THE RADICAL REVIEW

VOLUME FOUR NUMBER NINE

1 S 6d November 1965

202/THE NEW AFRICAN/NOVEMBER 1965

203 THE CHILDREN OF RAPE: Antonio deFigueiredo

205 FOR NAT NAKASA: Kathleen Conwell

208 THIS EMPHASIS ON FREEDOM: N. E. R.Mwakasangula

209 tt TWS SIDE OF ETERNITY": A. B. Ngcobo

211 COMING TO GRIPS: Lewis Nkosi

218 NO CROPS WITHOUT PLOUGHING?: MartinLegassick

219

220 THE TRANSKEI'S ANSWER - 2: L. Jipula

222 SOUTH AFRICA 1965: Candidus

202 Leader; 210 Poems by Paul Theroux; 211Poem by Breyten Breytenbach; 212 Reviews byKenneth Mackenzie, C. F. GoodfeUow, Obi B.Egbuna, Jill Jessop, Raymond Kunene, MlahleniNjisane and Collingwood August; 217 WordsWords Words

219 To the Editors; 223 Jazz Epistle 6 by LindsayBarrett

EDITORS: Randolph Vigne and Neville Rubin

LITERARY EDITOR: Lewis Nkosi

DESIGNER: lames Currey

Subscription ratesWorld Surface Mail: 1 year R2 - £ 1 - $2.80;6 months RI - 10s. $1.40; Renewal: 1 yearR.1.80 - 185. - $2.50.Students in Southern Africa: 1 year R1.50­155.; Airmail: 1 year V.S.A. $6 - S.A. R4.

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Published by Gransight Holdings Ltd., 12 Gayfere Street,London, W.l, and Printed by Goodwin Press Ltd. (T.V.),135 Fonthill Road, London, N.4, England.

A Spur to UnityNOVEMBER 11, 1965 was a day of humiliation for Africa. The seized inde­pendence of a white supremacist regime in unliberated Zimbabwe meant that,after so many years of struggle, apartheid had been extended to another partof Africa, far from being destroyed in its own breeding ground.

The Organisation of African Unity was meeting for its Accra SummitConference as the crisis neared, and was able to demonstrate its solidaritywith its brothers in Southern Rhodesia and" its determination that their fateshall not be bargained away ". But that determination has not yet found themeans of action, and as Osagyefo the President of Ghana, said in his farewelladdress to the Conference: "If our Assembly had not been in session at thistime what could we have done about the serious situation in SouthernRhodesia? Could we have in our various capitals agreed on a commoncourse of action? Could we have expressed our resolution to the world aswe did ... ? "

At least the world was left in no doubt as to Africa's view, but theConference is now over and the heads of state are back in their capitals. InSouthern Rhodesia the white supremacists have finally rejected Britain's pleasand African solidarity on this issue is fragmented and weakened. Who knowswhat painful, bloody actions may take place before this new advance ofapartheid is once more beaten back. Yet this chapter of the history of Africa'sstruggle for freedom and unity ends on one note of hope. The tragedy 01November 11, 1965 makes is even more certain that decisive steps will betaken towards real African unity in 1966.

AT THE ACCRA SUMMIT, it was a considerable achievement for the proponentsof an all-Africa Union Government that they won three-quarters of thevotes cast on a motion calling for a Commission to examine the proposal thatan Executive Council of the OAU be set up. They did not win the votes oftwo-thirds of all members, present and absent, so the resolution could not beadopted. But there is real hope that at Addis Ababa in 1966 such anExecutive will be set up. 1965 has seen the matter thrashed out in the honest,frank discussion which characterised the Accra Summit, by happy contrastwith its two speech-laden predecessors. The Southern Rhodesian crisis mayhave spurred some of the less enthusiastic members towards a realisation ofthe need for an Executive arm to the OAU. It will certainly have strengthenedthe resolve of all its proponents. The illegal white supremacist governmentmay well still be in power in 1966, and a united African response t~ itschallenge to human liberty and dignity may be achieved. The real achieve­ment here will not be simply the wiping out of the humiliation of November11, ·1965, but the taking of the first resolute, combined step towards freeingthe eight captive states of southern Mrica from racist domination, direct orindirect. e

The childrenof rapeANTONIO DEFIGUEIREDO

ON 19TH MAY THIS YEAR a jury appointed by the PortugueseSociety of Writers and comprising five of Portugal's best authorsand literary critics, announced that the Society'S 1964 prize for" short-stories" had been awarded to Luuanda, a book of estoriasby Luandino Vieira. The author turns out to be Jose Vieira Mateusda Graca, an Angolan who is now serving a 14-year sentence at a

I penal camp in the islands of Cape Verqe, for political activitiesagainst the Portuguese state (of which Angola is only an " overseasprovince "). In view of this, the Government demanded that theaward be cancelled forthwith.

The jury, comprising the writers Pinheiro Torres, Manuel daFonseca, Augusto Abelaira, Gaspar Simoes and Fernanda Botelho,refused to yield to Government pressure and stood by their deci­sion. When the first-three-named members of the jury werearrested and the second two detained for questioning by the PIDE(Portuguese State Police), they firmly stated that they had actedwithin the laws, such as they are, and that it would be dishonour­able to Portuguese culture if a jury were to act as a board offunctionaries of repression.

This attitude of defiance enraged the regime. Two days afterthe jury's announcement, the Society's headquarters in Lisbonwere completely wrecked by a group of right-wing extremists; thePortuguese Minister of Education, Prof. Galvao Teles, declaredthe summary dissolution of the Society on grounds that the awardhad "deeply offended Portuguese sentiment"-an allusion to thefact that Portuguese troops have been engaged in fighting Angolannationalist guerillas since the outbreak of the movement for inde­pendence in 1961. At the same time the pro-Salazar press pub­lished entire pages of cables, letters and statements by individualand corporate supporters of the regime in Portugal, Angola andMozambique, violently accusing progressive intellectuals of treason­able activities and demanding that even sterner measures shouldbe taken to ensure that they abide by the regime's "PortugalUber Alles" edict. As was to be expected the scandal soon hadrepercussions outside Portugal, especially in Brazil and other LatinAmerican and Latin European countries more closely connectedwith the Portuguese literary scene.

IN A COUNTRY WHERE the Government, through a long establishedsystem of censorship of the daily press, has an almost absolutecontrol over the proportions that any given event is to assume~

many wonder whether there were ulterior motives on the part ofthe authorities to allow the incident over a literary prize to becomethe centre of national attention. The fact is that the authoritieswere only too willing to respond to the sponsored campaign ofpublic indignation. Over the past three months Portugal has seena concerted operation of intellectual repression on an unprecedentedscale~ extending to Angola and Mozambique. All bookshops andpublishers' stores, both in Portugal and the "overseas provinces"have been raided and an estimated 100,000 books confiscated;hundreds of titles by Portuguese and foreign authors have been

ANT 0 N I 0 D EFl G U E IRE D 0, secretary of the PortugueseDemocratic Movement in London, was deported from Mozam­bique in 1959 after spending 12 years there.

THE NEW AFRICAN/NOVEMBER 1965/203

The first crop of African writersand artists of Portuguese languageare, as much as Luandino Vieira'speople of the Luanda slums, theproduct of the Portuguese colonialviolation of Angola and Mozam­bique.

indexed; several prominent writers have been banned from con­tributing to cultural periodicals and newspapers; newspaper editorshave been prohibited from mentioning the proscribed authors byname, even in ordinary news dispatches.

As so often happens in such political circumstances the Govern­ment defeated its purpose. Luandino Vieira's works have indeed avery deep significance in the context of Afro-Portuguese culture.This is attested by the fact that he had been awarded several prizesbefore in his own country-actually one every year, since 1962.He had, curiously enough, been awarded Angola's own "MotaVeiga" literary Grand Prix in 1964, for this very book Luuanda,the prize having been handed to his family, as the author wasalready a prisoner of PIDE. But there can be no doubt that theevents relating to the dissolution of the Society of Writers havegiven to Luuanda a permanent place in the history of Afro­Portuguese culture and accelerated the process of internationalrecognition of what might well be the first major revelation of anAngolan literature.

IN SPITE OF THE PROPORTIONS and long duration of the Portuguese.Empire and the social and qIltural variety of its component parts,the literary scene in Portuguese African territories is insular andarid-a true reflection of the stifling nature of Portuguese colonial­ism. Traditionally the only major contribution of an Afro elementin Portuguese literature has been the poetry of the" creoles" ofCape Verde Islands-but then the Cape Verde Islands are offAfrica's mainland in more ways than one. Its culture is as half­caste as the majority of its 300,000 inhabitants whose societypresent a unique social phenomenon of relatively widespread educa­tion against a background of isolation, rich in misery and fertilein endemic famines. Up to 1960, in Portugal's two greatest"overseas provinces" of Angola and l\lozambique, literacy wasconfined to the local settler elite and to 1% only of the Africanpopulation. A few European writers concerned themselves withobserving the social problems of colonial environment and onlyCastro Soromenho, who lived in Angola, can be said to have risenabove the purely sociological interest of the literary essays of localEuropeans. The exceptional coloured poet tried to put across somemessage of social protest, but the total output of " African" poetsof all coloured shades, could produce no more than an interestinganthology. Curiously enough the only work of real standard com­ing from Portuguese African territories is the poetry of ReynaldoFerreira, a Portuguese settler in Louren~o Marques who died, stillyoung, in 1959. But then his poems could have been written inLisbon or anywhere in Europe; and the very fact that he lived inAfrica for most of his life, without showing any awareness of it, isperhaps significant in itself of the insidious apartheid that prevailedin Mozambique, a territory which is exposed to South Africaninfluence.

In later years, and partly owing to the emergence of a newgeneration of Africans whose education coincided with the nativistferment that agitated Portuguese African territories, Afro-Portu­guese poetry showed greater promise. Many coloured and a few

204/THE NEW AFRICAN/NOVEMBER 1965

Luuanda

q S I

2 "

LuandinoVieira

purely African poets, stimulated by the publishing endeavours ofthe Casa dos Estudantes do Ultramar (Overseas Students' Associa­tion) in Lisbon, or Angola's" Imbondeiro Collection ", made theirfirst gropings towards a cohesive Afro literature. A number ofpoets, like the Angolans Agostinho Neto and Mario de Andradeand the Mozambicans Jose Craveirinha and Malagantana Valente,gradually gained some recognition abroad.

The more mbitious prose works, however, remained beyond thegrasp of Mricans partly because the censorship of the press in­hibited them from making the first tentative steps, in the form ofshon stories and other literary essays, partly because the localeconomics of publishing offered no scope. So far only the Mozam­bican Luis Bernardo Honwana, the author of " Nos matamos 0 caotinhoso" (" We killed the mangy dog") has had a short storypublished abroad (in Richard Rive's anthology Modern AfricanProse, Heinemann Educational Books). Set against this barrenbackground, the work of Luandino Vieira offers the unique featureof being simultaneously the first major native revelation comingfrom Angola while having qualities comparable to the best Afro­American or Afro-European works of real international interest.

THE PRIZE-WINNING volume Luuanda is a selection of three often estorias concerned with life in the musseques, the poor quartersaround Luanda where, as elsewhere in Portuguese Africa, the realsocial and racial encounter between Europeans and Africans takesplace. Luandino Vieira's usage of the local Afro-Portuguese patois,consisting not only of a mixture of Portuguese and native words,but of a picturesque corruption of both, is reflected in the phoneticemphasis in the book's title Luuanda, as well as in the term estorias-which is a simplification of the word historias, curiously nearthe English word stories, used by the author to define the literaryform of his cameos of life among his people.

The first estoria " Grandma Xixi and grandson Zeca Santos" isvery revealing of Luandino Vieira's compassionate grasp of thesubtle routine forms of human suffering resulting from socialpoverty and neglect. This, as well as the other estorias, is not basedon single dramatic events for the lives of the poor in the mussequesdo not usually afford such highlights. The quality of melancholyunderstatement one finds echoed in certain stories by such writersas Alan Sillitoe and in certain modern films, is a natural gift ofLuandino Vieira's. His compelling pictorial style is revealed in theway he takes us into the world of Grandma Xixi and her adoles­cent grandson, in the first paragraphs of their estoria:

For over two months no rain had fallen and all around themusseque the little children of the November grass, young andgreen, were dressed with a red dust skin spread by the warmwinds and the jeeps of the patrols speeding through the streetsand alleys that the straggling huts designed at random. So,when Grandma, at the door of her hut, felt the beginnings ofthe hot winds which did not want to blow as fast as they usedto, the neighbours heard her muttering to the grandson, thatperhaps two days would not pass without rain. The morning ofthat day had been born with clouds, grey at the start, black andwild later, mounting over the musseque and all people agreed

with Grandma Xixi, she had warned them before going intotOWD, with her short and agile step of seventy years, that waterwas coming without doubt.

Showers had come down twice that morning.First an enraged gale threw itself against the clouds, shuffl­

ing them, making them run from the sea over the Kuanza andback from the Kuanza over the town of Mbengu. In the back­yards and doorsteps, seeing such movements, people were won­dering if the real rain were coming or if it was another trickas in the last two days when the clouds would gather only tohave the wind come and swat them away. True enough Grand­ma Xixi had warned them and her old woman's wisdom neverlied, but all they could see was the same hot, crazed, somersault­ing wind, scattering bits of paper, dead leaves and rubbish, andcausing spirals of dust to dance in the streets and then the womenwould slam the windows and doors in the wind's face and keeptheir children close, for as they said that madness of the windbrought with it bad luck and diseases from the witchdoctors.The estoria of Grandma Xixi and grandson Zeca Santos is

simple enough. While Grandma was doing her chores in the hutZeca Santos burst suddenly in at the door as if he were makinga casual social call. She is half expecting him and she knows whathe is up to. Soon he asks her for lunch. He obviously is withoutmoney again; and she wonders whether he is just not loafingaround, trying to impress the girls with the colourful shirt onwhich he spent too big a portion of his last wages. In her Grandmagoodness she scolds him for not looking for work. She asks whyhe has not gone to see Mas' Sousa, the local Portuguese shop­keeper who might have advanced them some food on account ofwages if Zeca worked in the petrol station. At first Zeca Santosis reluctant to talk about Mas' Sousa. Later, trying to stop Grand­ma from nagging him, he decides to provide her with proof thathe had been to see Mas' Sousa. He rolls his shirt and shows themark of a whip lash on his back. And then, still baffled by someconfused event, he tells her of what had happened when he wentto see Mas' Sousa.

He welcomed him with a friendly smile, and even put hishand on Zeca's shoulder when he said:

"... but of course! For the son of Joao Ferreira I alwayshave something. And how is Grandma? Tell her she shouldnot be ashamed ... the bill is small, she can still come ..."

Mas' Sousa then disappeared inside the store shed, dragginghis big belly inside his dirty shirt, and Zeca Santos stood outsidegazing absent-mindedly at the petrol tank, with his big drumand measuring handle, not automatic like those down town, nosir. And he saw the two yellow glasses, each measuring fivelitres ...

"I swear Grandma, I swear I didn't do nothing, I didn'tsay nothing! I had only asked him if I could work at the station,measuring the petrol-nothing else. It was only to eat, and toget food in advance, Grandma!

"And Mas' Sousa was smiling, he was saying yes, sir-Iwas the son of loao Ferreira-a good man! And then I don'tknow what happened Grandma! "

Zeca Santos wanted to cry, he felt his eyes fill with water,[continued on page 206

THE NEW AFRICAN/NOVEMBER 1965/20!5

For Nat NakasaKATHLEEN CONWELLI

Nat Nakasa, South African journalist,worked on Post and Drum, 70hannesburgand was founding editor of The Classic.He went to Harvard University in 1964on a Nieman Fellowship for Journalism.In terms of the South African exit permitwhich enabled him to take up the fellow­ship, he was forbidden to return to SouthAfrica. He was supporting himself byfree-lance journalism in New Yark whenhe committed suicide there in July 1965.We reprint with grateful acknowledgmentKathleen Conwell's letter to The HarvardCrimson, 11th October 1965.

