by Simon Mann
Eighteen hours a day in pitch blackness. Walking becomes tricky. I count the seven paces, so that I won’t walk into the ends. My hand I run down the wall. The lawyer squadrons – mosquitoes – feast.
Magneto shows me how to take an arm’s length of loo paper, then split it in half, but lengthways. Taking the two lengths, you plait them. When finished, the paper cord, hung straight up and down, will burn like a slow match. The men use it for cigarette lighting after lock-up. No more matches.
I use two. One at each end. They keep the mosquitoes away, I believe. They also give me a point to walk to. I can’t write, though. That’s a problem. When I can write, I sit on the concrete by the loo. The mozzies see this weakness as their chance of a lifetime. I have to take one of my big white shopping bags – brought in by the Croc – then split it out. I lay it on the dark-grey concrete floor. Put my feet on it.
This way – as I sit and write – I will see the lawyers, circling to bite my legs. I fight them off. The No Fly Zone must be kept clear.
In summer, Chik stifles. Bakes. In winter, Chik freezes. Chilly and damp. With a shudder, I remember the cold of our first winter. Shorts and a shirt. Nothing else.
Paper for writing on is a problem. I have to buy the exercise books (two packs of Madison per book: expensive). The books are smuggled into FB 1 from the big sections; the cigarettes out. At least I don’t have to do as the povos do: make writing paper by layering and drying loo paper and sadza.
Perversely, there is no problem with the Croc bringing in biros. This is because Security – top to gloomy bottom – covet my blue Papermate Flexigrips. These are sent out to Zim by Sarah. Security can have them. So long as I get enough.
My EDR – 11 May 2007 – is coming closer. My painstaking chuff charts – countdown calendars – are clocking away the days. The weeks. The months. The years. My EDR is when I go home.
An extradition case against me, sought by EG, will be dealt with by then, the Croc tells me.
My second son, Jack, is about to go to war – in Iraq – with his regiment, the Blues and Royals. I can see him before he goes.
I ask the Croc: ‘Are you sure I’m going home on my EDR?’
‘Yes. I’d hate to come in here the day after your EDR … tell you why you’re still here…’
Surely he can’t make that up? Surely I am going home.
One thing I had asked Sarah to promise me – one of three – is No More Disappointments. I tell her: I can take anything. Hang me. Just don’t tell me I’m getting out of here, then I don’t, again.
Surely I am going home? Security will come and take Straw Hat again. They come. They take it all. The third time.
Wrong Straw Hat.
I knew they’d come for it, the arseholes. But the actual fair copy of Straw Hat I had already smuggled out of my cell and the section. My network had then hidden it. Inside my own suitcase, in the property store.
The Gestapo arrived.
‘Where’s your book, Mann?’
‘Security need to vet it before you go.’ (Never to be seen again, in other words. It wasn’t.)
I kick up a huge fuss. The Croc will bring down fire and brimstone upon them and their first-born, I say. The Ambassador will hear about this atrocity. The White House. The UN. The Court of Human Rights… My huge fuss spent, I give them the plastic bag. I have it ready. Eight hundred pages of drafts, rewrites, repeats, unsorted in parts … a mess … Good luck, chaps!
The network then smuggle the real Straw Hat back to me. I lied to them. They thought that it had to go into my suitcase, so that I’d take it with me on my EDR. My suitcase wouldn’t be searched. With luck.
Now I lie to my network again. I need the manuscript back for more changes. Back it comes. Why am I lying? Remember: everyone in Chikurubi wants to be a spy.
They’ll love you. They’ll betray you. They have to.
Once I have my exercise books back again, Uncle Bertie takes them out, stuffed down his trousers. I lie to him too. He knows nothing about the hiding, or the switch.
That afternoon, the manuscripts are in the Croc’s office, carried by Bertie.
That night the Croc flies with them to London. The manuscript is given the treatment. Big Time. Not because ‘London’ values the book, but because ‘London’ is sure that I have convicted myself in the pages.
What happens next to that manuscript is another story, causing havoc between Amanda and ‘London’, who keep it from her.
