Indian and in the economic climate . . . merely pro­ when the ruling classes seek refuge in Coloured races. We could be so rich, vides evidence of a return to healthier the most brutal forms of fascism. but condemn ourselves to poverty. and more normal conditions.” Malan’s “purified” Nationalist Party Shakespeare, Sheridan, Shaw are for all people. So are the dramatic So said Dr. Arndt, Deputy-Governor struck its roots during the depression years, but the outstanding example is legends, the songs and dances of Africa of the South African Reserve Bank at and of India. If thirteen millions in­ the Bank’s annual meeting. Hitler’s conquest of power at the height of the Great Depression. stead of three are encouraged to write Right along with the bankers are plays, we shall find our own play­ the Nationalist politicians, like Dr. van A depression in South Africa will wrights, speaking to us of our own Rhijn, who believes that the financial greatly increase racial tensions. The country, our own lives. We shall find hardship which so many people now Nationalists will try to exploit it for our own Bernhardts and Irvings and feel is nothing to be worried about. that purpose, as in fact they are al­ Terrys: our own Pavlovas and Fon­ “Instead of being frightened,” he says, ready doing. In the Transvaal Gar­ teyns: our own Robesons and Chap­ “people should welcome this return ment industry, antagonism between lins: our own Brittens and Gershwins to more rational standards.” This White and Coloured, and Coloured . . . and, what’s more, they will stay speech The Star reported under a big and African workers has become more here, fulfilled as artists, happy to live headline, “W ORLD IS GETTING noticeable, especially among unem­ their lives among and for their fellow BACK TO NORMAL.” ployed workers. countrymen. Page Fourteen FIGHTING TALK September, 1956

THE COLD COAST REVOLUTION AND THE NKRUMAH CULT ALAN DOYLE f a HE African people of the Gold which ended in Nkrumah’s dramatic emer­ had no words strong enough to describe T Coast (traditionally called Ghana, gence from prison to Prime Ministership, the evils of British imperialism; he was a rendered into English as Guinea) he himself was undergoing a period of en­ crusading radical, not afraid of being de­ have by their resolute organisation and forced inactivity. The general strike at scribed as “an agitator,” “a Communist,” mass action won important victories the beginning of 1950 (that preceded and etc. Since he has become Prime Minister for their national liberation which enforced the holding of a general election he has changed his tune. He hobnobs with have inspired colonial peoples every­ in which the CPP won its great victory, the British Governor, praises the “British where, and especially in Africa, in and Nkrumah’s release from jail) was Commonwealth,” and his Government per­ their struggle against imperialism. The called not by the C.P.P. but by the Trade secutes Communists and radicals. Ghana people have not yet achieved Union Congress. And the TUC was allied Does this mean that he has “sold out” ? full emancipation, political and econo­ with but not controlled by the CPP. That would be an over-simplification. He mic, from dependence upon Britain. As yet we have no book which deals is a, representative of the Ghana middle But they have taken important steps fully with the historical events of the Gold class which genuinely desires to be rid of along that road. Coast revolution of 1950. Mr. Timothy’s imperialism. But this middle class is Dr. Kwame Nkrumah, the present book does not pretend to do this, being capitalist,- and fears the revolution of the Prime Minister, has without doubt only a biography of Dr. Nkrumah. When workers and peasants. Therefore when the played an important part in these vic­ this book does come to be written it is revolution of 1950 had placed the Nkrumah tories. A talented organiser and dyna­ hoped that it will not be just another ministry in office this middle class sought mic leader, he grasped the key im­ expression of the Nkrumah cult but will to call it off. portance of mass organisation and give full value to the actions and struggles But it is not easy to “call off” a mass action in a way that Dr. Dan- of the people themselves. revolution that has half-succeeded. In quah and the other old-style intellec­ Mr. Timothy greatly admires Dr. order to retain the support of the people tual leaders of the United Gold Coast Nkrumah, and his book carries a laudatory in their still continuing struggles with im­ Convention had failed to do. When foreword by Mr. Kojo Botsio, Nkrumah’s perialism the CPP leadership, one feels, Kwame Nkrumah returned to the closest associate and lieutenant. Yet the must be compelled by historical imperatives Gold Coast at the end of 1947 to take book, often unwittingly, exposes grave to make more and more concessions in the up his appointment as secretary of the weaknesses in its subject. Nkrumah is shown direction of greater democracy, industriali­ Convention he speedily began the as dictatorial, conceited, and lacking in sation and higher living and educational transformation of the Convention from principle. He has described himself, on standards for the working people. a middle-class debating society into a different occasions, as “a Marxian social­ “K W AM E N K R U M A H — His Rise to popular mass movement. When the ist,” “an undemoninational Christian,” and Power.” By Bankole Timothy. Pub­ older leaders resisted this process a “disciple of Gandhi.” lished by George Allen and Unwin Nkrumah broke away to form the Con­ During the struggle for power, Nkrumah Ltd. Price 20s. vention People’s Party, based on the slogan of “ Self-Government Now ” which speedily developed into a mass liberation movement of the Ghana people. The Un-American In his biography “ Kwame Nkrumah,” the Gold Coast writer Bankole Timothy pays fully adequate tribute to all these HE INVESTIGATOR,” something record, but by all accounts it is played merits of his subject. It must be conceded T less than a novel and more than with devastating effect, and with all ihat Mr. Timothy is also occasionally a play, is a biting and witty satire the Star Chamber realism of a hearing critical of Dr. Nkrumah, and furnishes on Senator Joe MacCarthy. It would before the Un-American Committee. much material upon which a more be nice to think that the present I imagine that the record is the real balanced judgment can be based. eclipse of the red-baiting Senator was “ Investigator,” and the book a It is plain that Dr. Nkrumah, despite in part the result of Author Ship’s slightly paler shadow. But wicked his merits and services, is too egoistic. He barbed shafts. But reading the book, drawings by Ronald Searle add some­ has fostered a cult founded on and cen­ I am inclined to doubt it; there is a thing which the radio play must have tered in his own person. Thus, all the slightly muffled quality about the missed. For an evening’s fun with pur­ great achievements of the people of the punches. But “The Investigator” was pose, try them both. L.B. Gold Coast, going back over many years, not originally written as a book, but to force concessions from British imperial­ as a radio play, broadcast from Canada “THE INVESTIGATOR,” by Reuben ism are ascribed to Nkrumah alone. Even with such phenomenal success that Ship. The book: Published by leaving aside the protracted struggles of the tape recordings of it were first boot­ Sidgwick and Jackson, illustrated people before 1948, when Nkrumah first legged about the United States, and by Ronald Searle. Price 8/6. entered the picture, history shows that later recorded and released in Britain The record: Oriole longplaying during the decisive stage of the struggle and America. I have not heard the 12-inch. MG 20006.

Collection Number: A3299 Collection Name: Hilda and Rusty BERNSTEIN Papers, 1931-2006

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Publisher: Historical Papers Research Archive Collection Funder: Bernstein family Location: Johannesburg ©2015

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