NF (1957) Going Home

by Doris Lessing

  In Standard II Shadrack failed and fell out, leaving Isaac to continue.

  Isaac proved a good student. He passed his examinations well. He was ambitious.

  While he was doing Standard IV a strike took place among the students and Isaac was suspected of engineering it. The students were sent home. After a while some of them were readmitted. Isaac received a letter from the principal forbidding him to return. Isaac returned to Domboshawa and pleaded with the principal. He was taken back.

  Isaac’s influence among the students was dynamic. He formed a group known as ‘The Band of Outlaws’ which held debates after school hours. The principal naturally looked upon it with disfavour and did not like Isaac very much for it. But the boy did his examinations well and was very loyal to and popular with the teachers.

  After doing post-Standard VI in agriculture he went to teach at Jonas School in the Epworth Circuit, at a wage of £2 5s. a month (being an untrained teacher). After three months he left and took up the post of agricultural demonstrator at the Government Experimental Farm, Msengezi, Makwiro. Old demonstrators resented this meteoric promotion of a junior. There were protests and Mr Samuriwo was transferred to the Gatooma Cotton Ginnery Station. Jealousies followed him there, and he did not last more than three months.

  Going to Kwenda he taught agriculture for two years. Then he went to Tjolotjo as a builder, quarrelled with a European over accommodation and was fired. He came to Gwelo and became hide buyer for the Bata Shoe Co. at a wage of £6 10s. a month. He saved some of the money, got a passport and went to the Tsolo School of Agriculture in the Transkei, Cape, for further training.

  That was July 1943. He arrived at the school on a Tuesday. The following Monday he was made a prefect. A week after that he became head prefect. He told his class-mates: ‘I shall be great.’

  Two years afterwards he wrote the final exams and passed in the first class, with a percentage of 80.3. That was in June 1945. In July came his marriage, which he was arranging as he was preparing for the examinations. The bride was Miss Rotina Ntuli, daughter of the head of the Hlubis at Etyeni, Tsolo.

  He returned home with a certificate and a wife. The Education Department offered him a post at Domboshawa as an agricultural instructor. He turned it down, saying, ‘I want to be a land development officer.’ The Government would not give him that post, which was for Europeans only. Samuriwo went to work for Mr Meikles at Leachdale Farm, Shangani. He received good pay and treatment. After a year he left and bought a secondhand lorry, which he drove in Harare, Salisbury, carting sand, bricks and firewood. He made money and bought a new bus for £2,300. Before it was fully insured he drove it home to the Chihota Reserve on a third party cover to show it to relatives. A half-brother out of his senses set fire to it, and it was completely destroyed.

  Mr Samuriwo came back to Salisbury and drove his old lorry. He rebuilt the business, sold the old vehicle and bought a new one. Then he bought a diesel bus. Then another bus. Then he built two stores—one at Mt Darwin, one at Chiweshe. Soon afterwards he established two stores in the Chihota Reserve, one in Salisbury, and a service station in Chihota. Recently he has acquired three new lorries.

  He says he owes all this success to truth, hard work and fearlessness.

  In politics he is not unknown. Soon after his return from the Cape he took an interest in the Southern Rhodesia African Association, whose membership includes a number of chiefs. Before long he was appointed its vice-president, eventually president. When a branch of the Federal Party was established in Harare he was chosen its first chairman. For some time he was a member of the Harare location advisory board and one of the location’s streets is named after him.

  Mr Samuriwo is the first president of the Southern Rhodesia African Chamber of Commerce and is now president of the Southern Rhodesia African Transport Operators’ Association. He is an agricultural and horticultural adviser in Salisbury, a building contractor, a cartage contractor, greengrocer and provision merchant and general dealer.

  5

  For two weeks I had been meeting Partners, Useful Rebels, Interracialists and supporters of the new anti-colour-bar society, Capricorn. I had attended a Capricorn meeting addressed by Colonel Stirling and Laurens van der Post and seen something that would have been impossible eight years ago: a white audience applauding a black man. In 1943 a few members of the Labour Party held a meeting in a Native Township where such matters as the Passes Act and the Destocking Act were discussed. This meeting caused such a furore among the citizenry, such a flood of newspaper leaders, angry letters signed ‘Pro Patria’ and anonymous letters that ultimately it led to the breaking up of the Labour Party. A decade ago the Labour Party split on the issue of whether there should be an African Branch of the party. Now, in 1956, I heard five hundred applauding speeches about racial harmony; and all the political parties court African membership. Day and night I had been besieged by people who wished me to report that Partnership was an honest policy—people who believed, or rather wished to believe, that it is.

  I never did believe it to be true that one has to live in a country to understand what is happening in it. I believe it even less now. One cannot be brought up the daughter of a white settler with impunity; and it is hard to withstand the persuasions of old friends whom one not only likes but respects.

  In short, I was on the verge of succumbing to the blandishments of what must be the most effective public relations officers in the world, both official and self-appointed, when I met an old African friend to whom I confessed my state of mind.

  He listened with the sardonic good humour with which Africans meet the involuted defences and rationalizations of their white allies, and told me to go off and have another look at the Land Apportionment Act.