It’s three days before my EDR. I know that I’m not going home. I’ve looked forward to nothing else for more than three years. The Croc and my sister have not told me that I’m not going home. The Croc’s promise – that I will go – stands. I’m going home. Never to EG.
But I know I’m not going home.
It’s my shield.
I need to defend myself. One letter from ‘London’ during these days knocks me down for two weeks. The pain I’m in is an agony of frustration and despair. And fear. And more fear.
For me to tell Amanda that she is free would be wrong. Hopefully she has always been free. More free with me than without. Otherwise, what’s the point? Even so, I have to tell her to carry on with her life. Have fun. She will know what I mean.
Writing that letter hurts. But I write it. I wrote one before. That hurt too.
I fear that she isn’t there any more. I fear she is with another man.
Bang. Crash. SHUMBA!
Security take me to the OIC.
‘There’s been a mistake. Your EDR is today, Tuesday … not Thursday. Put him in khaki now … he must be in khaki before midday…’
My mind spins. Security take me to reception. A hullabaloo follows while khaki is dug out. Something is wrong. My EDR is right. The Croc has checked it. It’s right. I know it’s right. And why the fuss about khaki?
The Security sergeants swap. The one who now takes me back to my cell is the one who transferred Magneto into FB 1. Life-saver.
There are people around us in the passageway. This is very dangerous.
We’re out of hearing… I beg him, plead with him: call the Croc, tell him what has happened. The EDR. Me into khaki. You must call him. Go into Harare yourself. Find him. Do what you have to do.
Back in the section, I don’t know if my pleading has worked. Everything is wrong all afternoon. Everyone who comes into the section has a story: cookers, water carriers, shift-change officers.
‘Shumba – you’re going home.’
‘Shumba – half of CIO are out there … for you!’
Then … what?
Days later I find out. Because of my message – delivered by the sergeant to the Croc – he had been able to thwart an EG and Mugabe plot to kidnap me.
In order for the plot to work, I had to no longer be a prisoner undergoing a sentence. Kidnap while on remand for extradition is OK. Kidnap while undergoing a custodial sentence is not.
That’s Zim. Ridiculous. Thank God.
JANUARY 2008
Seven months after my EDR.
I’m still on remand, pending extradition to Equatorial Guinea. I have no date to count down to. No chuff chart.
I am really lost now.
I’ve served my sentence in Zim. I have this gnawing feeling that Mugabe is about to cash me in. I know that Obiang still wants me.
I’m desperate to escape.
Fuck the conditions. I have to be free. Extradition to EG means death.
An escape plan is taking shape. Uncle Bertie has been busy. He has recruited two other heroic officers to aid my escape. Uncle Bertie and I are making copies of the keys. Chubb, of course.
The door to my cell. The first door from the section to the officers’ cage passageway. These are the two keys without which No Escape. The real ones live in the armoury with the duty officer.
Neither of us has done this before, even if it had been talked about on my SAS Combat Survival Course.
Our first shot is a farce. We try to copy using wax. The shonky, shanty town locksm
ith that Uncle Bertie goes to laughs. The second time, ten days later, we try with soap. Close, but no cigar. Another ten days and we try again.
We could open but we couldn’t close. We need to be able to lock closed for the night rehearsal. Ten days later, I am sitting on my concrete bed. Uncle Bertie walks into the cell. He has come through both locks. Hallelujah! We have to be utterly silent. I hug him. I am in tears. We have keys.
The dangers of doing this, to Uncle Bertie especially, have been astronomic. If caught, he would be shot, after torture. I would get three years at least, if I was lucky. ‘London’ have paid Uncle Bertie the £300 for the key work. I am surprised. Maybe they’ve got it at last?
From that second door onward, and with the help of those other two officers, no more keys would be needed. Our plans beyond Chik Max are good, if vague.
Each of the officers wants US$200,000. Once operating costs are added in, the escape plan costs a million. The three boys, not unreasonably, need evidence of their money being ready – and available – before the escape happens.
The money is to enable them to set themselves up in South Africa. To buy new ID, a house, a small business. They are risking their lives. We will be on Mugabe’s hit list for ever. They’ll need that money for always having to look over their shoulders. To me it doesn’t sound like enough, but to them it’s a win on the football pools.