THIS IS A LETTER for and to NathanielNakasa from a friend who perhaps knewhim very well in some ways and not wellat all in others. That is not important.What is important is that his death, hisdecision at some point to take his own life,be understood.

Nat Nakasa came to America with adream. All that he had learned about thiscountry while in South Africa had givenhim the hope of freedom here. He knewabout the problems of the American Negro,but what he had read and heard about hadmade him believe that the Americangovernment was in all sincerity and honestyattempting to redress these grievances. Heonce said to me that when he came toAmerica, for the first time in his life hecould let himself dream things he had never'even dared to think about while he was inSouth Africa. He said he was like a childwhen he first came here, full of the excite­ment of being able to walk freely, stay outas late as he wanted-simple things that wetake for granted were all adventures forhim.

And then the dream broke, crumbled,really, in the subtle way that America hasof letting things, crumble for the sensitive.He always had several speaking engage­ments: social clubs, churches; everyonewanted to know about South Africa. Heonce said that he felt like a puppet danglingfrom a string-he was invited to speak sothat people could hear horror stories, theugliness of South Africa: "What do thewhite people there do to Africans?" Itwas always the same question: "Tell uswhat it feels like to be South African." Forwe Americans like to assuage our guilt byhaving listened to the horror of another'sexistence. We like to think that we havereally contributed something if we havelistened to all the gruesome details; it is akind of flagellation. It is what sends someof us to the Selmas and Albany, Georgiasof our own country: it enables us to refuseto look inside-to refuse that realisationthat when we ask a Nat Nakasa to recountthe horror of South Africa we have madehim into an object.

We have said, we will invite you to studyat Harvard, or we will invite you to speakat our social hour and in that way we willhave fulfilled our responsibility to allblackness.

AND NAT NAKASA KNEW THIS, and it killedhim. When he came back from the South,something had broken inside him. I sawhim constantly for two or three days afterhis return, and he was in great pain. Hetried, tried so hard to write an honest storyabout the South, because he had perceivedthere the real tragedy of the AmericanNegro. He knew that no magazine wouldtouch what he had to write. He knew that

what this society has done to the AmericanNegro was far more terrible than whatSouth Africa was doing to the Black SouthAfrican. Late one night during these daysimmediately following his return he said tome: "Kathy, when I was there, there weremoments when I wanted to bow to a tenantfarmer in Alabama, because I understoodthe miracle of his survival. They took awayhis identity and yet he has survived. InSouth Africa we have a culture that haslasted for generations; we have a language;we are a people; we are grounded in some­thing solid. But they took everything awayfrom you, everything, and yet that tenantfarmer still gets up in the morning, theblack man in Harlem still rides the subway."

Perhaps few of us, I know it is difficultfor me, can understand what it is to bewithout a country: to perceive and strugglefor the simple truths that most of us neverallow to exist within us, and be strangled bya society that cannot stand truth. Perhapswe can never fully sympathise with hisdecision, because we have never gone thatfar down in our own souls. But Nat Nakasawanted to give something to the world,wanted desperately to give Black people asense of their value, and not in the serviceof any doctrine of Black Supremacy, butbecause he knew that if people were torelate honestly, each person in the relation­ship must have a sense of his own worth, ofthe value of the way he has used his life.Without that, there is always a master-slavementality-the kind of master-slave men­tality that unconsciously rules all therelationships between black and white inthis Society. He once said he wanted tomake a movie, and he described it thus:" I want to make a movie so powerful thata black man will come in slumped down,the way he has been taught to live slumpedover, but midway he will begin to sit upstraight, and by the time he leaves he willbe walking with his head high."

I salute you Nat Nakasa, because I be­lieve you lived bravely. I ask, too, that theworld mourn your dying, and if it cannotseek its own soul far enough to mourn you,that it respect the effort of your living. Ifwe can do that for you, Nat, then perhapswe can begin the kind of honest inquiryinto our own lives that must precede anytrue communion between the races. e

206/THE NEW AFRICAN/NOVEMBER 1965

.Luuanda

continued from page 204]but his rage was big and hot, as hot as the crack of the rhino­whip on his back, and the heat of his rage dried his tears insidehis eyes, and would not let them come out.

" ... he then thrashed me, I don't know why Grandma!I had done nothing! Then, as I was running away, he startedshouting after me that he was going to report me to the policepost, because I was a thief like Matias, who had stolen moneyfrom the petrol station when he worked there ..."

" Ih! But is that boy still in jail, is he? "" Yes, Grandma - it was Mas' Sousa who handed him to

the police. And he was still shouting after me son of terrorist,that he would charge me too . . . that there was no more food for

bandits - no more tick!"

WHEN GRANDMA WAS FINALLY CONVINCED that Zeca was not justtelling another of his stories, even her permanent good and warmhumour gave way to the sad noise of the rain falling on the zincroofs as they both sat silent for a time. Suddenly as if to shakeoff the gloomly atmosphere, she goes to unwrap a parcel, announc­ing that she has some food in store. Zeca, watching her movements,realises that she must have gone to collect scraps of food fromthe down-town dustbins - but by then he is too hungry andtoo weak for pride.

" Zeca, look my boy ! It looks as if these small roots are manioc.And see this orange, you see, my boy! I found it for you ..."

Zeca knew she just wanted to take the edge off his hunger andhe saw her old and bent body, sucked dry by life and the tropicalmist, under the fine rain, her hands full of callouses groping inthe dustbins of down-town. The oranges she had brought with herwere all rotten, one could save a small piece from each, and thosemanioc roots . . .

Without even knowing what was happening, Zeca jumpedup pushed Grandma aside, and without thinking any more, beforetears come to his eyes again, he burst out of the hut and shoutedback in a shocking voice, as if he had gone mad:

"They are dahlias, granny! They are flowers, the roots offlowers."

The door, swollen with rain, did not fit back into theframe. It banged once, twice, and then it swung creaking, as ifit were mourning Zeca's departure, as if it were also sad.Grandma Xixi stood in the middle of the dark smoky hut, look­ing at the door, still holding in her trembling hands the dahliaroots, and shaking her head from side to side as if she were apuppet in a shop-window.Luandino Viera's empathetic grasp of the plight of those who

live in the no man's land of Angola'S main racial, class and cul­tural divisions, is shown by the fact that the characters whoseestorias he tells are inarticulate about their own social condition.The points of reference provided by the better living in down-town,as much as the everyday difficulties they might have to face, aretaken for granted as more or less a matter of luck. When wenext meet Zeca Santos he is trying to flirt with the girls or he isroaming around with his pals, always being careful in his walksto see the effect of his colourful shirts reflected in shop windows.

The critical social comment in the following two estorias isperhaps even more subtle. "The estoria of the parrot and thethief" resembles a popular tale. It concerns "a certain Lomelinodos Reis, Dosreis to his friends and ex-Lolo to the girls" whois caught with seven stolen fat and live ducks by the Police, anddescribes his funny and shrewd way of getting along with the" law." "The estoria of the chicken and the egg" lives off the oldhousewives' dispute as to who is the rightful owner of the egglaid in one's backyard by someone else's chicken, especially whenthe owner of the chicken happens to be an unfriendly neighbour.But then such an old story is enacted very effectively in themusseque where both a lot of people and a few chickens live incramped promiscuity - and where, any way, there is a perennialshortage of eggs. But ultimately the impression left by Luuanda isthat although poverty might be suffered gaily, it might well bepoverty itself that is the opium of the poor.

AT ONE STAGE IN HIS YOUNG LIFE Luandino Vieira's desperationwith the condition of his people must have reached a point whenhe thought that literature was not enough. In 1960 he set out tojoin Angola's Movimento Popular de Libertacao (MPLA) whichwas clandestinely led from headquarters in Luanda by some of hisschool friends. It turned out, however, that Luandino Vieira'spolitical skill did not match his literary talent.

The sentence of 14 years imprisonment pronounced by Angola'sSupreme Military Court on 24th October 1964, contains indict­ments that might not even be easily understood in democraticcountries, where some of Luandino Vieira's actions would not beillegal. The findings of the Court are as follows: (a) that theaccused received on the 4th February, 1961, from a Mr RossanBrandao, a report on the social and economic conditions obtainingin Angola at the time, which was critical of Portuguese colonial(sic) policy, a report which the accused translated into Englishand later handed to a BBC reporter in Leopoldville, having sent.a copy of the Portuguese original to Argentine for publication inthe magazine Principios; (b) that Luandino Vieira tried to come toLondon to establish contact with the Angolan rebel leader Viriatoda Cruz, his projects being frustrated owing to the fact that hecould not obtain a pasport; (c) that he planned to organise a newmovement called "New Angola," set up a clandestine printingpress and radio station and acquire plastic bombs to scare (sic)the authorities; (d) that he visited Lisbon where he received acopy of the " Manifesto of the MPLA," several copies of a maga­zine called Tribuna Livre and a report on alleged desertions fromthe Portuguese Army - all this at an encounter with another ofthe accused in which each of them used one half of the samebox of matches, previously sent by other contacts, a sign ofidentification; (e) that he wrote to the Angolan exile Mr CostaAndrade, then living in Italy, a full account of his conspiratorialprojects (in a letter that might have been intercepted by PIDE,though we are not told of this).

For the experienced politician, who is well aware that thePortuguese regime is made up of men who never forgave the"'Dutch for not having killed Gutenberg before he invented the

prlnnng press, Luandino Vieira's indictment is a sure indicationthat he is the type of naive idealist on whom the PIDE ventsthe rage and frustration left by the many really feared rebels whoescape their net.

It is, however, significant that Luandino Vieira should haveaspired to become a member of MPLA, rather than of any ofthe other Angolan liberation movements that have emerged before,during, and since, the outbreak of actual fighting. Leaving asidepurely partisan considerations, and without wanting to impute anyillegitimacy to the nationalist stand taken by other groups, MPLAis by far the most interesting of Angolan political phenomena.Its origins date back to the middle fifties and although its naturalcourse was altered through the influence of political events inthe rest of Africa, and especially in the Congo, in the earlysixties, the fact is that MPLA is still deeply rooted in the embryoof a new Angola that was born of the long and painful contactbetween Portuguase and Africans. It was actually first organisedinside the musseques of Luanda. The significance of LuandinoVieira's work goes beyond the literary analogies of style and atti­tude one could find between his work and that of Portugal's Aqui­lino Ribeiro and Brazil's Jorge Amado or even the semblancebetween the musseques and the morros of Brazilian towns. Luan­dino Vieira's two published books A cidade e a infancia andI~uuanda are not only the revelation of an incipient Angolan culturebut also its product.

THE QUESTION OF WHETHER PORTUGUESE colonialism has producedan Afro-Portuguese culture in Angola and Mozambique, is oftenobscured by the primary political nature of the arguments putforward by either the critics or the apologists of Portuguese rule.Normally the arguments of the critics tend to be confined to theruthless social exploitation of Africans, the long process of evolu­tion from the slavery system to insidious forms of forced labour,besides which all other sociological features seem irrelevant; onthe other hand the apologist will unconvicingly use the contrastprovided by apartheid and racial segregation, to make of the non­racialist character of Portuguese legislation a propaganda asset.

Such propaganda- takes two main forms. One is expressed in theofficial literature that pours out from the Government's institutionswhereby the Portuguese were somehow endowed with an uniquehistorical - almost racial - vocation for harmonious contact withpeoples of all colours and creeds. This has been effectively con­tradicted by Professor C. R. Boxer, of King's College, LondonUniversity in his studies of Portuguese colonialism (Race Relationsin the Portuguese Colonial Empire, O.U.P., 1963) and by boththe American Professor James Duffy, author of PortugueseAfrica, and the British writer Basil Davidson. The other line ofapology, more elaborate in analysis and encompassing Brazil andother territories of Portuguese language, is found in the theoriesof "Luso (Portuguese)-Tropicalism" advanced by the Braziliansociologist Gilberto Freyre. These have been discussed by Pro­fessor Marvin Harris, of Columbia University, New York, inPortugal's African Wards.

According to Professor Freyre there exists a distinct "Luso-

THE NEW AFRICAN/NOVEMBER 1965/207-

Tropical World" made up of the multiracial lands which are,or formerly were, parts of the Portuguese Empire. In a study visitto the " Portuguese tropical world," as well as in his native Brazil,a former Portuguese colony, Professor Freyre has never found theracial antagonisms that prevail among other peoples, especiallyin the United States, South Africa or in Asian and African terri­tories formerly ruled by the British, the Germans or the Dutch.

Progressive Portuguese intellectuals share the view that boththe regime's propaganda and Gilberto Freyre's theories rely on twowrong premises. First, such theories are based on a comparisonin negatives.

It is apartheid that is an offence to human dignity, not racialtolerance to Africans in their- own land that is a positive virtue.The very concept of tolerance is still a reflection of a deeplyingrained belief in one's own racial superiority. Moreover, thosevictimised by the insidious forms of racial discrimination thatexist in Angola and Mozambique only know and react to theirown environment - they lack the points of reference of the eruditeand much travelled theorists to derive any comfort from theirfindings.

It would appear, however, that the process of cultural miscegena­tion is not incompatible with the phenomenon of social exploita­tion; nor does it run strictly along the boundaries of race andcolour. Owing to a conjunction of negative social factors manyPortuguese immigrants are resigned to living in the multiracial peri­pheries around the centre of trade and industry dominated bywhites, while being unable to afford the economic luxuries ofapartheid. The coexistence that ensues has resulted in the emerg­ence of an elite of exponents of an embryonic multi-r~cial culture.It is significant that Agostinho Neto, Malangatana Valente, LuisHonwana are pure blacks; Mario de Andrade, Jose Craveirinha,Viriato Cruz are mulattos; Luandino Vieira, like the Mozambicanpoet VirgiIio de Lemos, now exiled in Paris, happens to be a purewhite.

However the striking affinity between such men is that theyare all, in one way or another, linked with African liberationmovements. Moreover they have all been persecuted by thePortuguese Government. While Luandino Vieira is in a concentra­tion camp in the Cape Verde Islands, Jose Craveirinha, Malanga­tana Valente and Luis Honwana are now in jail in LourencoMarques awaiting trial on charges of belonging to Frelimo, Mozam­bique's Liberation Movement; Agostinho Neto, Mario de Andradeand Viriato Cruz, are now exiled leaders of the Angolan liberationmovement and, like Virgilio de Lemos, were all former prisonersof PIDE. '

This seems to epitomise the drama of Portuguese colonial rule.The first crop of African artists and writers of Portugueselanguage, are not the children of the happy, legitimate marriagebetween Portuguese and natives, of the official Government pro­paganda. Such a marriage never took place. Nor are they even thechildren of the natural love implied in Professor Freyre's theoriesof racial interco~rse in the tropics. They, as much as the people ofthe musseques, are the children of rape - the casual, inevitable,creatures, of a long Portuguese colonial violation of the oppressedpeoples of Angola and Mozambique. Ultimately the ruthless re­pression they suffer is an expression of guilt and fear. e

20S/THE NEW AFRICAN/NOVEMBER 1965

COMMENT

This Emphasison Freedom

N. E. R.Mwakasungula

AFRICAN GOVERNMENTS IfAVE REALISEDthat the best way in which democracy canbe achieved, democracy which matchesAfrican culture and personality, is a one­party system. In a typical African one­party state the one party is no longer aparty in the normal sense but a nationalmovement.

There are two reasons why it is thoughtin the West that one-party democracy can'twork. Firstly, very unfortunately too manypeople are addicted to social formulae towhich they give the same rigidity as mathe­matical formulae, a thing which is totallywrong.

Social conditions do change, so what isgood today may not be good tomorrow.People behave differently under the sameconditions. Therefore any attempt at get­ting an all the time correct political formu­la is not right.

Secondly, these hostile critics of Africa,with all their cunning, have failed to realisethe conditions which made nearly allAfrican States tend to one-party systemsand yet retain their democracy.