  He also said that having worked in the Union as well as in Southern Rhodesia he infinitely preferred the Union; and so did most of the Africans he knew who had the opportunity to compare them. ‘Apartheid’, he said, was an honest word, exactly describing the segregation patterns of the Union and also of Southern Rhodesia. ‘Partnership’ was a typical bit of British hypocrisy. There was nothing he disliked more, he said, than the British liberal, having his cake and eating it; give him the Nationalists every time—they said what they thought and meant. They were honest opponents.

  This upset me. I had not suspected that the ghost of a perverted patriotism still lurked among the meshes of the stern pattern of my Socialism; I did not like to think of British Africa being worse than Nationalist South Africa.

  But I exorcized the ghost, and set myself to ask all the Africans I met, who knew South Africa, which they preferred. They all said that within the segregation patterns, which were identical, there were much better amenities for Africans in the south: they could shop, for instance, being served on equal terms with the whites. The colour bar was much less rigid. There were hotels and restaurants on a civilized level—only a few, but better than nothing, and there was nothing in Southern Rhodesia.

  So I restored myself by a couple of evenings with the Land Apportionment and other Acts.

  Briefly, then: Southern Rhodesia has modelled itself on the Union: a law passed down south is always passed within a year or so in Southern Rhodesia, under a different name. The Land Apportionment Act is the basis of Southern Rhodesia policy, as the Group Areas Act is in the Union. In both countries land is parcelled out into areas called Native and European. In Southern Rhodesia only 46 per cent of the land still remains to the Africans. (Whereas in Northern Rhodesia and Nyasaland about 5 per cent has been taken from them.) Since Partnership, this basic segregation has been hardened, not relaxed. Thousands of Africans have been forcibly moved off ‘European’ land, where they had been living for generations, into Reserves.

  Here I quote from that revealing document, the Report on Native Affairs, 1954, signed Mr J. E. S. Turton, Chief Native Commissioner, Secretary of Native Affairs, and Director of Native Development.

  It is little appreciated what is involved in one of
these mass movements. Land has to be provided to accommodate the Natives, and as prerequisite to the movement, the land has to be developed with roads, water supplies, village sites, dipping facilities and medical services…the preparations for movements have, at the dispatching end, entailed patient explanations to the Natives, and arrangements of minute precision regarding the timing and loadings with goods and families, of the Government and private motor vehicles engaged on the problem of transport. In some areas where approaches to Native kraals are limited it has been necessary to set up collecting areas or transit camps from which the Natives are collected by Organized Transport. Similar provision has to be made at the destination, so that all the Natives moved were subject to as little inconvenience as was possible in the circumstances. Most movements have been done during the period August to October, that is after crops have been reaped and before the onset of the rains, and in all respects maximum attention has been given to the human aspect. Thus it is that, although some opposition was experienced in some districts when movements were first organized, Natives moved from Crown lands and other areas have been in fact co-operating extremely well with the administration. It was often noticeable that the women were the first to put their shoulders to the wheel in assisting with the preparation of the household and domestic baggage. The remarks of the Native Commissioner, Gokwe, typify the attitude of the administrative official and the Native:

  ‘The never-ending movement of Natives to this district continues at high pressure. Administrative and field officers are fully extended to cope with the necessary developments of virgin areas to accommodate the annual movements. The tempo for settlement is such that we have neither staff nor finances to launch protective work which is so vital…the movement of some 1,500 people with 3,000 head of cattle was carried out without a hitch and was completed within approximately four weeks.’

  [I would give a good deal to know what those three dots represent in the report of the Native Commissioner at Gokwe-Author.]

  There has been the call for the utmost tact and consideration from the Native Commissioners concerned to ensure that these Natives settle down without rancour or bitterness towards the administration, who alone in their eyes are responsible for the upheaval. [Italics mine—Author.]

  No major incidents have occurred; and the smooth running of these mass movements, unnoticed by the general public, redounds to the credit of the administrative officials.

  This note of self-congratulation, almost self-commiseration, is typical of Government publications during this era. I suspect that at the bottom of their hearts the officials are sorry for themselves because the Africans are not grateful for being moved off their land with such tact and consideration.

  Another interesting piece from the same Report: ‘October 1954 saw the completion of the first year of Federation, and the Native population for the most part have accepted the metamorphosis with complete indifference. There have been the usual vociferous few who have made the occasion one of maligning the motives of the Europeans, but this was only to have been expected from malcontents who in the aggregate live, not by an honest day’s work, but on what they can squeeze from a simple and credulous Native population who generally see, too late, hard-earned money passing into the pockets of thieves and rogues who filch it from them on the pretext of “taking legal advice or other suitable steps to safeguard the interests of the Natives”. Never once has a society or organization of this type published a statement detailing the manner in which donated funds have been spent, and experience has been that they shun any publicity on this aspect of their affairs.’ Officials always complain about the venality of African leaders; sometimes they are venal or careless. But this is not a weakness confined to Africans.