Fail: we are dead men.
Then the next step of the operation: Othello. One dark night, I’m going to walk out of Chik Max in prison officer’s uniform, blacked up. Othello means I need theatrical greasepaint: easy to buy in London; hard and dangerous to buy in southern Africa.
I write another letter to be smuggled, for Sarah. The three plotting my escape with me – Uncle Bertie and his two friendly prison guards – need proof of funds. Some kind of underworld escrow account. We need her to pop round the corner to Covent Garden for my war paint.
Weeks pass. Uncle Bertie beats me up.
‘You’re going to die soon. You will go to EG. It’s coming.’
Wait, I tell him. I have to trust ‘London’. My fear is growing. I am losing my faith in ‘London’. I begin to think they gave me the money for the op, as a sop. To keep us happy.
I worry that they have risked Uncle Bertie’s life … for what?
They have let me get my hopes up. Why?
It can only be that my escape is coming by other means.
I hope that my escape is coming by other means.
The Croc sees me. He is worried. He tells me – frantic whispers in the passage outside Security – that the extradition appeal judgment is going wrong. My sister, he says, told him not to pass this to me. But he has to, he says.
Weeks pass. I pace my cell. Today, I tell Magneto – when he asks – why I look glum. I have this feeling: if I look over the walls of our box, I’ll see the enemy closing in.
I pace my cell. I cannot deny my feelings. Escape. Faith in ‘London’… I face myself: the time has come. If I am to live, then I have to screw down the top of my bottle again.
I must write to Uncle Bertie.
The lights are off. Mostly they are now. I’ve just told the officer, for his education, that Zimbabwe has wiped out 300,000 years of Man’s achievement. No light. I climb up on the loo, open the cistern cover and stretch my arm deep into the ventilator shaft. Rat shit stinks. I take hold of the hidden cord. At the other end is the plastic instant coffee jar that holds my contraband – candles, cigarette lighters, bullshit notes, coded escape plans. I pull in the line. Taking out a candle, I spark the cigarette lighter. I sit down to write.
Drafts later, and still not happy, I try again. I go for it.
I keep thinking that ‘London’ has failed us. That is shocking to me. Not to Uncle Bertie. He’s been warning for months that ‘London’ is full of shit.
Bought and sold. Diesel and petrol.
Forget ‘London’. Let us go it alone. That is what I tell Uncle Bertie in this handwritten letter. To guarantee their money, post escape, I will stay with them, in South Africa. Their hostage.
The lights flicker … the lights are on. How strange. They have been on so little. An omen?
They come on for me to sleep.
Tonight I can go to sleep feeling that I am moving on: for good or bad, we will make an escape.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
WEDNESDAY NIGHT, 30 JANUARY 2008
I’m awake.
Afraid. Full of dread. Rats are here, in my cell, scuffling beside me. I can feel them. Nasty. Before I open my eyes. Before I throw off my best blanket – the one that covers head and body, a shield against the mosquitoes.
It is about 3 am.
Isn’t it always about three when bad things happen? The graveyard watch. The secret police.
Isn’t three in the morning the time we die?
They are in my cell, three of them, with a larger body of men pressing outside. Like bulls at a gate. This has been the nightmare of my days and nights; now it is here. I told Magneto they were coming. My prophecy.
They have come to take me away.
They? Mugabe’s CIO, in my cell, to take me. The President’s office, they call themselves, or the President’s men. They wouldn’t put Humpty together again. They wouldn’t be able to read the instructions on the back of a tube of glue. Right. But they aren’t to be laughed at. Many taken for questioning by them are never seen again. They tried to kidnap me out of prison last year but – by luck mostly – I foiled them. This time I have no chance. They are a black Gestapo, and proud of the epithet.
The CIO’s mission is to kidnap me, steal me to Equatorial Guinea and hand me to Obiang. For God’s sake – their last shot at this was a good enough clue. I have been told what my fate in EG will be by enough people to believe it. Once there I will be tortured, interrogated, shot. Then eaten.