All ex-colony African States were at warwith their colonisers, constantly fighting fortheir independence. It is a general principleuniversally accepted that during wardifferences of different parties should beburied for national interests.

States which neglect this fact sufferserious consequences. Kenya's independencewas delayed mainly because people indifferent parties failed to get together for acommon goal which was independence.

Zimbabwe People's Republic is stillsuffering the same thing to this day. Theleaders are not prepared to come togetherfor a common purpose. When the timecomes to realise this they will have foughthalf the battle against the imperialists.

In certain countries even after indepen­dence when parties fail to forget their bitterdifferences to consolidate their efforts todevelop their country and to form a stablegovernment, chaos reigns. This was the casewith the Congo Republic (Leopoldville).

After getting independence the war doesnot stop there. The. day when imperialists

N. E. R. M W A K A SUN G U L A writesfrom the District Court, Kilosa, T an­zania.

leave the country, on the same day theyenter it through the back door bringingwith them wors.e type of imperialism or theso-called Neo-Colonialism.

So at all times the Africans must beunited in their states or else they becomeprey to the colonialists again and the hardwon independence becomes meaningless.

WHAT A TRUE AFRICAN PATRIOT has to tellis that democracy, like belief in God, canbe achieved through different ways. Hindus,Buddhists, Moslems, Christians and thelike can go to heaven provided that theyare faithful to their respective religions.But too often you hear one religion sayingthe other one is wrong! Who is rightthen?

Similarly, democracy can be achieved byhaving one party, more than one party oreven in a partyless state.

Not all Hindus or Christians will go toheaven merely by virtue of being Hindus orChristians. Those who will go will go be­cause apart from being Hindus or Christiansthey believed and behaved themselves assuch.

Similarly, not every so-called multi­party or one-party democratic governmentwill be democratic merely by virtue of be­ing so-called. But it will be democraticbecause the leaders of that state followdemocratic ways.

I need not list some multi-party stateswhich call themselves democratic but are infact fascist in the literal sense. Yet ourcritics persistently pose the question, " Arethese one-party states in Africa reallydemocratic ? " Dear imperialist, theanswer is simple. If democracy means theexistence of opposition parties it is No, butif democracy means government by repre­sentatives freely elected by the people theanswer is a jubilant Yes.

To test whether an African one-partystate is really democratic one has toexamine if the instruments of democracydo exist. These instruments are freeperiodical elections, free discussions, free­dom of worship, freedom of speech andfreedom of association. The emphasis is onthe word free.

In addition to these one has to see if

~np ls2uow~ ds!wo.ldwo:) JO l!-I!ds ~ S! ~Jdql

members of the community.

IN NONE OF THE ONE-PARTY AFRICAN statesdoes the constitution, which apparently isthe bible of the state, enact that there willbe no free periodical elections. Tanzanialast month had its General Elections inwhich three former Ministers and six juniorMinisters and several other Parliamentarianswere dropped out. If there was any coercionthen all the Ministers should have beenreturned or directly nominated.

In none does the government say worshipshould be this or that. Paradoxically veryimportant believers in multi-party demo­cracy go as far as saying that members ofcertain Christian sects shall not, by con­stitutional enactment or should not bypractice, be heads of state. In such a statean ambitious citizen may abandon his choiceof sect if he foresees the chances of leader­ship.

Certainly in such a state the freedom ofworship is conditional. Look at Ghana,Guinea, Liberia, Tunisia or Kenya if sucha thing exists, even indirectly.

The one-party system works better inAfrica because it is essentially based onAfrican tradition which calls for a deeperspirit of compromise and goodwill amongstits community. This compromise is so im­portant because without it Africa will goback to multi-party democracy in whichpeople, through lack of compromise, go tothe Parliament to oppose for the sake ofopposition because they believe their mainjob is to differ and create differences. Thisis their work and they do it and get paid forit! This, as President Nyerere says, is amockery of democracy. There is no pointin going to Parliament knowing very wellthat you are going to disagree.

It would be extremely difficult to con­vince a one-party African State that demo­cracy is better practised in multi-partystates when they know very well that SouthAfrica, Southern Rhodesia and other stateswhere people are denied their right to votehave many parties and yet have govern­ments which are based on minority rulewhich is not representative of the people.It will not take long before others realisethat Africa is right and therefore they maycome to change their attitude and probablyin the long run adopt the same practice. e

THE NEW AFRICAN/NOVEMBER 1965/209-----------"This sideof eternity"

An appeal tothe United Nations:Special Committeeon Apartheid on behalfof Mangaliso RobertSobukwe

A.B.NGCOBO

THE STORY OF MY COUNTRY is a story of grief, a story of want, astory of hunger, homelessness, a story of torture, and a story ofendless persecution.

There is yet another aspect to it. Its glorious side is the greatstory of resistance, the story of heroes, past and present-the storyof service, of sacrifice, of suffering.

Our struggle against foreign domination started on the very daythe white man landed on the shores of South Africa, appropriatingto himself vast tracts of land.

The first African victims were the Khoikhoin and the Bathwapeople who were renamed Hottentots and Bushmen. They foughtheroically until they were overpowered. Then came the Bantu­speaking Africans who, for over a hundred years, fought heroicallyin defence of shrines of their gods and the ashes of their fathers.They fought on the hills, they fought in the valleys, they fought inforests and on the plains. Yes, they fought everywhere.

This chapter of our history constitutes a glorious episode andaffords one mental and psychological relief. Epics have yet to bewritten about it. When we look back into the corridors of historyand see these heroes, we feel proud to have come out of theirloins. We are the heirs of that great tradition. How can we notfeel proud that we are heirs of great historical figures like Tshaka,Hintsa and Moshoeshoe? What of Cetshwayo, Sekhukhune andMgungunyane. They stood and faced fearful odds and in truetradition, they chose to die on their feet than to live on their knees.In this galaxy of names, you find the names of Dingane, Mzilikaziand Makhanda. In the great book of history, the pages that printtheir accounts shall be read with great relish by the generations thatfollow, for the names of these men have vindicated our very exist­ence and have inspired men to action.

It is not out of romanticism that I have mentioned these greatnames. I have done so to bring to your notice another name withas great a potential.

I speak of Mangaliso Robert Sobukwe-President of the Pan­Africanist Congress and national leader of our people. He is con­fined to Robben Island prison under clause 4 of the General LawAmendment Act of 1963,. After completing his three year sentence,he was further imprisoned on this notorious island.

He had been earlier found guilty by the mock courts of SouthAfrica of having organised and marshalled the nation into a posi­tive campaign against the Pass Laws-when more than 700,000people responded. It is the same campaign that led the Broeder­bond-indoctrinated police to open fire at unarmed people inSharpeville and Langa, where there were brutal massacres. This isnow part of universally known history.

Sobukwe is the only man who has been held and imprisonedwithout trial under this obnoxious clause. According to the settlerMinister of Justice he is held till "this side of eternity".

Mr. Chairman, Sir, my petition is that this man must be set free.

MANGALISO SOBUKWE was born in the Cape Province at the small

A. B. N G COB 0, treasurer-general of the ·Pan-Africanist con­gress (South Africa), addressed the U.N. Special Committee onApartheid on 19th April, 1965. His statement has been curtailedand slightly adapted here.

town of Graaff Reinet on 5th December 1924 of very poor parents.He was the last born in a family of boys.

During his childhood days, he realised and felt the pangs ofoppression, exploitation and degradation. He has vivid memoriesof the days of his youth. He remembers well, his parents wakingup hours before dawn and returning long after dusk from heavytasks they had to undertake to ensure one meal a day for the family."The only time I used to see my parents in broad daylight wason Sundays" he used to state afterwards. He himself was put toonerous duties during the day. He grew up to be a tough man-aman who could take it. Although he never enjoyed perfect healthduring his childhood days, upon entering school, he became a verygood sportsman. In 1943-4, he held the lawn tennis championship(African) for the whole of South Africa.

His parents could hardly afford to keep him long in school. Hetook the post-primary teacher's diploma. Before he could completeit, he was down for the greater part of the year with a chest ail­ment. But when he eventually wrote his examinations, he secureda first place in the first class. This was the beginning of his manyfirsts in life.

Because of his outstanding achievement, he was offered a scholar­ship to proceed to high school. He matriculated in the first classand proceeded to Fort Hare University College on another scholar­ship. His ability and personality quickly earned him the leadershipof the Youth League on the campus and presidency of the StudentsRepresentative Council.

In 1948, he was acclaimed throughout the country fot an end­of-term speech he delivered in his capacity as President of theStudents Council. He vividly analysed the situation and as early asthat, he urged that positive action be implemented. This speechcost him his scholarship.

As a Youth Leaguer, he had by now become a household name.In December 1949, he piloted the 1949 "Programme of Action"through the Annual Conference of the African National Congress.This programme was militant and for a time generated dynamismwithin Congress. That year he was elected Secretary-General ofthe A.N.C. Youth League and became an ex officio member of theNational Executive of the A.N.e.

In 1952, he participated in the Defiance Campaign-this costhim his teaching job. He could not get employment for a longtime-until he was recommended to take up a lectureship inAfrican linguistics at the University of the Witwatersrand.

After the Defiance Campaign, he and many others felt that themilitant Programme of 1949 was being sacrificed and compromisedon ideological grounds.

At this stage of his life, he wrote prolifically in a newsletter heedited, The Africanist. He emerged as the chief protagonist ofAfrican nationalism as the only vehicle to a nonracial Africanistdemocracy on a continental basis. He wrote, " All people who havemade Africa their home must adjust themselves to an extent where, Africa for the Africans' suggests no menace to them. Failure todo this would mean that they have not yet accepted Africa as theirhome."

Some of his fellow African nationalists with whom he had cam­paigned at school fell by the wayside. He held his head up andwent on.

210/THE: NEW AFRICAN/NOVEMBER 1965

IIWe Swallow Pallid Grief

and Gape at Black 11

LEOPOLDVILLE, CONGO

We swallow pallid grief and gape at black,tyrannise the torturers, newly singingof the terror and the poisoned blood;

gather the armies caked hard with bloodwhere they pulled down the rage of black;command the children now done singing,

to take pistols and tears, squeeze the singingbullets through the air to hustle bloodfrom peace, from wounds once only black.

PAUL THEROUX

The Hindoo Crematorium

MOMBASA, KENYAThe huge roof on posts crouchedover pits and patient stone, groinedarches stained with soot and greasysmoke,· the assistants squatting

on the steps, passing a thin cigarette;and lush below the fire-pits, arches,flowers, grass, even trees receivingthe ashes supposedly flu~hed to the ocean

The only movement: me following twochildren; whole fistfuls of ribsthey gave me, burned teeth, innocentgifts, the chalky lumps of jaws;

the three of us scooping the cuspedskull-scraps caught in heaps nearthe sea on the bunches of flowers;crunching through the ashes, going among

the bones.PAUL THEROUX

At the inaugural Conference of the Pan-Africanist Congress,where he was unanimously elected President, he postulated thebasic policy of the P.A.C. . .

" Politically we stand for government of the Mncans, by the Africansand for the Africans, with all those who owe their only loyalty toMrica and accept democratic rule of an African majority being regardedas Africans."

In the same vein, he continued,"We guarantee no minority rights because we are fighting preciselythat group exclusiveness which those who plead for minority rightswould like to perpetuate."

He continued," It is our view that if we guaranteed individual liberties, we have giventhe highest guarantee necessary and possible."

This is the sort of man the South African settler authorities incar-cerate and hold in prison without trial.

YOUR PETITIONER HAS THE HONOUR to be the last person outsideprison to have been with Sobukwe. My sojourn with him in Pre­toria Prison for the greater part of two years was a period of learn­ing, which I shall never regret.

To work with him is a pleasure and to serve him is an honour.His presence in prison animated us and boosted our morale.

A humble and unassuming man. Although whilst a lecturer atWitwatersrand University, he could have had a life of comfort, hedid not. He led a simple life-travelling third class by train everyday.

When he was arraigned before the courts in 1960, he refused toenter a plea, thus refusing to recognise its authority over him."The law I am charged under is a law made by the white manand administered by him." He refused to associate himself withwhite man's dirty work. "If the white man wishes to do his dirtywork, let him do so, but he must expect no co-operation from me­my hands must be clean of it," he protested.

He was taken from Pretoria to Robben Island and when askedwhat he felt about it he said stoically, " If you want freedom, youmust be prepared to suffer for it ".

This man is the conscience of my country-without him we area people whose conscience is wanting.

It is over five years that he has been in prison. Since 21st March1960, he has been behind prison bars. He has been in prison thelongest period to date fqr any politico in South Africa.

He has a family-a young courageous wife, Veronica Zodwa, andfour children. One girl Thoko (Joy) 12, a boy, Dinilesizwe (sacri­fice for the nation) IQ-what a prophetic name. Then there arethe twins, 8, Dedanizizwe (give us a breather ye nations) andDalindyebo (creator of plenty).

This is his family and if they were here, they would associatethemselves with the prayer of your petitioner that Sobukwe mustbe released.

The South African Government suspended the " 90-day" clausebut left clause 4, which affects Sobukwe.

Some people thought the suspension of the " 90-day" clause wasa sincere manifestation of good will on the part of the SouthAfrican Government. Why then did they not release Sobukwe-aman who like the "90-day" detainees has never been brought totrial?

How long, 0 Lord, holy and kind? e

the yellow and fat chrysanths in the green bottleare now naked and gray (the dogs are blind)every poem begins like this about flowers about dogsand tries to plant its symbol with my handssymbols of my wizened heap of cellsdragged out of house and kneaded by the space aroundto grin a mouth- shrivelled into a little hunchbacked clay.But it is not clay, nor is it dustbut bones blood veins and hairand what had love, could laugh and copulateinto a body the pure scare of life,that could howl and walk and then lie downtill this false light commandeered the eyetill chrysanthemums stank, till they were slimythe water tight and green with mud . ...fold over, sweet water, not the guts of plantstold to cover the watcher's painand damp this fearthis hairless angel that whites by the glass

BREYTEN BREYTENBACH

THE QUALITY OF THE PAPERS was, to put itin a pleasantly ambiguous way, astounding!It was comforting to hear from the chairmanon the very last day that he found thecontributions of a very high quality, that thewhole mess of pottage was going to be servedup as a book. Accordingly if this conferenceseemed to me somehow irrelevant to theurgencies of the race question, (for instancethe growing tendencies toward "Colour­Maoism" not only in the third world butamong many American Negroes), thisanthology will presumably have the salutaryeffect of presenting authoritative informa­tion on the subject of race: Mr. EzekielMphahlele still serving up his favourite dishon negritude; Mr. Louis Lomax telling usall it needs to dethrone Dr. Verwoerd isthat American Negroes should march in thestreets of New York!

When the West Indian writer, Mr. E. R.Braithwaite, warned in a very passionatelanguage that a racial storm was about tobreak in Britain, I followed this by a re­mark to the chairman, Mr. Robert K. A.Gardiner of Ghana during recess in whichI suggested Braithwaite had done very well.Mr. Gardiner seemed very impatient: "Idon't think he is right. We are not hereto discuss tactics; we are only tryinp; tounderstand the race problem." It was leftto CoHn Legum, an invited observer, andDr. Edward Shils, the American sociologist,to express their misgivings about the failureof this conference to come to grips withurgent race problems such as SouthernAfrica, most likely to go up in flames in thenear future. Legum expressed astonishmentthat a conference such as this one hadpresented no paper on Chinese intentions,their attitudes to colour and their successesor failures in the political field. Perhaps itwas for this reason that the chairman of theday, Mr. Gardiner dismissed CoHn Le~as " a self-appointed critic." . _

FOR JEREMY SENTILLI

LEWIS NKOSIreports on theSeptember 1965Conference ontRace and Colourat Copenhagen

THE NEW AFRICAN/NOVEMBER 1965/211._ ••••••••••••••_ window; stared at the river and the island

across and the massive drawbridge periodi­cally lifting to allow the barges to steamunder. "Because I'm Negro white peoplelook at me and assume that I'm a gooddancer. This always amuses me because Isimply can't dance. I may be a Negro butI just can't dance very well...." Oneknows the joke, if one may call it that;where white liberals are gathered solemnlyto discuss the race problem such jokes arethe stock-in-trade of the Negro intellectuals.Unfailingly, the joke, pale as it has become,always draws laughs. What is even moreunendurable is that if one has attended thesame parties with Mr. Louis Lomax, whobrought the house down resoundingly withthis particular one, it is impossible not toremember that he has told it before. Listen­ing to speakers like these, witty, glamorous,certainly knowledgeable, one felt that anincalculable joke had been perpetrated uponus; for wasn't this being back at someschool debate in which jokes were carefullyplanted at the right places, properly workedout and timed with split second precision!