  Conditions in the cities of Central Africa exactly mirror those in the Union. Around the ‘white’ centres are African townships and squatters’ camps. These are completely segregated. Africans may not use restaurants, hotels, or bars in the white areas. They have special counters in post offices, banks and public buildings. An African leaving his Reserve must carry a variety of passes—his registration certificate in any case, which is a sort of certificate of identity; then his certificate of residence, of work, and—if he is employed as a servant—he must have a ‘pass’ to go visiting. Thousands of Africans are fined or imprisoned every year for not being in possession of one of these passes.

  A few privileged Africans carry a pass exempting them from carrying passes. One of these told me a story of how he had been picked up by the police, since he had left his pass at home, and was taken to the police station where the official said: ‘What! They’ve picked you up? They don’t know yet you’re an old Rhodesian? Off you go.’

  It is always a question of grace and favour, the disposition of a particular official. Thus, Salisbury is repressive in the matter of pass offences; whereas in Bulawayo, under the liberal Dr Ashton, things are much better.

  Africans were amused in Salisbury when I was there because Colonel Hartley, the Superintendent, had been complaining that Africans were not to be trusted with money, and therefore he could not allow them to act as gatekeepers for the location football matches. The European gatekeepers he appointed having mislaid a sum of money, Colonel Hartley exclaimed from the depths of his paternal heart: ‘How can our people be so irresponsible as to act so, setting such a bad example to these backward natives?’

  I quote here a letter to the African Weekly which explains how Africans feel about the curfew regulations:

  SIR,

  The curfew regulations in all the main urban centres of S. Rhodesia which prohibit an African from passing through town after ten o’clock, sometimes nine o’clock, are bringing untold harm to Africans. They restrict all their movements after dark and virtually put them in a ‘social box’.

  What type of social life is the African expected to have in urban areas? He is expected to go and see bioscope in the Welfare halls. Often he has not got the money to pay at the door, and at times he is not very interested because bioscopes are a new thing to him. We like to play (particularly those of us from Nyasaland) our own games, and dances. To do this we want to get together after work—cookboys, houseboys, garden-boys, and general workers—at a central spot and play our own dances. The problem is how will some of us cross the town after ten o’clock so that we return to our rooms on the other side of town. We cannot. In that way the curfew regulations are making it difficult for Africans to enrich their social life and organize the dances they used to partake in before coming to town. The cooks and garden workers who do not reside in urban locations are the ones most affected by this.

  The argument that Africans would steal a lot of property if permitted to pass through town at night is groundless. They should be permitted to move on the road and pavement. If someone leaves the road and starts getting on to private premises, that one should be arrested and dealt with severely. Even in Europe, America and anywhere in the world no one is permitted to linger in someone’s premises without permission.

  Conversation overheard on a bus:

  WHITE CHILD (aged about 12): Is your dad going to let you go to the Kaffir college?

  WHITE CHILD (about 15): Nah, I’m going down to the Cape.

  LADY (from back seat, leaning forward): My dear children, there have been Africans at the Cape Town University for years.

  WHITE CHILD: Nah, the Nats have kicked all the Kaffirs out.

  The Land Apportionment Act has been amended to allow Africans and other people of colour to reside at the University, which is on ‘white’ land.

  It has also been amended to allow representatives of the Indian Government to live in white areas—provided it is understood that the local Indian community does not do so.

  As soon as I arrived I was canvassed for support against an Indian couple, official representatives, who had insisted that their child had the right to go to the local white Government school. One man, a journalist, said sourly: ‘Yes, and as soon as they had their
way, and made a fuss, then what? They haven’t even sent their kid to the school. They just wanted to fight on principle so as to make us look silly.’

  Later, meeting representatives of the local Indian community, I was told that the parents of this child had had so many anonymous threatening letters that they had not dared send her, for fear of what she might be made to suffer.

  The Indians of the three federated territories suffer all the hardships that the Africans do, with minor differences—for instance, they may drink ‘European’ liquor.

  I was told they had petitioned Lord Malvern and Mr Garfield Todd for a revision of the colour bars on the grounds that their treatment was inconsistent with Partnership. They got no satisfaction. Easy to see why not: administration, terrified above all of the white voters, would not consider the satisfaction of the comparatively small Indian communities worth losing their seats.

  The Indians here, as in the Union, have always been the sore spot of the colour bar. One cannot say of Indians, who have a much older history of civilization than Europeans, that they are barbarous and backward, yet they are treated just as badly, sometimes worse, than the Africans. The excesses of the colour bar are always due to a bad conscience; and it is the Indians who excite particular venom in the white people.

  Mrs S., the wife of one of the Indian Government representatives, being advanced in pregnancy and feeling tired, attempted to use the lift in one of the big stores. She was pushed out and made to use the stairs.

  A charming and cultivated girl, used to intelligent society in New Delhi, after two years’ residence in Southern Rhodesia, she showed signs of strain. Mr S., however, on the evening I was at their house, told anecdotes about the colour bar with zest.

  ‘Imagine, what people!’ he said. ‘I want a hair-cut. I am told I can only have a hair-cut if I come in after hours through the back door so that no one can see me. So I do, and then I’m charged extra. Fascinating! Extraordinary! Wonderful!’ And with savage joy he darted off on another expedition to collect evidence of white imbecility.