‘Handei! Handei! Let’s go! Let’s go! … Come on, Mann. Get up. Get dressed. Hurry up. You’re going to Harare Central. Your time here is over.’
In Chikurubi, prison officers use your surname. It’s a sign of respect, although I didn’t know that at first.
‘Handei! Handei! … Schnell! Schneller!’
My stunned mind catches up with me. I remember what I had been doing before I lay down on my blankets. I’d been working out my escape. One way or another, escape had been the tyrant of my thoughts since March 2004. Four years. I want to escape, sure; but not like this, not from Zim’s Chik to EG’s Black Beach. Out of Mug’s frying pan into Obiang’s pot.
Then I remember. Shit! The letter to Uncle Bertie is in the cell with me. It’s in the coffee jar. Beside where my head sleeps.
If seized, the letter could lead the CIO to Uncle Bertie. He would be a dead man twice over if they caught him.
‘Handei! Handei! Let’s go! Let’s go! … Come on, Mann. Get up. Get dressed. Hurry up. You’re going to Harare Central. Your time here is over.’
‘What the hell’s going on? What do you want? You can’t barge in here and move me without warning. Where’s my lawyer? I’m not moving from here without him. Those are my instructions – from my lawyer – and the officer in charge knows that perfectly well.’
I stand up, naked, stepping out of my washed and lice-free blankets. It is high summer in Zim, roasting in my cell. Cell 2.
Faced with a stark-naked and angry white man, they have a look that gives me hope. Perhaps I can keep the letter from them. It is a pity that I don’t have a hard-on to wag at them – to embarrass them further, these wannabe toughs. But not so tough about the sordid comedies of the day-to-day here in Chik Max. Not toughened to our shit stench. I can see their faces wrinkle at it.
Faking panic and anger, I repeat my mantra: ‘Where’s my lawyer? I’m not moving from here without him. Those are his instructions.’
As I bark this at them I take my blanket. I deliberately throw it to one side. I begin to pull on my threadbare khaki drill, clocking my kidnappers. I have never seen any of them before. But I know they are a
mix of CIO and plainclothes police. All the plainclothes are new. That’s a dead giveaway in Mugabe’s shit-poor shithole.
My mind is racing. I have to hide the letter. To protect Uncle Bertie. That casually thrown blanket is now covering the plastic coffee jar in which I keep my contraband.
The CIO are now scooping my stuff into the worn but lovingly decorated cardboard box I keep in my cell. There goes my Penguin Classics Iliad, with me when I was arrested, still with me now. Heart of Darkness follows. I begin to get dressed, trying all the while to keep them away from the blanket.
I know that as soon as my cell is empty, and the routine opening of section FB 1 takes place, the officers in the cage will be in my cell, scavenging, filching anything they can find to sell. They will find the contraband. The letter.
I keep repeating my mantra: ‘Not moving … my lawyer’s instructions.’
They say theirs over and over: ‘Handei! Handei! … Let’s go…’
My last chance. ‘Magneto? You there?’ I call out. Of course he’s bloody well there, poor sod. There’s no way he isn’t there, next door in Cell 3.
‘Here, Shumba,’ he calls back, bravely, loudly.
‘Ma one,’ I say.
‘Ma one,’ Magneto comes back. Prison slang: a mixture of Shona and English. It means: ‘Troubles? Oh yes, I have many ones.’
‘Please – will you look after all my containers? You know that some of them must go back to our friend, Shambezi. But look after all my containers, will you?’
‘OK, Shumba. I will take care of all your containers. I will.’
The goons are unhappy. They may not know ‘Ma one’. They are trying to find some hidden meaning in what we said. They fail. They miss it. Instead, they hustle me to the officers’ cage door and thence out of the section.
Goodbye home.
I hope Magneto has understood the urgency in my tone. He knows about the coffee jar, and its usual hiding place deep inside the ventilator shaft, the one that runs over our bogs. He knows I can only ever risk chucking the jar, anchored by its piece of string, rattling along the shaft like a ping-pong ball, when the officers’ shifts change. I have to hide the stuff well in case our cells are searched. They are searched. They are rummaged. Hard. Often.