From the sixteenth floor window of theEuropa one stared at the river and theisland across and the massive drawbridgewhich lifted periodically to allow the bargesto steam under. About twenty or morescholars, writers and observers, ,all carryingglamorous names some of which appearregularly on the covers of glossies, sat in theconference room analysing the whys andwherefores' of racial hate. "If Mr. PhilipMason will take it upon himself to repre­sent the whole of Britain, I'll be glad toleave him to answer...."

No, Mr. Philip Mason, certainly does notwish to speak for the rest of Great Britain,though. '.. The light filtered through the

11Hairy fruit,

subsiding water"

Comingto grips

PERHAPS THE CHOICE of the venue was thefirst indication of the lack of urgency orimmediacy which was to characterise thisConference on Race and Colour. Sponsoredby the prestigious American Academy ofArts and Sciences and by the Congress forCultural Freedom, the conference took placeat Copenhagen's plushy Hotel Europa, farfrom any sound of racial battle of LosAngeles, Manchester or Johannesburg, nordoes it appear that Dr. Verwoerd's theo­reticians were ever approached to attendand contribute their accumulated intelli­gence' on the subject, something that mighthave made the conference seem a littlerelevant to the troubled times we live in.

212/THE NEW AFRICAN/NOVEMBER 1965

Books&theArts

Were thereNo Heroes?

c. F. Goodfellow

Studyingthe dinosaur

Kenneth Mackenzie

South Africa, A Study in Conflict by Pierre L.van den Berghe (Wesleyan University Press,$8.95)White Laager, The Rise of Afrikaner National­ism by William Henry Vatcher Jr. (pall Mall,63s.)A History of Postwa1' Africa by John Hatch(Andre Deutsch, 50s.)

WHY, PROFESSOR VAN DEN BERGHE asks at thebeginning of his book, should a sociologist studySouth Africa? Because, he says, " the anachron­ism of its governmental policies and racial atti­tudes gives South Africa the value of a museumpiece, of a living political dinosaur ... " Also,he adds hopefully, it will give a good opportun­ity of studying" rapid and drastic change ".

Professor van den Berghe, who was born inthe Congo and now works at an American uni­versity, lived for almost two years in SouthAfrica doing sociological research in Natal(about which he wrote a previous book, Cane­viZle). In this new analysis of the whole situa­tion he shows himself once more to be a mostliberal and sympathetic-as well as discerning­student of ,the dinosaur.

This book is aimed more at sociologists andanthropologists than at laymen, and somereaders may find the jargon discouraging (SouthAfrica is a "society characterised by an extra­ordinarily high level of internal conflict, con­tradiction and dysfunction . . . with a rigidlyascriptive and particularistic system of racialsegregation and stratification ..." and so on).But those who persevere will be rewarded forthe professor, although he does not add to ourinformation, has some stimulating and clear­eyed insights.

It is interesting, for instance, to find him say­ing that the traditional distinction betweennorthern racialism and Cape liberalism" couldbetter be described as a relatively minor differ­ence of opinion between two brands of pater­nalists." He seems to me wise in insisting that

it is futile to think that there may somehow bea "change of heart" among South Africanwhites, or that overseas pressure can bringabout more liberal policies. This is his vision ofthe future, and it is a strange one to comefrom an American academic:

At present, repressive measures appear tohave disorganised the African opposition, anda prospect of a successful revolt seems slen­der in the immediate future. Once the colonialterritories to the north of South Africa willhave become independent, however, the col­lapse of white supremacy will be imminent.With foreign bases of operation along a two­thousand-mile frontier, and military assist­ance from outside, guerilla operations in SouthAfrica will be extremely difficult to counter­act, as indeed any underground movementwhich has the passive or active support ofthe mass of the population. Furthermore,once the fight will have reached the stage of

, large-scale terrorism, Afro-Asian demands forinternational sanctions or UN interventionwill undoubtedly be stepped up, and becomemore effective. Revolutionary change willthus probably result from a combination ofthe following actions: strong internationalsanctions, strikes and passive resistance in theurban centres, peasant revolts in rural areas,and well-organised sabotage from a foreign­based underground receiving outside militaryassistance and training.He adds that " conditions will become favour­

able for these developments within five years atthe most."

White Laager, 'also by an American academic,covers a smaller field in more detail and froma historical rather than sociological point ofview. It deals exclusively with white politics­splits and toenaderings and parliamentary man­oeuvres and, in the old days, appeals ,for the"Native problem to be kept out of politics."The writing here is again rather heavy-goingin what is almost an American academic tra­dition, but the research is solid and the book ispartcularIy useful in its documentation of theNazi links and sympathies of leading National­ists. This author's conclusion is also that theperiod of Afrikaner dominance is now drawingto a close.

John Hatch was the Labour Party's Common­wealth expevt and is now also on an Americancampus. He is obviously well-qualified to des­cribe this most exciting period in Africa's his­tory, and he has produced a fine book, writtenwith sympathy but with an -admirable lack ofany sort of sentimentality (about corruption, forinstance). The field is so large that even in abook of 432 pages one sometimes feels one isbeing hurried on just when things are gettinginteresting, but if th'at is a fault it is also acompliment. •

The Imperial Factor in South Africa by C. W.de Kiewiet (Frank Cass & Co. 45s.).

THERE ARE INEVITABLY two judgments to bemade of this important book, first published in1937, on the occasion of its reappearance in1965. Professional historians will mainly askhow it helps towards an appreciation of theperiod dealt with by the author, the years from1870 to 1885, while the" broader audience willwonder what it contributes towards an under­standing of modem South Africa, and perhapsof Africa generally.

Yet the two judgments involved ought not tobe totally divorced, as of no interest one to theother: for a very obvious connection betweenthem arises from the fact that it is illogical tolook for present guidance to an author who failsto interpret his own period satisfactorily. Inother words the professional judgment shouldprecede the lay. A number of more or lesstechnical grouses will no doubt be heard fromhistorians, chief among them that the opportunityhas not been taken to provide a revised edition,so that the book reappears with the same factualslips as marred the first edition; for example theimplication that Richard Southey's formativeexperience had been gained in the "liberalWestern Province" (p.17), and the even moreastonishing blunder of attributing to the year1876 the bitter complaint of a ParliamentaryUnder-Secretary against Britain's spending her"blood and money upon these wretched Kaffirquarrels in South Africa," which 'was in factvoiced a few months after Isandhlwana in 1879(p.67). These instances are in fact indicative ofa cavalier attitude to the sources which theauthor excuses in his preface by saying that"footnotes like friends should not be made tobear too much responsibility for a writer'sjudgments." The Imperial Factor in SouthAfrica is best considered as an extended inter­pretative essay, based upon a reading of theoriginal sources but containing no seriousattempt to use them to prove the hypothesesadvanced; an essay, furthermore, very much inthe literary tradition of historiography, whoseepigrams incessantly distract from the argumentand sometimes (as in the one just quoted) aresubstituted for it.

Essentially the book is important because itis the only introduction in any detail to theperiod, between the discovery of diamonds andthat of gold, which saw the subordination toEuropean control of the last important indepen­dent African societies south of the Limpopo:the Pedi, the Xhosa, the Zulu, the Tswana, and,although under somewhat different circumstancesfrom the rest, Lesotho. These were the lastyears in which the principal resistance to whitedominance was offered with tribal spears; there­after came the slow growth of sub-continental

ON THE OTHER HAND, Mr. Ike's book is aboutthe most engaging West African novel I haveread in recent years. Unlike the "recognised"champions of "simplicity" in the Nigerianliterary world, Mr. Ike achieves simplicity with­out betraying any strain or consciousness ofeffort at being simple and, 'what is more, sayssomething. It is refreshing to read someone who,though he belongs to the old school of "sim­plicity," does not regard style as the end but asa means to it.

For this reason, Mr. Ike occupies the ambiva­lent position of enjoying the popularity of theold scholars (among the Western back-pattingpatrons of Nigerian literature) and enduring theunpopularity of the outspoken younger writers(in the same quarters).

Harvill gives the work an excellent blurb­"to be engaged to three girls simultaneously,accused by one ef being the father of her child,rusticated by University authorities-these aresevere setbacks in the career of an undergradu­ate." The author's understanding sympathy andinsight into undergraduate life in Nigeria todaymake this much more than the farce that thehero's predicament implies. The Ezinkwo villagelife is sunnily sketched in without vulgar pro­vincialising, another rare thing in Nigerianliterature. The characters, whether Ibo orYoruba, student or porter, male or female, in­tellectual or intelligent, are real, living, convinc­ing; and the dialogue, whether pidgin or goodEnglish, literary translation or hard vernacular,is good, humorous and richly embroidered withproverbs like, "The offspring of a snake cannotbe short." And the puzzlement over the titledisappears the moment the key proverb isencountered, "When a child eats a toad, it killshis appetite for meat."

At the risk of being quoted out of context,my recommendation must surely be that Toadsfor Supper be devoured without a pinch of salt.•

ObiB.Egbuna

With no pinchof salt

A PARTY SUPPORTER" gets contracts because he isa party man " and the music teacher is dismissedby the sage headmaster for teaching a songstarting off, "Our noble president, messiah andredeemer," and the dismissal justified because," patriotism couldn't grow in the soil of person­ality cults." Such meaningless cliches so pervadethe -book that one's fingers begin to itch for ablue pencil. "Now you find," exclaims Seth the

THE NEW AFRICAN/NOVEMBER 1965/213~~~~~~~~~~--~~~~~~~~~ intrepi~ "thebbck c~un~t an ~p~~you

just as ruthlessly as any white capitalist" andthe village leading lady philosophises that "onewould prefer something nobler than aggressivewarfare directed against Katanga, which seemsto me to be about the only orderly portion ofthe Congo." The president, we are told, "runstuckling to the east, mortgaging the cocoa-cropto Russia. Borrowing money from Peking,China. From Peking! And the Chinese workerseat only a cup of rice a day. We should beashamed." The only white "Helper" in thevillage, a ·German boy, "has maturity beyondhis years. Our men have not his ways." Thechicken thief has to be Markwei, a great politi­cal wrangler popularly known as Karl Marx.And a foreign firm refuses to build a petrolstation because "they haven't much confidencein the economic stability of the country." Eventhe local birds have something detrimental to

Nyitso Ca Novel of West Africa) by M. F. C. sing about the social set-up-" Witchdoctor'sRoebuck CMacdonald 21s.). sick."Toads for Supper by Chukwuemeka Ike (Harvill This is a village where people strangle dogs,Press 18s.). steal meat, chicken and kerosene, shove their

grandchildren's hands in the fire, knife eachother across meat tables, a village where headlessbodies are found in public paths, of tuberculousyoung women, lepers and matricides, " an atmos­phere so charged with exasperation and frustra­tion," that the reader is left with the impressionthat here is a beautiful village with the wrongpeople living in it-a whiff of apartheid which,even if unconscious, is no doubt responsible fora mediocre work of this nature being a prize­winner in South Africa, the author's countryof birth, upbringing and education.

MIS S ROEBUCK HAS a rare power of description,an ear for sounds and an eye for narrativedetails. I suspect that she even knows her WestAfrica well but the place she has portrayed isnot the West Africa there is but the one shehas a near-pathological obsession to see. Result?N ear-believable characters in unbelievablesituations! If this book is declared seditious inGhana (the Nyitso country) and banned, Ishould not be the least surprised (nor probablywould Miss Roebuck) for behind the author'ssparkling style lurks naive but calculatedlydestructive propaganda. In my opinion, if thereis nothing as stimulating as a lively novel thatadmits to being a political instrument, there isalso nothing more nauseating than damagingpolitical literature that shams a village-talesuperstructure.

Nyitso is, we are told, the name of a villagein an unnamed West African state whose capitalis, curiously enough, Accra. In the local langu­age, Nyitso means, "the day before yesterday,"or, in some contexts, "the day after tomorrow."And the hero, Paul, is one of those Africanswho have graduated in Wisdom because theyhave been to Europe and back and, in hisparticular wisdom, resides in what "could be amiddle-class home in a pleasant English suburb."An ex-political detainee, he emerges out of" prison" to build a Tower of Babel out of hisnative Nyitso and thus rescues his people anda dilapidating village from the clutches of asavage regime, a forerunner ef total overthrow.Anti-Pan-African to the marrow, he detestseven the word " Africans" because " , Africans'is a mighty word. It covers multitudes. . . . Inour village we only go ahead in our own wayand leave the outside people to their generalisa­tions. . . . We did not achieve independence tofight among ourselves like savages. Leave thatto the Congolese."

THE TREATMENT OF THE OTHER MAIN THEME,

which gives the book its title, is less satisfactory.British imperialism is presented as the lightthat failed, whose innate striving towards "asocial and economic order in South Africacharacterised by a greater tolerance of race, amore ardent trusteeship, a more inspired socialwisdom" was defeated by forces both externaland internal to itself. For the modem studentof affairs this hypothesis may not unfairly betranslated into the assertion that the intentionsof British imperialists have, by and large, beenbenevolent, whatever the actual effects of theirpolicies. There will be found few to accept thisinterpretation as applied to British policy in themid-twentieth century, whether in relation to theRepublic of South Africa, Rhodesia, or else­where: if Britain in the end discountenancedwhite dominance in Kenya, and if, as remainsto be seen, she does so in Zimbabwe, theexplanation lies more plausibly in the globalbalance of power than in the personal righteous­ness of successive British politicians. Ninetyyears ago in South Africa the case for imperialbenevolence is weaker still, as de Kiewiet mighthave had to admit it he had attempted to proveit. There exists in the private papers andconfidential minutes of the policy-makers of the1870s overwhelming evidence of a firm pre­occupation with Britain's national interest, andin so far as this basic ingredient was laced withother sentiments, the pinch of humanitarianismwas neutralised, to put it no stronger, by a sub­stantial dash of racism. One is driven tosuspect that the author, unable to accept thedark fact that in much human history there areno heroes for those ·who set their standardshigh, was forced to cast Secretaries of Stateand High Commissioners in the vacant roles ofhis plot. In modem terms, this is like believingthat Mr. Bottomley has the liberation of Zim­babwe at heart, or that Mr. Wilson wants topromote economic sanctions against SouthAfrica's fascists. •

political organisations. How satisfactory is theinterpretation offered? The two best chaptersin the book, those dealing with the economicorigins of the Cape-Xhosa and Anglo-Zuluwars, are perhaps the finest analyses in existenceof the processes leading to African dispossessionin Southern Africa: pragmatic and free fromdogma, they illuminate the scene as no otherhistorian has yet been able to do. The onlyserious criticism to be made he~e is that whilethe aggressive and predatory society of theEuropeans is brought sharply into relief, thedesperately defensive tribes remain faint andshadowy victims: nevertheless the modemenquirer will gain deep insights into thedynamics of European dominance from thesepages.

214/THE NEW AFRICAN/NOVEMBER 1965

A meticulouspattern

JillJessop

The Deserter by Kenneth Mackenzie (Eyre &Spottiswoode, 21s)

The Story of Sarah by Sylvia Whitehead (Mac­donald, 21s)

Chance to Die by Lionel Black (Cassell, 16s)Sunrise over Tanesia 'by Donald Swanson

(Simondium Publishers, Cape Town, 16s)

OF THE FOUR, The Deserter is the most interest­ing and easily the best. Kenneth Mackenzie'splot is excellent, so are his ideas about hischaracters, so are some of his scenes and images.I get the impression, however, that he workedeverything out beforehand with meticulous care,then started to write, found his charactersweren't quite turning out ·the way he'd intended,and so forced them into the patterns he had setfor them. With unhappy results for the book.More than enough novels are written haphazard­ly, by writers who presumably argue that left tothemselves the characters will somehow work outall right. So I should congratulate Mr. Mac­kenzie on his control. I do. But it's too firm andinflexible.

The story is about J apie van N iekerk, a youngSouth African, who deserts from his Boercommando after the battle of Spion Kop andreturns to the family farm, where he finds littlesympathy for his half-articulated ideas aboutnot killing people. He (being, I fear, a half­baked youth, a little too intense and at timeseven a 'bit tedious) meanders unhappily fromsister to mother to English friend's civilised,tea-sipping mother to simple but flighty girlfriend-like Hamlet in isolation and uncertainty,but not in brains or charisma. He struggles toextract from his emotional confusion a workableattitude to life and people. His Calvinist back­ground cannot help him-the few who mighthave understood him are committed to the war(like his English friend's mother) or to their ownrebellion (like his sister Sannie) or to the lifethey have learnt to accept as inevitable (like hispatient and oppressed mother).

He establishes an understanding-if only ahalf-acknowledged one - with an Africanlabourer from Basutoland. Together they builda dam (though "not a masterpiece of civilengineering," as a British officer remarks lateron)-here is something constructive, close to theearth, and concrete. These scenes are amongthe best in the book. The symbolism is not over­played, and I particularly liked the descriptionof Japie's feelings towards the Basuto in thepresence of other people--the mixture of deter­mined solidarity, and anxiety lest his friendshould put himself outside the pale and forceJapie to commit himself on one side or theother. I was also impressed by the scenes

between Japie and his girl friend Martha, whenthey "sit up" together in her parents' sittingroom, the leng·th of the candle allowed thembeing ·the measure of parental approval. Japieof course takes full 'advantage of these plentifulopportunities to demonstrate his gaucheness;Martha, who has a kind of unsophisticatedsagacity (and the women in this novel are apretty sensible lot, compared to the men), letshim run on without ever committing herself. Inthe end, !When Japie is in terrible trouble, shecomes to him; by this time it doesn't reallymatter, though I suppose it was nice to know.

As for Japie, his problem is indecision. He'dlike to do the right thing, but sometimes itdoesn't seem worth the struggle, and anyway hecan't be sure what is the right thing. He allowshimself to be pushed into positions he neverwanted to take up, and worse, he allows himselfto do things he later detests himself for. If youhave no general guidelines in life, the nastythings you do are all the more detestable, be­cause you feel they are the result of self-indul­gence or carelessness. Japie needs to find outwhy he should damage other people--or things.When at last he does, he joins those who canexplain or justify what they do, because theythink they are shaping events, not being shapedby them.

It is vital to Mr. Mackenzie's scheme thatJ apie should finally evolve a positive policy forlife. Unluckily he has not equipped him withthe necessary strength of intellect or characterto make this plausible. Nor has J apie grown instature during the story. -Condemned to deathby the British for killing a British soldier afterthe war is formally over, J apie is still trying toexplain things to his family. Then he escapesand in the course of a remarkable night, dis­covers that he can kill without remorse, that hisfather's sexual values are not for him, and thattwo people can be a physical and affirmingcomfort to each other without saying anythingof importance. In fact he has shed his past andasserted his control over events. Now he is ingrave danger of being left, perched out on hislonely limb-the least likely of figures to end anovel with. Mr. Mackenzie manipulates theplot shamelessly to avoid this. I sympathisewith him, but I think if he had allowed Japieto develop more naturally, and to be a littleless consistent and predictable up to the lastchapter, he might have got away with thespiritual revolution and left his hero staringabstractedly at the ashes of the farm house. Asit is, he leaves us feeling cheated and a bitsceptical.

" THE STORY OF SARAH" I found oddly touching,repellent though many of Sylvia Whitehead'sattitudes are. It is an account of how she, her

From the coverdesign of KennethMackenzie's novel

husband and her children went out from Eng­land to South Africa, and chiefly of the relation­ship that developed between herself -and herAfrican servant, Sarah Jantjies. Mrs. White­head's ideas about Africans are the epitome ofwell-meaning English-speaking middle-classpaternalism-probably the most offensive andultimately the most dangerous of whites'attitudes towards non-whites. And yet as shegets to know Sarah better, and to see heragainst the background of racialism and suffer­ing (how many white employers do this ?), shebecomes less laughable, her attitudes less repel­lent, her predicament and confusion more mov­ing. She evolves, like a character in a novel,'and in the end the patemalism seems almost tohave switched directions. Only by now it is thedominance of one personality over another, andhas nothing to do with race.

"CHANCE TO DIE" is a thriller that happens tobe set in Swaziland. It is packed with villainousSouth African ·Government police agents, evenmore villainous Communist agents, a ruthlesslyefficient but lovable British agent and the inevit­able helpless but energetic amateur. Quite goodin parts but not wildly plausible.

" SUNRISE OVER TANESIA" is simply a distaste­ful, funny book, whose best line, '" Sonny, whydon't you go and play outside? ' said the Cap­tain hatefully, whilst they were flying at tenthousand feet" is surely not new. I wouldn'trecommend it for that line alone. •

THE AUTHOR'S DECLARED intention (p.138) is toview Christianity in "its manifestation as a

IN THIS STUDY THE AUTHOR EXAMINES very eru­ditely the impact of a proselytising faith, Christ­ianity, -on the religious life of the Akan peopleof Ghana. The author's background as mission­ary, theologian, and faculty member of theUniversity of Ghana Divinity Department,makes him eminently qualified .as an authorityon the subject he undertakes to analyse, andalso combines training and experience in aunique manner which explains the profunditywith which he handles his subject.

I am impressed by the number of topicalquestions which the inquiry raises, and also bythe fact that some of these were the focus ofinterest at the Mricanist Congress held in theUniversity of Ghana three years ago. Brieflystated the common theme was whether or notwe must expect a reorientation of the analysisof African problems now that the African is nolonger a chattel or a means to an end (exceptin southern Africa). The author's focus of in­terest is on what is to become of the Christianreligion in its future interaction with a tradition­al Akan religion and way of life which, as theauthor observes, is now reasserting itself, andat a time when it is in a position to do soeffectively in the wake of a recently acquiredindependence. In the colonial regime Christian­ity or a Christian Church gained ground as thehandmaid of western cultures and the exponentof the religion of the white race (p.xi). Todaythe 'Christian Church must declare u its rele­vance for the Akan)J through its own excellence,independent of political power.

To begin to understand the author's attemptat 'a comparative recapitulation (Chapter VIII)it is necessary to read the introduction verycarefully. After reading over and over againboth the Introduction and Chapter VIII I con­cluded that it would have been very helpful ifthe author had not shirked the task of explain­ing (and operationalising) Christianity in greaterdetail by including in the main body of thewriting something of a fuller definition of whathe distinguishes as "empirical Christianity",the "Christian faith", and "revelation inChrist". To assume that prospective readerswill have read the New Testament is also toassume that they will find it easy to relate theNew Testament to Christianity as lived andpreached by the missionary in Mrica. It isdoubtful if the rrnssionary majority did ever"unlearn the rash and erroneous identificationof empirical Christianity with the revelation inChrist" (xvi).

THE NEW AFRICAN/NOVEMBER 1965[215In fact Africans more logically believe that thewhole deception was engineered by the whites, Handmaladmore specifically by Sir George Grey.

Much more serious than these historical finaccuracies are the claims made about the 0 powerAfrican National Congress. Surely Mr. Copeshould know that in 1912 it was the SouthAfrican Native Congress that was formed, notthe ANC nor did this herald a new and unknowndesire to unite the Africans against the invaders.Cetshrwayo, Sekhukhuni and Xhosa rulers had Mlahleni Njisaneearlier tried to forge such an 'alliance, much tothe terror of the Boers in the Transvaal.

Writing about the ICU, Mr. Cope states that" Kadalie made the fatal move by removing theheadquarters from the Cape Town to Johannes­burg. This deprived Kadalie of the services andadvice and guidance of a number of CapeColoureds ,who had far greater experience andorganisational ability than did he or his fellowAfricans." On the contrary it was when ICU Akan Religion and the Christian Faith by Sid-moved its headquarters to Johannesburg that it ney George Williamson (Ghana University Press,flourished. Again, dealing with the All-African Accra, Oxford University Press, London, 30s.)Convention he makes the wildest claim-that itwas organised by Dr. Jabavu. Those who knowthe history of this organisation will tell Mr.Cope that in the first place the Hertzog Billswere introduced in 1935 and the MricanNational Congress, represented by Dr. P. kaISeme, the President General, called the All­African Convention jointly with Prof. D. D. T.Jabavu who represented the Federation ofAfrican Teachers and the :Cape African VotersAssociation.

WRITING ON THE NEIGHBOURS of South Mrica,Mr. Cope tells us, " A little over a century agoa clan of Ngunis under Chief Sobhuza movedaway from Pongola to settle in the mountaincountry of Swaziland." Of course the founderof the Swazi nation was Dlamini I, who ruledwhat is now known as Swaziland, in the 12thcentury. It was Mbandzeni, not Sobhuza, whoin more recent years "played off Boer againstBriton," and finally ceded large portions of thecountry to the Boers.

This ignorance of historical facts goes on adnauseum throughout the book. But we are alsopresented with inaccuracies of the most elemen­tary type. Contrary to all statistical evidenceMr. Cope states, "Curiously enough Mricanwomen are more literate than their menfolk."We are also told that prostitution is rife, whenin fact one of the baffling phenomena to allsocial scientists, is the low level of its occur­rence among Mricans in South Africa.

Mr. Cope's remark that" these Mrican minelabourers live under hygienic conditions in largecompounds and are adequately and scientificallyfed, clothed and cared for" shows to whatlengths he is prepared to go to shelve the truth.The rural areas ure rightly stated to be over­crowded and eroded, but in another chaptertheir unproductivity is attributed to Mricanignorance. In the same breath in whichBantustans are condemned we are told that the"government is making strenuous efforts toreplan the rural areas ... but it is an uphillfight against the traditional cattle-cult, againstignorance, and the general spirit of suspicionand hostility to the authorities."

In one section ,we are told that externalpressures and a wave of riots and protest demon­strations can topple apartheid. In the samechapter, claims are made that a serious crisistends to move the whites into a laager.

Except for a few chapters on the rise ofMrikaner nationalism and the Broederbond, therest of the book became an anachronism themoment the ink was dry. •

Romanticisinga a

Inaccuracies

MR. COPE HAS NOT ONLY written a very subjec­tive book, he has chosen a style that leaves nodoubt as to his inability to write a book at all.First of all, the chapters are arranged in cate­gories that suit more the author's conveniencethan the logic of history. We have P'art Onedealing with SUbjects that demand the back­ground thrown into Part Two. To illustratethis, take the subject like "Africans" in PartOne and compare it with " Black Nationalism"dealt with in a much later section of the book,P'art Three. "Opponents of the ApartheidPlan" are dealt with in Part One and with noapparent logic, the historical forces responsiblefor apartheid are right in the heart of the book.In itself this would not be a serious error exceptthat we are deprived of a natural historicalsequence in the development of the whole con­cept apartheid plan. We hear how the TransvaalRepublic practised apartheid, long after we haveread how the present day Government is imple­menting apartheid.

It would be forgivable if the pattern of thebook wai the only aspect to criticise, but Mr.Cope infuriates by his very lack of accuratehistorical facts. He tells us the old fable thatthe Europeans were pushing into the interiorwhilst similar "late arrivals," the "Bantu,"were pushing into the south.

Of the Ka he claims a primitive origin. "Itmay well have been here (Kalahari) whereAustrolopithecae evolved into the earliest for­bear of the Bushman. . . ." Of the Khoikhoihe claims "The Bantu in Central Africa weremore advanced than these Hottentots...." Onewonders how Mr. Cope with his claim to know­ledge of ancient African history has failed tofind out that the Mapungubwe culture of theTransvaal is Khoi Khoi in origin. The Buntuof course, are in turn primitive compared toEuropeans. Gold mining and iron making aresaid to be of foreign origin.

The history both of the Zulus, Sothos andXhosas in more recent times is to say the leastwholly inaccurate. Romanticising the pre­industrial Mrican communities, Mr. Cope says"the various tribes were living in a state ofrelative peace." Moving on to deal with Zuluhistory he tells us N andi was waylaid bySenzangakhona when everyone knows that sheconsented in a moment of weakness and luterwas to regret her mistake for the greater partof her life. Mr. Cope also tells us that Dingis­wayo was ambushed, when in fact he was killedon the orders of Zwide.

He is just as misinformed about Xhosahistory. Not for the first time one hears therumour that the cc great Basuto chief Moshesh... wished to destroy the power of the Xhosas."

South Africa by John Cope (Ernest Benn37s.6d.).

Rayrnond Kunene

216/THE NEW AFRICAN/NOVEMBER 1965religion expressed in the Christian society andits historical institutions" rather than in itsecumenical and ideal character. His referenceto Kraemer raises the expectation that a dis­tinction will be maintained between the idealChristian faith and the variable forms of Euro­pean Christianity as well as between the idealChristian faith and Akan Christian religion castagainst the background of Akan traditional life.The ideal Christian faith in any such analysisand comparison would be neither eastern, west­ern, Akan, nor European; the variable formsof Christianity would be those practised inEurope, as observable in the settler elementsand as lived (and preached?) by the missionary.These would provide basically different levelsof substruction.

The author emphasises the fact that Akanreligion is very much a way of life, a "worldview" as Busia very aptly describes it. Religionis 'woven into a more or less systemic institu­tional complex in which context it is not conceiv­able as a seperable entity. Durkheim observesalso that it is not necessarily defined by beliefin god, and that it gives birth to all that isessential and sacred in society. It is this diffusecharacter and integration of such socialisedreligion with other institutional complexes thatmakes it difficult to think of Akan religion inecumenical and theological terms, and which,therefore, makes the author's selected compara­tive indicants unsuitable. Has Christianity nosocialised observable concrete indicants, such asare referred to in the Bible's injunction, "Bytheir acts shall ye know them "?

THE AUTHOR'S DEPENDENCE on secondary sources

In,

abundance'

Collingwood August

Praise Poems of Tswana Chiefs translated andedited by 1. Schapera (Oxford University Press45s.)

SEVERAL WEEKS BEFORE I knew such a bookexisted a friend who was staying with me mademe get up at some heathenishly early hour inorder to listen to him reciting the praise-poemsof Zulu kings. (Kings, Mr. Schapera, please---­remember these were hereditary monarchs; theterm " chief" could be left for white man-madestooges.)

To return to the morning of the praises. Aswe were both not quite sober (having been to aparty the night before), I kept on interrupting.One interlude went on something like this:

ME: Fine, fine. But where do these poemsexist?

FRIEND: In the minds of men.ME: That's not a very reliable place, you

know. Oral tradition, and all that. Why don'tyou write them down?

FRIEND: You're the one who thinks he canwrite. Do it yourself.

ME: But I don't know any.FRIEND: Go and learn them-like I did­

and stop interrupting me.Alas, poor me ! I cannot even "go and

learn ".

makes it imperative for the reader to pause overhis reference to Gluckman and Barbara Ward.Gluckman conjures up the image of "burgeon­ing fears of witchcraft" and "blossomingmagic" with the usual anthropological efficiencyand sensation. Trend developments no longerlend themselves to such broad generalisations,and for credence and validity we shall be justi­fied in demanding more reliable measures of the"very considerable increase" of witchcraft be­liefs reported also by Ward (p.128-9). To keepimpressionism at a minimum it seems obvious(especially in a computer age such as ours) thatsome use, however primitive, of the statisticalmethods must be made if we want to talk aboutwhat we have today as against what we hadtwenty years ago. Is this an increase in intensityor is it the extension of these practices to areasof social behaviour or regions (physical) wherethey were formerly non-existent? In fairness tothe missionary, moreover, if we take the time­span of Christian influences in England, South­ern Italy, or Ireland respectively, and compareand contrast those influences with the century­old Christian activities among the Akan, I feelthat the missionaries deserve better credit thanthese sensational reports give them.

Take libation (p.132-3) which to my tortuousAfrican mind is as interesting as I find theChristian Asperges~ and as I think the Akanwould find the Christian reference to the S ouZsof the Departed to be. To mention ancestorworship without explaining how the practicediffers from All Souls' Day and All Saints'Day anniversaries in the mind of the Akan isto leave out an important consideration in theanalysis. I think all these points are logically

Congratulations, then, Mr. Schapera on put­ting together such a necessary book. Where arethe Schaperas of the other linguistic groups?

The introduction tells us, among many otherthings, what praise-poems are, and they are" ... a form of traditional literature commonin all clusters of Southern Bantu (Nguni,Tsonga, Sotho and Venda). . .. They are com­posed not only about chiefs, headmen, famouswarriors, and other prominent tribesmen, butabout ordinary commoners also, including wo­men; there are, in addition, praise-poems oftribes and subdivisions of tribes . . . of domesticanimals (notably cattle), of wild animals (includ­ing birds and insects), of trees and crops, ofrivers, hills, and other scenic features, and ofsuch inanimate objects as divining-bones. Inmodern times some have been composed aboutschools, railway trains, and bicycles."

The introduction then goes on to describe thegeneral characteristics of praise-poems. Mr.Schapera is here too polite a man to say whatneeds saying strongly. So, let me do it for himand it is this: Thank God, the days are gonewhen poetry was not poetry that did not con­form to European poetry in form. The vigourof Mqhayi's "formless" poetry is infinitelymore poetic than Vilakazi's effete sonnets whichshould be read only at literary tea-parties. Thisis as far as his politeness allows him to go:" Of their' literary art " Tswana scholar [B. C.Thema, 'The trend of Setswana Poetry (1939);p.44] writes: There is no question about theabundance of poetry in the language, but inits purely primitive form Setswana poetry hasno prosody. There is no question of rhyme ormetre about it, nor that of division into stanzas.In fact I do not think that it would savour thename 'poetry' if it had to be written in theform in which we find it in the primitiveMaboko (praises generally of chiefs and heroes)."

"This judgement, by a language teacher, has

relevant comparative references which belongto Chapter VIII even if the author by assump­tion (p.168) regards them as "scientific" withrespect to the "world view" contexts.

THE SIGNIFICANCE AND IMPORTANCE of this bookmust also be judged by its most timely appear­ance. Quite recently this year the secular author­ity of Ghana (through one of its ministers) de­clared : "The Christian Churches of Ghanatoday should actively join in the Crusade fornational reconstruction at the basis of which aretoday's concepts and values symbolic of spiritual,intellectual and political emancipation." At theend of the book one feels that the focus has beenvery much on the ecumenical and philosophicaldifferences, and that it does not grapple directlywith the more vexing questions of state-churchrelationship. The" dichotomy of mind" (p.128)which the author finds seems to be part of thewhole inherent conflict which is going to becomesharper now .that the same church is being calledupon to become (as before) a handmaid of thenew regime. It is the same dichotomy whichhas led in the more totalitarian white-controlledAfrican colonies to "separatist" movementssuch as are found in South Africa. We areaccustomed, however, to the accommodativecharacter of the Christian Church and thereforethe new demands made upon it by the newstates of Africa should not be very strange norpresumptuous. In Chapter IX (" Akan Critic­isms of Missions") a careful review is made ofthe criticisms emanating from different strataof the Akan society, and an old nagging ques­tion comes again to my mind: Can one beAfrican and Christian? •

obviously been influenced by what he thought[Would not "had been made to think" bebetter, Mr. Schapera?] to be English concep­tions of poetry. But as Lestrade has shown[Bantu Praise-Poems (1935), pp.4 fI.] "Tswanapraise-poems do in fact have characteristics thatreadily distinguish them from normal prose.Those he specifies are dynamic stress (metricalrhythm), parallelism, chiasmus, and linking."

I HAVE ALWAYS FOUND parallelism a charmingcharacteristic of Bantu poetry. Here are twoexamples quoted by the author:"(a) letZhoZa bommaeno gobeoZwa~

letlhoZa bommaneo goZaZa balla(you foredoom your mothers to mourn,you foredoom your mothers to weep allnight);

(b) mogatsa-Legwale gaabone moses,mogatsa-Legwale otshotshe botlhoko(Legwale's wife does not menstruate,Legwale's wife is afflicted with sorrow)."

Apart from being a good example of paral­lelism, the second, is a good example of poeticinnuendo: What causes Legwale's wife sorrowis the fact that she is infertile and thereforenot fit to be anybody's wife.

The translations, mainly because Mr. Scha­pera is at home in the Tswana language, cap­ture with apparent effortlessness the virility ofthe original poems; this becomes yet more appar­ent when the pieces are read aloud-as they aremeant to be.

This then is a good book, made easier tounderstand (even by people whose knowledge ofTswana is either rudimentary of completely non­existent) by the use of clearly-written footnotesand thumb-nail biographies of the kings whoare being praised.

No serious student of Africana can afford tobe without a copy of this book. •

THE NEW AFRICAN/NOVEMBER 1965/217national support . . . analyse African problems")to " proYide a regular source of reliable informa­tion' for those inside South Africa actively en-,aaged in the revolution". Elsewhere Crisis f!fChange states that 2,500 copies are to be distri­buted free in southern Africa, thanks to "severalorganisations and individuals in Europe andAfrica". Mahomo's address is 607A GrandBuildings, Trafalgar Square, London, W.C.2.

WordsWordsWords

Okyeame, published half-yearly from Accra,contains an unforgettable story, "The LateBud ", by Christina Ama Ata Aidoo (whoseverse The New African has published) and aremarkably vivid haunting one by GeorgeAwoonor-Williams, "The Funeral", both insettings of Ghanaian village or town life butwith universal themes. Christina Aidoo, in herearly twenties, is on a five-year African Litera­ture fellowship at the University of Ghana,Legon, and is teaching and writing. She hasfinished another play.

Like her Dilemma of a Ghost (Longmans),about a young Ghanaian graduate who bringshis Afro-American wife home to his Clan house,it is in a village setting, but without such ob­vious contrasts.

With another able young Ghanaian writer,Ayi Kwei Armah (whose story "Contact" willappear here in December), Christina Aidoo ishighly sceptical of most European literary critic­ism (seen at its most vaunting and absurd insome London theatre critics' attitudes to J. P.Clark's and Soyinka's plays in September) whenapplied to modern African writing. Awoonor­Williams, whose Ghanaian film Hamlet super­imposed European art on Africa and vice versaabout as uncompromisingly as could be, bitesthe hands that would pat him on the head withhis castigation of "the European intellectualapproach (which) has until recently been be­devilled by a certain patronising and condescend­ing hauteur that was repugnant to Africa."Thank God," he writes, "the new interest inAfrica will produce less and less of the pedanticacademics and the seeming humility of theJahns ".

OF COURSE some of the wrong hands get bittenin the process, but it is an inevitable and healthyone. The African literature racketeers need thistreatment as much as the pedants do. SinceDrum's first Darkness and Light anthology,what sins have been committed in the name ofAfrican anthology. I would exclude in advanceRonald Dathorne's coming Penguin anthologyof African prose, provided he does not take ontrust too much about what someone who hadn'tread any of it called " the Golden Age of Xhosaliterature." Black Orpheus ran some SouthAfrican verse "translations by Uys Krige"from Xhosa, Zulu, Sotho and even the Khoisanlanguages, none of which he knows. Perhapsa poet may render another's work into his ownlanguage from a literal prose translation. Anon-poet cannot, which is why Louise Fried­mann's version of Vilakazi's verse was such adisaster. Certainly no one should pronounce onwritings he cannot understand without consider­able research, which I do not see taking place.

Monthly notes on books and the press.

IN AN INTERESTING REVIEW in the current NigeriaMagazine Robin Horton explores the errors ofcategorising African sculpture under Europeanheadings. Ironically, William Fagg and MargaretPlass in African Sculpture~' an Anthology (Dut­ton Vista Paperbacks) tried to get away from"preconceptions about African art as an irre­ducibly different exotic thing-in-itself" by call­ing African sculptures naturalist, abstractionist,cubist, surrealist, grotesque, Gothic, baroque,rococo. They fail to make the labels apply andseem to know it. Mr. Horton, a gifted anddedicated anthropologist who lives on the Nigerdelta with the people whose lives and ways hetries to interpret, takes that correct middle posi­tion. He calls for "serious attempts to workout a purely formal geometrical scheme for thedescription and classification of African sculp­ture; and intensive ethnographic study of thecultural contexts of important sculptural styles. . ." Something of the same position shouldbe taken by students of African oral traditionaltexts. Modern African writing calls for a dif­ferent critical apparatus but one that mustas determinedly acknowledge the African con­text of the work.

BILLY ORITSETSANINOMI DUDLEY'S telling article"Violence in Nigerian Politics" was writtenfor Transition~s special "Violence" issue (No.21) before the Western Region's appalling andbloody election fiasco last month. The NNDPshowed that a party with 5% electoral supportcan rig an election and win two-thirds of theseats, by, in Dudley's phrase" breaking heads inorder to count them." A saving grace was tohear Nigerians publicly debating the issues withno fear of secret police and informers. If thereis fear it is among some newspapermen. Thepart-Thomson-owned Daily Express followed thebent of its pro-NNDP editor, T. o. Adebanjo.Less understandable was the concurrence in hispolicy of Lord Thomson's watchdogs on theadministrative side of the paper, other than aslong-term balance-sheet precautions. Certainlythe Express~ which was virtually boycotted insome UPGA strongholds after the elections,must have lost circulation in the short run. Assome of the press becomes more partisan, andin the rest as fears erode responsibility, journalslike Billy Dudley's Nigerian Opinion (NigerianCurrent Affairs Society, University of Ibadan,monthly, £ 1 a year) will be needed to tell thewhole truth about Nigeria.

Crisis & Change, Nana Mahomo's newmonthly, has one of the best cover photographsever. The standard is kept up in the text,which aims, among other things, (" to promoteunity against white domination ... rally inter-

HAVING READ WITH PLEASURE Vol. 1 No. 4 ofThe African Review (edited by Julian Mayfieldfor New Africa Publications Ltd., Accra), manymust be waiting for Vol. 1, No. 3-the Sep­tember issue- of this "monthly analytical re­view". It was held back because it containedan article seriously arguing the case for areconstructed OAU, and it was felt that thiswould not be tactful reading matter to haveround Accra during the Summit Conferencethere. The article expressed a view heard in­creasingly-that the OAU cannot succeed untilall its members come to it freed from neo­colonialism: the progressive nations should forma nucleus around which the others could co­here as they shake off their colonial past orneo-colonial present. Certainly the OAU Sum­mit Conference was attended by some shakyclaimants to independence, above all by the rep­resentatives of the ruling parties in Basutoland>Bechuanaland and Swaziland, while theirnationalist, opposition counterparts were amongthe poor relations petitioning from outside theclosed sessions. While the representatives ofKing Sobhuza's traditionalist ruling party,Imbokodvo, were within, the Ngwane NationalLiberatory Congress were busy circulating ascandalous letter written by Sobhuza's whiteSouth African settler ally, Mr. Carl Todd>laying detailed plans for rigging the electionsto ensure that a sufficient number of the " rightEuropeans" were returned by Swazi votersunder Sobhuza's orders.

While Chief Leabua's Basuto National Partyrepresentatives were within, Messrs. Mokhehleand Kolisang of the militant, pan-AfricanistBasutoland Congress Party were attacking them(and their pro-Bantustan adviser, ProfessorCowen) in their memorandum, complete with itsown scandalous letter (from Chief Leabua toSouth Africa's Commissioner-General Papenfus:"We shall place this country and its peopleunder the wise guidance of the government ofthe Republic of South Africa economically,politically and socially, so that you can lead usto true independence.").

Though it reads like rumour, our note aboutThe African Review should be accurate-moreaccurate ,at least than their description of us as"the now defunct New African" in a note onBessie Head, who contributed one of the bestitems to their V 01. 1, No. 4 from her place ofexile in Bechuanaland. Our being banned inSouth Africa may have been to blame.

IN A RECENT RADIO TALK the moKgatla-by­adoption N aomi Mitchison called Bechuanaland"probably the poorest country in the world".Bessie Head whose £16-a-month teaching postthere has come to an end is in great hardship.She has nothing in the world except her smallson Howard, her friends (mostly political exileslike herself but elsewhere) and the soul of atrue writer. A "black" South African, therehas been so far no scholarship or travel grantfor her-only misery, which is likely to breakher if no peace to live and write is found forMrs. B. Head, P.O. Box 130, Serowe, Bechu­analand, or through The New African.

218/THE NEW AFRICAN/NOVEMBER 1965----------No cropswithoutploughing?

IN THE SOUTH-EAST part of Los Angeles,Southern California's major artistic creationrises some 100 feet above the tawdry frameand stucco homes and ugly streets of thecity's major slum. Simon Rodia, an Italianimmigrant tilesetter, settled in Watts andbuilt his Towers over a period of thirtyyears. They are a bizarre creation of con­crete and metal covered with junkyardornamentation (broken tiles and dishes,Seven-Up bottles, sea-shells, old jugs)which spring from a walled garden withmurals of multi-coloured mosaics imprintedin some places with his tools, his hands,and his initials. Some time after Rodia leftWatts, a group of concerned art-lovers setabout incorporating this undefinable andfantastic piece of folk-art into the main­stream of American culture. Now the visitorto the Towers pays 50c admission and canbuy a glossy booklet with professionalphotographs, romanticised history, andsuitably effusive praise by celebratedcritics.

The Watts Towers came to public at­tention after city bureaucrats attempted topull them down as "unsafe." (Calculationand tests eventually proved that an earth­quake would have destroyed the City Hallbefore the Towers). The rest of Watts ­the overcrowded and frustrated ghetto ­remained unnoticed until the eruption ofAugust, which occurred, coincidentally, lessthan a month after Rodia's death. The" LosAngeles riots" have been described, ana­lysed and photographed in a thousandjournals of a hundred countries; there is noneed for repetition. The images - thecharred remains of liquor stores and pawn­shops, bleak as empty eyesockets, the star­ing hatred of Negro faces - are unfor­gettable and eminently tragic.

Most of the causes for the outbreak areapparent. Most are reflected in the statis­tics: 98% Negro population, largely mi­grants from other states; two-thirds with lessthan high-school education; unemploymentat least three times the average for the city;87% of the homes built before 1939. Of

M ART 1NL E GAS SIC K is a formerRhodes Scholar and a South Africanexile now working for a Ph.D. in Africanhistory at the University of California,Los Angeles.

Reflectionson Los Angeles­and violence

30 alleged rioters shot to death, 14 hadbeen convicted of crimes (chiefly burglaryor petty theft), and all, apan from threestudents, were in jobs either menial ortransient or both. "Employed at one timeas a hospital canteen worker" stands as agrim epitaph to many. Three quarters wereborn outside California, mainly in thesouth west.

TO THESE LONG-TERM CAUSES of resent­ment were added more immediate ones. Areferendum in November had repealed ananti-discrimination housing law; the federalanti-poverty programme had been stalled bylocal political squabbles over who shouldcontrol the patronage; the weather had beenhot. The police were ever-present and dis­criminatory. (Police brutality is only symp­tomatic of injustice: law-enforcement agen­cies are entrusted with the task of eliminat­ing crime and keeping order. Police fearsof the septic overflow which Americansociety produces in the ghettoes cycle intopolice brutality, and black resentment re­inforces police racism and harsh treatment.)

The responses to the uprising-an up­rising which caused 35 known deaths, over700 injuries, 1,000 fires and propertydamage of $200 million-have been pre­dictable too. A plethora of investigatingcommissions, relief bodies, ad hoc com­mittees with grandiose "programs" havecome, belatedly, to integrate Watts intothe mainstream, as the artlovers did earlierfor the Towers. But with most of themconcern for order rates higher than concernfor the community of Watts, just as wesuspect the succession of well-dressed, gush­ing women and earnest reporters who wentto seek out Simon Rodia in northern Cali­fomia after the Towers had become famous.For most Americans, the solutions to prob­lems like Watts are just mopping-up opera­tions before the Great Society arrives forall.

MARTIN LUTHER KING ARRIVED to speak forthe people, but found that even CORE andSNCC had both feared and scorned Watts:the civil rights movement has not yet in­volved the hard core of Negro deprivation.The left was equally dogmatic; two younginhabitants of Watts, who had been tryingfor months to raise the community to action,wrote in Liberator "If [a revolutionary

MARTINLEGASSICK

group] . . . had existed, large areas of thecommunity could have been liberated frompolice control, and stores and factoriesrather than being burned could have beenseized and made the property of the people.This organisation did not exist and so wehad an uprising instead of a revolution . . .even if a revolutionary Black governmenthad been established in south-east LosAngeles it would eventually have fallen un­less it had spread to other cities. Revolu­tionary organisation must be community­wide but also nation-wide."

Talk of revolution in America is-at. present-quite unreal, though what the

pressures of automation will do to the socialstructure is still uncertain. Robert Theobaldhas suggested the separation of wage andwork: a fixed minimum income for all.Others, in Monthly Review, have suggestedthat those who "do not work . . . do notexpect to work again . . . as they adapt to'their new conditions of life . . . do notwant to work" are the potential revolu­tionaries in American society.

But in between the dreams of Theobaldand the futurism of the revolutionaries, twofactors are working for drastic and non­violent social change. On one side theFederal poverty programme specifies com­munity action, community control of funds,community representation on decision-mak­ing bodies. Among the "outs ", the newAmerican left - the students, peace­marchers, and civil-rights workers - aregroping from activism to comprehensivesocial programmes. They too are stressinglocal, community-based activities: the stimu­lation of self-help schemes, political educa­tion in the ghettoes and among the newlyenfranchised southern Negroes. Both ap­proaches circumvent, at least partially, thetraditional mechanisms of American govern­ment. Out of the conflict or co-operationthat occurs will come a new balance offorces crucial for the domestic future ofthe United States.

But there was another aspect of the Wattsepisode that is significant, especially forSouth Africans. The left-liberal Nationwrote" Watts has recovered its social iden­tity . . . the sad fact is that most race riotshave brought some relief and improvementin race relations and the Los Angeles riotswill not be an exception." Certainly theviolence was an act of self-assertion, un-

THE NEW AFRICAN/NOVEMBER 1965/219

conscious no doubt, but directed against theindifference of Los Angeles whites, cocoonedin their self-contained communities northof Pico Boulevard, and even driving overthe ghetto on the Harbour Freeway whilealmost oblivious to its existence. The vio­lence was cathartic, as Fanon has stressedin another context: an attempt at the des­truction of a relationship. It will also bringrelief: jobs, remedial education, housing,which will far outweigh the damage. Theeffects of the damage fell, for the most partanyway, on white property-owners who sawtheir stores burnt only on the televisionscreens.

VIOLENCE IS STILL, then, a major methodof domestic interest articulation. But, assuch, its nature varies. In Watts the vio­lence was political only in its repercussionsand its long-term causes. For the most partit was anarchic, the concert of its actionsheld together only by homogeneity of ex­perience. Leaders, if there were any, couldonly have come from the gangs of restlessyouths whose contempt for the laws waspathological. It was violence quite distinctfrom any of the recent South African mani­festations: the intellectualised or quasi­revolutionary sabotage of respectively theARM and Umkhonto, or the semi-organisedterrorism of Poqo.

This violence also poses the same prob­lems for the American desiring social changeas for the South African opposition. Shouldit be approved or disapproved ... or whatintermediate shades of attitude can be adop­ted? "Tragic but inevitable". "Tragicbut necessary ". "Tragic but desirable ".And is disapproval, like most pacifism, notsimply an implicit desire not only to pre­serve a privileged position but to enjoy itin peace? Or as Martin Luther King,echoing in reverse a remark of Goethe's,put it in his famous letter from Birming­ham jail "I have almost reached the con­clusion that the Negro's greatest stumblingblock . . . is the white moderate who ismore devoted to 'order' than to 'justice ';who prefers the negative peace which isthe absence of tension to a positive peacewhich is the presence of justice . . . "

Which leads on to a question harder toanswer, and which the social context ofAmerican violence hardly even poses. Here,for most, it is a question of approval or

disapproval. For the South African opposi-.tion there is the further dilemma of passi­vity or initiatory action. If violence is in­evitable is not inaction implicit disapproval?" Those who profess to favour freedom andyet deprecate agitation are men who wantcrops without ploughing up the ground.They want the ocean without the awful roarof its many waters" said Frederick Douglasover a hundred years ago.

Yet the wish is not the act. Instrumentalviolence can only be undertaken success­fully by certain groups in any social con­text ... through them and with them if notby them: this was the lesson of the failureof Blanquism. The vectors of conflict indi-

To the Editors

Kenya's African Socialism

SIRS,-Miss Harris's intriguing interpretation ofKenya's African Socialism paper suffers fromthe conceptual vagueness and confusion whichincreasingly limits the usefulness of most writ­ing on African Socialism, including the Kenyapaper. A number of questions need much moreprecise and detailed examination than they arenow receiving.

What is the distinction between AfricanSocialism or social democracy in Africa? Towhat extent are there 'common ideological, insti­tutional, and programme elements among thepolicies of African and socialist states e.g.'Ghana, Guinea, Mali, Congo-B which repectthe title African Socialism? Those states e.g.Nigeria, Cameroun Republic which lay claim toAfrican (or pragmatic or Ahidjoist) Socialismbut hardly seem to meet any normal set ofSocialist or social democratic crietria?

What, if any, are the relationships betweenSocialism or social democracy and a WelfareState? Is not the position of the Kenya paperthat state expenditure must be concentrated onproductive investment not a welfare state one ofits most socialist stands? Surely the structureof ownership--or ,at least of economic control­rather than the level of welfare services is the

cate not only the necessary means of changebut suggest who should, who can, under­take the change.

The Watts outbreak left the Towers un­touched. The glossy booklets are still forsale; one quotation extracted from the taci­turn and self-contradictory Rodia asserts" I wanted to do something for the UnitedStates because there are nice people in thiscountry." A recent New Y orker article byCalvin Trillin records some less patrioticremarks of Rodia's; but in the last resortwe must presume that Rodia, like the citi­zens of Watts, and like those who willchange South Africa, created for themselves,in self-realisation, as human beings. _

appropriate test of the presence or degree ofAfrican (or any other) Socialism?

Is acceptance of the need for foreign invest­ment funds properly equated to acceptance ofsubstantial private foreign investment? Thebulk of intemational capital transfers are publicsector or private loans not direct private invest­ment.

In any event, is the critical choice whether ornot to seek private foreign investment? Inprinciple at least, such investment can be con­trolled, phased out, isolated from domestic poli­tics and income distribution patterns. Is notthe more crucial issue whether or not to encour­age the growth of a large scale African privatesector? If such a sector is to be encouraged­as Kenya is doing-how is it possible to avoidincreasingly sharp class differentiation?

Is satisfaction from accumulation properlyequated with control over means of production?Socialist states accept accumulation of consumerdurables (including homes), insurance and r~

tirement claims, bank accounts and governmentbands (on which interest is paid) as who desireto 'accumulate for-to use President Nyerere'stenninology-power instead of use. Indeed,neither individual, family, nor co-operativefarms or firms (nor reinvestment by them) areinherently incompatible with Socialism (muchless social democracy) so long as they do notdepend on non-member labour.

Until a more critical and precise set of con­cepts and criteria is developed and standardised,writing on African Socialism is likely to re­main in ,that curious realm of Alice in Wonder­land in which words mean what the authorwishes them to mean at the moment and haveno stable objective correlatives.REGINALD HERBOLD GREEN, East African Insti­tute of Social Research, Makerere UniversityCollege, Kampala.

220/THE NEW AFRICAN/NOVEMBER 1965-----------The Transkei'sAnswer

PART TWO

L. JIPULA

BOOKS AND THE ARTS

The Restoration,of Man

D. E. Steward

Whit~ Lotus by John Hersey (Affred Knopf,New York)

THE MAN WHO MADE conclusive statements onHiroshima, the W'arsaw Ghetto, people who lovewar, and even on the frosty character ofpeople who are native to the New Englandstates, has made an important statement onracism in America and slavery as it has existedanywhere.

John Hersey wrote White Lotus midstream inthe passion of the American Oiv'i1 RightsMovement. It should have been written longbefore now, yet that it was written at all isabsolute proof that the world has passed farbeyond the point df 'a century 'ago when Disraelicould say, " . . . race implies difference,difference implies superiority, and superiorityleads to predominance."

Hersey compresses hi'S history of the agonyof the African in America into one lifetime, thatOf a white girl from Arizon'a who, after beingtaken into slavery, is given the name WhiteLotu's. Her saga ends '3'S she stands alone innon-violent protest 'aga:inst the racial powerwhich has nearly erased her soul.

White Lotus isa tong al1egory; it is set inwhat is either a distan'tly possib1e future or inan undetermined p'ast. In this novel Chinais to North America exactly as historically NorthAmerica hals been to Mrica. Hersey isabsolutely successfu~ because every aspect o'fWhite Lotus's life is a11egorical1y correct. Heis a master at the deta'iled fantasy of allegoricalreality; here so completely that every chapteris a further parable, and so the book becomesa chain of parables which leads down into thedarkest pits of racism.

Even though he knows Chinese cultureintim'ately, John Hersey has not written a bookabout China. White Lotus is about everyhorrible rea-Ihy in the sorry history cif racerelations all over the world so far. •

DURING THE 1963 ELECTIONS there wasgeneral intimidation. Incidents of actualassaults on the opposition have been re­corded. In Matanzima's area, for example,those who urged others to vote againstMatanzima were publicly assaulted. Al­though many of these cases were reportedto the police, no prosecutions followed.Matanzima and his thugs were thus ableto brutalise their opponents with impunity.Elsewhert the people were told to vote orface dire consequences, including loss of" rights" in their areas. On the actual votingday an army of police moved in. Fleets ofWhite police toured the length and breadthof the land night and day. Planes andhelicopters stood at the alert.

Despite the fraud, corruption and intimi­dation, the fear of reprisals, attempts weremade to boycott the elections. This move­ment was inspired by the African People'sDemocratic Union of Southern Africa(APDUSA) an affiliate of the Unity Move­ment of South Africa. In Pondoland wherethe movement was strongest, impis weresent out to intimidate those who showed re­luctance to vote and cow down the opposi­tion. But in some areas, notably Mqanduli,whole vilages stayed away from the polls.Large sections of the population in Baziya,Tsmo and Engcobo also boycotted thesesham elections.

Pressure was brought to bear upon all lay­ers of the Transkei to vote for Matanzimaand his men. There was intense intrigue andmanipulation. The chiefs also came into thefray. Chief Havington Zulu, a member ofPoto's Party has this to say on the sub­ject:

"I was nearly dismissed by the RepublicanGovernment for fighting against rehabilitation.I was called an underground Poqo. Chiefs whojoined the Democratic Party were threatenedwith dismissal from their positions. At UmtataI was taken into a dark house and questioned bypeople I could not see. They urged me to sup­port Chief Kaiser Matanzima because he hadsaved me from dismissal."

Matanzima himself in one of his moreboastful moments has said: "I have akeen eye on chiefs and will protect them.I have files on all chiefs and headmen andI am keen to see how they work."

L. J I P U L A is a member of the Execu­tive of the All-African Convention and isnow in exile in Lusaka. T he first part ofthis article was published in The NewAfrican, August 1965.

IN SPITE OF ALL THESE machinations bythe South Mrican Fascist Government, thepeople themselves remain resolute. Whenthe results of the mock general electionwere announced they showed that of the45 elected members 38 supported Poto.Matanzima had his greatest support fromthe 64 puppet chiefs, who are recognisedor appointed by the South Mrican Govern­ment and paid by it as its servants. Thefinal result was a 54 to 49 victory forMatanzima over Poto. Thus the chiefssupported the Broederbond-backed candi­dates while the people rejected them. Themajority of the people had voted overwhel­mingly against apartheid and the creationof a Bantustan.

In the by-election that took place inGcalekaland, following the shooting by un­known persons of one of Matanzima's fol­lowers, Chief Mlingo Salakupatwa, in April,1964, Matanzima's candidate, Paul Majavu,was defeated by Poto's candidate, MosesDumalisile, by 7,434 votes. The actualvotes were 36,137 for Dumalisile and28,703 for Majavu. The election itself wasthe first in the T ranskei Bantustan to beconducted on a party political basis. Thepeople were called upon to choose betweentwo policies. Again they voted againstapartheid.

Here again intrigue, intimidation and cor­ruption were used in favour of Matanzima'sman. On the eve of the by-election, Matan­zima in his capacity as Chief Minister ofthe Transkei Bantustan sent the followingletter to chiefs and headmen in Gcaleka-land: Chief Minister's Office,

Transkei Government,UMTATA.6th October, 1964.

Chief/Headman,Gcaleka Region,Re: Gcalekaland by-election.

As you are aware the By-election is closeat hand. I advise 'all chiefs and headmen tobeware of jackals that will turn against theirown people. The usual practice of these jackalsis to lead the people into difficult positionswhere they will find themselves chased by thepolice. These jackals bring about trouble be­tween the chiefs and their people.

Stand with the Government if you wish tolead a happy and contented life because thesejackals themselves are being hounded by thepolice as they have Communistes sheltered un­der their blankets.

Vote for Paul Majavu, who is supported byParamount Chief Zwelidumile Sigcawi and alsoby the Chief Minister of the Transkei.

THE NEW AFRICAN/NOVEMBER 1965/221

Let all sub-headmen be busy on the dayof the by-election and see to it that the peopleare not misled.

(Signed) K. D. Matanzima,Chief Minister of the Transkei.

Following upon this directive by the ·col­laborator-in-chief, chiefs and headmen inGcalekaland got busy. As we have seen fromthe results of the election, their advice wasrejected by the people despite the fact thatit is an offence to disobey an order of thechief. The intriguers were confounded.

The oppressed people of South Africahave moved on to the offensive. The initia­tive is theirs and the Herrenvolk cannot doanything about it. Although the governingwing of the Herrenvolk has not acknow­ledged this fact, it has by its actions given It

tacit recognition. For example, members ofPoto's Party, acting under pressure fromthe mass of the population, have with im­punity condemned, rejected and publiclycriticised and characterised as traitors tothe cause of the liberation of the oppressed,the chiefs who follow Matanzima. Yet, inthe face of these "treasonable acts" theGovernment has not been prepared to in­voke the tyranny of Proclamation 400 of1960, which makes any criticism of a chiefor headman a criminal and punishableoffence. This despite Matanzima's requestthat its oppressive provisions be appliedagainst his opponents.

Thus in his election manifesto in respectof the by-election referred to above, MosesDumalisile was able to demand full owner­ship of land, abolition of job-apartheid andinflux control regulations in the urban areas,universal education as opposed to African,Indian, Coloured and European Education- education to fit the child in a pluralsociety; equal work and equal qualifica­tions; repeal of the rehabilitation scheme;repeal of Proclamation 400 and the institu­tion of a truly national Parliament. Hedemanded "one Parliament . . . not aParliament for Africans in the Transkeiin Umtata, and a White Parliament in CapeTown."

Speaking of Proclamation 400 and lackof freedom of speech and movement inthe so-called free Transkei, another oneof Poto's men, O. O. Mpondo, had this tosay recently: "There is no freedom in theTranskei. There has been a state of emer­gency since 1960. But we are prepared to

go to jail in the struggle for liberation ofall people in South Africa. We are preparedto die in carrying out the wishes of theparty."

Another high-ranking official of Poto'sParty who is also a prominent member ofSteytler's reactionary Progressive Party, theRev. Benjamin S. Rajuili, said in East Lon­don not so long ago: " No chief can super­sede the voice of the people. The people arenow turning against their chiefs who want tocarry out the wishes and whims of theSouth African Government. To those chiefswho do not carry out the wishes of theirpeople the emergency regulations are aboon."

Much of this coming as it does fromincorrigible collaborators is so much lipservice. But the fact that these turncoatshave found it necessary to mouth these noblesentiments is significant of the mood ofthe teeming millions of the Non-Whitepeople who have pledged themselves tofight for the realisation of a new way of lifein South Africa. Under the banner of theAll-African Convention, the Unity Move­ment and APDUSA the nation is beinggalvanised for a final showdown with theHerrenvolk and their agents. The ideas ofequality and freedom have become a livingreality in our country. Even Matanzimahas to represent his shameful collaborationas the royal road to freedom. He declares,"The policy of multi-racialism is nothingelse but an instrument of African oppres­sion." And again, "It is clear that theDemocratic Party with its liberal policy isdetermined to abolish chieftainship andAfrican traditions. The people of the Tran­skei will defend any attempt to attack theirtraditions and customs." Once again thebarbarian is invoking the dead gods oftribalism, the kaross and the voodoo cultdespite the all-encompassing rays of themidday sun of scientific and technologicaldevelopments of the twentieth century.

THE QUESTION MAY WELL be asked: Whydoes Verwoerd allow Poto's men to agitateagainst apartheid? Why does he not havethe Democratic Party outlawed and itsmembers arrested? Verwoerd is truly on thehorns of a dilemma. Logically he shouldban and arrest. But to do this would upsethis whole plan and defeat the purpose ofthe Bantustans. Yet Verwoerd cannot afford

to allow the disgruntled quislings to use theBaboons' Parliament as a platfonn to spreadanti-apartheid propaganda. Mter all,apartheid is sacrosanct. It is beyond criti­cism, especially by Non-Whites. Besides,Matanzima and his men have been pressingfor action to be taken against these " agita­tors who are against all order." But it wouldseem that his masters have decided that inthis case discretion is the better part ofvalour and to approach the matter withcircumspection. It is a tricky problem forthe Broederbond.

I have indicated in this article that theGovernment of South Africa has imposedupon the people of the Transkei a Bantus­tan that the majority rejects. Force, intrigue,cajolery and intimidation have been em­ployed to put the plan into operation asplanned; the protagonists of apartheid inthe Transkei rely upon the tyranny ofProclamation 400 for their own personalsecurity and the maintenance of their posi­tions; in the interests of maintaining "lawand order" the rule of law has been abro­gated. But in spite of all this, the demandfor one man, one vote persists. Indeed onlyrecently Verwoerd's army moved into Pon­doland where there were threats of anotherBare-up against the system. Matanzima andhis Party have refused to recommend totheir mentors the removal of Proclamation400 on the ground that it is there to dealwith Communists who are waiting for an op­portunity to stir up a revolution amongst thepeasantry. In plain language, conditions inthe Transkei are not propitious for thesmooth running of a Bantustan Parliament.Matanzima and other quisling chiefs andheadmen have to be guarded by the policenight and day against the wrath of thepeople. Everywhere there is restiveness andresentment. There is agitation against theBantustan system on all levels. There isagitation against job-reservation, against in­doctrinated schooling, against political apar­theid, against the Rehabilitation Scheme,against quisling chiefs and headmen. Thiskind of agitation has effects that go beyondthe confines of the Transkei. It has theeffect of undermining the system of apar­theid as a whole. A great deal of constantmanoeuvering; manipulation and ingenuityis required to keep the caricature intact andunder control. Thus is Verwoerd's Bantus­tan having a boomerang effect. e

222/THE NEW AFRICAN/NOVEMBER 1965-----------South Africain 1965

I HAD BEEN VISITING FRIENDS on a smallfarm on the outskirts of the town and wasstanding at the edge of a ploughed fieldto watch the sun go down over the flat,limitless highveld.

All was quiet except for a murmur ofvoices from a group of Africans about aquarter of a mile away from me. Theywere squatting on their haunches in theMrican way, and I surmised that they weregambling with stones or cards.

Suddenly a motor vehicle came tearingalong a sandy track through the veld, break­ing the silence, and I saw that it was apolice" pick-up" van. The Africans scat­tered and began to run. The van screechedto a halt in clouds of dust near the piecesof sparse, wintry veld where they had beensquatting.

One of the men had not been as quick asthe others, who had disappeared amongsome outbuildings and trees inside the farmfence. This man ran uncertainly for a fewyards. The constable who was driving thevan slammed it into reverse gear, -backedtowards him and then jumped out. TheAfrican by this time was walking slowlyalong a path. The constable, a small manin the light blue uniform and cap of theSouth African police, aimed his fist at theman's face and hit him with all hisstrength. The African staggered back.

The constable slammed his fist againand again into the man's face - aboutsix times in all - and each time the Africanstaggered, until at last he fell to the ground.

A second constable had got out of thevan and the two of them hauled the man tohis feet and pushed and pulled him to theback of the pick-up. One of the constablesopened the back door. They made theman bend his head and the other police­man planted his boot on his buttocks andgave a hefty and well-aimed shove. TheAfrican fell sprawling into the back of thevan, the door was slammed and locked andthe van moved off.

IT ALL HAPPENED VERY QUICKLY - in amatter of minutes. I should think thatevery South African over 40 has seen ithappen at least once in his lifetime. Ihave had the assurance of a high-rankingpolice officer that it happens "all too fre­quently" that policemen, especially young

Incident on aHighveld Farm

constables, take the law into their ownhands - take it upon themselves to punishmost severely people who are untried byany court of law.

There was no attempt by the policemaninvolved in this incident to acquire anyevidence of any alleged offence or to findwitnesses. Unauthorised gambling in publicor even in private is an offence in SouthAfrica and this mayor may not have beenwhat the Africans were doing. The policedid not bother themselves to find out.

The owners of the farm had not com­plained to the police. A liberal-mindedcouple, they were as shocked and as in­dignant as I was. They know that Africansmeet on the veld on the periphery of theirproperty on Sunday afternoons to talk andgamble.

"There is simply nothing else for themto do here," they told me. "N0 sportsfacilities, no cinemas, almost no transport."

White South Africans who witness as­saults like this on Africans very rarely com­plain, either because they concur with thetreatment or through fear of becoming" involved with the police."

An Afrikaner lawyer whom I once knew- a Nationalist - told me that everytime he visited the local jail to see awaitingtrial prisoners he witnessed assaults. Thevictims rarely lodge a complaint or laya charge. Every court reporter has seenprisoners in the dock with the marks ofassault on their faces.

The police officer to whom I complainedappeared sympathetic and concerned. "Wetake a very serious view of cases of assualton prisoners," he said. "Every youngpoliceman on assuming duty has to sign aspecial instruction issued by the Depart­ment of Justice forbidding him to punisha prisoner. Yet I know that it happens alltoo often. But unless the prisoner himselflays a complaint there is nothing we cando. If the man you saw being assaultedwants to lay a charge we will call you as awitness in a criminal charge. MeanwhileI'll investigate the matter departmentally."

WELL, THAT WAS SOME WEEKS ago and Ihave heard nothing more. It is easy for apoliceman accused of assault to plead thathis victim resisted arrest. . .

A middle-aged policeman recently told

CANDIDUS

me that he thought a policeman could havea powerful motive in assaulting a prisoneras a quick and easy way of securing a con­fession, but he "failed to understand " whya prison warder should hit a man who hadalready been convicted as that motive wasnot present: therefore he found the storiesof prison ill-treatment difficult to believe.

At least 80 per cent - probably more- of our police are Afrikaans-speakingand I am told that most of the assaultsare committed by young policemen re­cruited from the platteland - the farmsand villages of the countryside. It is notice­able that such people reveal a curious am­bivalence in their attitude towards Africans.In the loose, intimate atmosphere of anisolated farm there is a rough friendlinessamounting almost to familiarity but thismay turn at any moment into panic-strickenviolence if the African oversteps the invi­sible but very real barrier.

Many of these lads were brought up frominfancy by African "nannies" some ofwhom they knew more intimately than theirown mothers. But when puberty is reachedthe child slowly realises that this connectionmust be broken and his relations with theblack people must become those of hisolder brothers and sisters and his parents.

Psychologists have deduced that the reallove of the African mother-substitute maythus be turned to guilt-ridden hate andfear. The love-hate attitude persists in adultlife and may be responsible for the numer­ous contraventions of the so-called Immor­ality Act by people who have not outgrowntheir childish love of a black woman. This,of course, has been the theme of manySouth African novels.

All this is part of the tragedy of theAfrikaners - of a deeply religious, nor­mally extremely courteous people.

IT IS QUITE REMARKABLE how different therelationship is between the urbanisedEnglish-speaking South Africans and theAfricans. The English almost always treatAfricans in a stand-offish, but strictly fairmanner. Their aloofness does not endearthem to the Africans; I have known Afri­cans who prefer Afrikaners, with all theirfaults, because they feel they are morehuman. The English are not as subject asAfrikaners to violent reactions and hates;at the same time they rarely show any

THE NEW AFRICAN/NOVEMBER 1965/223

December 1965 issue

AYI KWEIARMAH"Contact"-a story

LEWIS NKOSIDoing Paris with Breyten

IT IS NOT AT ALL FAR-FETCHED to assertthat the direction that jazz has taken in thelast few years has brought it, both in soundand spirit, closer to the ancient music ofBlack Africa. And in fact there is nothingso remarkable or strange about this factsince, contrary to common decision of thegeneral western critical forces, the majorpreoccupation of the great innovators injazz has been greater spontaneity and flexi­bility of expression rather than greatertechnical facility for facility's sake. In factthe overall technical innovations, discover­ies, or methods introduced into the world'smusical vocabulary by the experimenters injazz have been always subordinate to theidea of being able to say that crteain hiddenthing. Charles Parker testified to this.Omette Coleman is in our time re-assertingthis forcefully. Eric Dolphy who died lastyear aged only thirty-five also said this, notin defence or explanation, but in comple­ment of his music.

Even a passing acquaintance with thevibraphone and flute music of West Mricancountries such as Guinea, Mali, Senegal, andNigeria to mention only a few cannot fail

6

SOUL

MEETING '65

LINDSAY BARRETT

Fr. BEDE ONUOHAWhat is African Socialism?

(By arrangement with Andre Deutsch Ltd., London)

real friendliness and the professed friend­liness and chumminess of some English­speaking liberals is often regarded by Afri­cans, who are quick in intuition, as thefalse coinage it sometimes is.

Ever seen an Afrikaner laughing andjoking with a black man (something anEnglish South African rarely does) andthen kicking him in the backside in thenext minute? There you have the essenceof the Afrikaner attitude and it is one,of course, which is carried into public lifeand politics in all kinds of subtle and 00­subtle ways.

It may help to explain the pathologicalfear of the Afrikaner politician that hispeople should be protected from "con­taminating" themselves by social mixingwith the Africans. Hence the strict appli­cation of apartheid in sport and highereducation and residential and social life.

Remember too that the Afrikaner hasbeen fed from infancy with stories of Blacktreachery and violence - stories handeddown from fath'er to son and dating fromDingane, the Frontier Wars and Voortrekkerdays when a handful of Whites survivedamong the hordes of "black savages."

THE" SAVAGES" ARE SUPINE in 1965; theyhave built up an elaborate code of conductto avoid being thrashed to within an inchof their lives. The bowing and scrapingand rubbing together of the hands and theoft-used appellation" basie " (" little boss ")are symptoms of the sickness. Sobukwe andMandela and hundreds of others who tookup arms against the White hegemony,bravely but hopelessly, linger on in ourjails and are only spoken of in whispers.Instead there is the. " petrol boy" who tipshis cap for a 3c tip and the waiter whoseeyes roll if you attempt a political discus­sion. And all is quiet and Verwoerd andVorster and Co. are happy and the econ­omy prospers exceedingly ~ith the help ofunderpaid black labourers and manyEnglish-speaking businessmen who back thegovernment to the hilt.

But resentment is being stored up, slowly,secretly, deeply, and one day it will surelyexplode in a way which will make th'eLos Angeles affair look like a Sundayschool picnic. At the moment there doesnot seem much to hope for in South Africa.

•

224/THE NEW AFRICAN/NOVEMBER 1965

to impress on the listener the similarity inimprovisational approach between bothmusics and whereas differences in instru­ments and instrumentation give rise to nat­ural differences in tone and presentation,the closeness of an Ornette Coleman riff tothe monotone elephant-horn calls of tradi­tion ritual musicians from Guinea (for ex­ample when playing for an initiation cere­mony) is uncanny. But comparison andsmug recognition of similarities still cannotferret out or fathom the yet deeper ties ofaesthetic harmony that has brought musicsfrom two continents so close to each otherso easily. On the Eric Dolphy MemorialAlbum, (Vee Jay, VJ2503 t) there is a ren­dition of an old American pop song " AloneTogether" played only by Dolphy on bassclarinet, a difficult and too often neglectedinstrument and one of the many reeds hemastered, and Richard Davis, a remarkablebassist. Together they seemed to overlookor ignore any need to satisfy stereotypedexpectations on the part of their listeners(fans?) and as a result this performance, ifnone other in jazz, has broken the groundfor an even closer rapport between the

stricter melodic form of jazz and the moreintensely rhythmic conceptions of BlackAfrican musics. This may be too much tosay of one performance but it is not in factthe only such performance in jazz. How­ever it happens to be one of the most beau­tiful selections on a superb record. Whetherit is the most beautiful or not is a matterof taste.

On the flip side there is the extraordin­arily updated band performance of FatsWaller's old hit Jitterbug Waltz whichbrings to mind another observation, thatthe most forceful innovators in any art willalways examine the historic archives of theirart for valuable material, and of course injazz this is especially tactful since as wehave asserted here the movement forwardis a movement into history. There is greaterlight in the knowledge of our beginningscthan there is in the knowledge of our end.

ON ANOTHER TACK, it is equally pleasing tohear in jazz the growing volume of incorp­orated tunes, riffs and chord structures fromother black musics of the West of which

Sonny Rollins is one of the chief expon­ents, and Omette Coleman also. In thisDolphy Album, just as on Alone Togetherhe used the chords of a popular song as thespringboard for a brilliant construction oflyric and rhythmic ideas; so two membersof his band on side one, flautist PrinceLasha, and altoist Huey Simmons have usedthe popular form of the calypso on whichto build their tune, Music Matador. Theresult is a free-for-all avant garde calypsoimprovisation which achieves the extr~ord­

inary in providing uncompromising musicwhich even the squares can shake a leg toshould they feel so inclined. Of course Iam not suggesting that our music is usuallyundanceable. I find Omette Coleman andSonny Rollins beautiful for dancing. Monkis extraordinary for solo dancing. Girlthere. Boy here. Go now. Why should thisbe surprising (as so many people seem tofind it)? Jazz in all its forms is eventuallyritual music. Ritual and rhythmic. BlackMrican music is superb for dancing whenmeant for dancing and who is to say thatjazz when jumping, (the music itself is adance) should not be jumped to! e

THOUGHTNew ideas and oldin and about Africa

LIFESocial and ·economic lifein industrial and pre­industrial Africa and SouthAfrica. And the landsin sch it is lived

T his magazinecovers Africain generaland South Africain particular

ARTSThere is no culturalapartheid:poetry, painting, writing,sculpture, everything

POLITICS

T he freedom andunfreedom movementsof Africawhere they've moved fromwhere they're mOfJing toand not leaving behindSouth Africa

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