Sango had heard of the coal crisis which broke out in the Eastern Greens, of the twenty-one miners who had been shot down by policemen under orders from ‘the imperialists’. To him it had a faint echo of something happening in a distant land.
He was somewhat taken aback when McMaster called him into the office and told him that a passage had been booked for him to travel to the Eastern Greens and bring back reports.
Sango was not happy to leave the city where he was still unsettled, sharing a room with First Trumpet, having his meals outside. But worse still he was afraid he might see his mother and find her worse than ever. He had just sent her twelve pounds – all the money he had kept to deposit as advance payment for a room.
The plane was taking him towards the Eastern Greens, nearer the source of his poverty, of his ambition to seek his fortune as a journalist and musician west of the Great River. Until he landed and visited the mines and saw the scene of desolation he could think of nothing else but his mother in hospital, and the girl Elina in the convent. He would try, if possible, to visit the two of them. It did not seem possible to visit the two places in the little time that would be available.
He saw the Great River below, broad and brownish with here and there a canoeman – a mere dot many thousands of feet below. Instantly his past life seemed to flash before his eyes. He saw his own poverty and his youthful ambition and found that he must work still harder to give happiness to his dependants.
As the plane touched down Sango saw the expectant group standing at the air terminal. One of them would be Mr Nekam, President of the Workers’ Union. Sango had not met him but had seen pictures of him in the Sensation. Indeed Nekam was there, bearded and in a bush shirt.
‘You’ll be staying with me,’ he said to Sango, shaking him warmly by the hand. ‘So, better you cancel your hotel booking.’
Sango, who wanted to see both sides of the dispute, told Nekam: ‘You’ll give me a free hand, I hope; not try to influence my reports in any way.’
They drove through unmade roads into the workers’ quarters and Sango noted immediately the atmosphere one experiences in a town under the iron boot. Policemen were everywhere. Not the friendly unarmed men he had been used to in the city, but aggressive boot-stamping men who carried short guns, rifles or tear-gas equipment. There were African police and white officers and they all had that stern killer look on their faces. The shadow of death had darkened the people’s faces as they went about their daily business, and though Sango listened hard, he could hear no laughter.
He decided to go – not to the president’s house – but to the famous valley of death at the foot of the hills where the coal was mined. Here he saw the thorn scrub where many wounded miners had crawled in agony to die of bullet wounds. At the Dispensary many of the miners were being treated for head injuries and fractures in thigh and arm.
Sango spoke to them and their story was full of lament. They told how an outstanding allowance, amounting to thousands of pounds, had been denied them. How frequently labour disputes arose, and how the mine boss – an overbearing white man – would not listen. The background to the shooting had been simply – strained feelings.
Back in the home of the workers’ president, Sango found that Nekam occupied a little compound with two rooms and one kitchen, that his wife raised chickens and rented a stall in the market where she sold cigarettes,
tinned foods and cloth. The children had been sent away into the village because of the emergency.
Sango got down immediately to work. Nekam showed him copies of telegrams from the West African Students’ Union in London, the President of the Gold Coast, the League of Coloured Peoples in New York . . . and one from a President in South America, urging Nekam to bring the matter up at the United Nations. Some of the telegrams were unrealistic but heartening.
At a Press conference the following day, Sango discovered that this shooting had become a cementing factor for the nation. The whole country, north, east, and west of the Great River, had united and with one loud voice condemned the action of the British Government in being so trigger-happy and hasty. Rival political parties had united in the emergency and were acting for the entire nation. Sango was thrilled.
In his report he was loud in praise of the new movement and caustic in his comment on the attitude of the British. His youthful fire knew no restraint and he wrote about the bleeding and the dying, the widowed and the homeless; the necessity to compensate these men who had sacrificed so much that the country’s trains might run, its power-houses function, and its industries flourish. No other correspondent had been so brave and forthright, and the Sensation was eagerly bought and read for ‘the real truth about the coal crisis in the Eastern Greens’.
For Sango the great question was: why do politicians have to wait for a period of crisis before they can sink their selfish differences and unite? Why can it not always be like this, what can we do to hold this new feeling? Even as he tortured himself with these questions he knew that as soon as the crisis was over the leaders would all go their different and opposite ways, quarrelling like so many market women.
At night he was at the airport to see the arrival of dark troop-planes from Great Britain. His report on the arrival of these reinforcements drew forth an immediate denial from the Government. The troops had nothing to do with the coal crisis, they said. And now the coal city was drained of women and children, black and white. Only the able-bodied men remained to face the terror.
Thanks to the unity of the politicians a way out was found. In the leaders Nekam placed all his confidence. In him the workers, in their turn, believed. The result was that the politicians said to Nekam:
‘We must do things in a constitutional manner. It is hard, but that is the best sign of maturity. We don’t want any more demonstrations or violence. Go and get your miners back to work and leave all negotiations with the British to us. Do we represent you or do we not? That is the first question.’
‘You do!’ grunted Nekam.
Nekam, who had faith in the politicians, told the workers, who surely still had faith in him. He spent all night negotiating with the gang leaders who accused him of back-pedalling. By early morning he was fagged out. He invited Sango to the railway station where the workers took their train. If they did return to work, his task had been performed. If they did not, then something else must be tried; he could not now tell what.
They stood looking down at the valley below. The mist of morning cleared from the hills. In the east the sky reddened and the redness oozed into the valley. Sango peered, then held Nekam excitedly. Nekam followed Sango’s eyes, but said nothing. His lips were pursed. Down there, there was movement – in groups. Neither Sango nor Nekam dare say the groups were composed of miners coming to work. It was best to wait. Soon the train would come.
The first man arrived with pick and Davy lamp, followed by others and soon the station was humming with mumbling men. They had come. He had succeeded. With hearts too full for words, Sango and Nekam boarded the train which took them down to the mines.
Sango followed them inside, into the abyss of the earth where heat reigned supreme, and reverberations threatened the teak props. There was ever present a sense of death, danger, disaster. Yet the men who risked all worked in sweat and courage.
Sango heard a rumbling ahead of him and went forward to investigate. The gang leader pulled him back. ‘Look out! Coal coming up!’
Sango stepped aside, just in time. A chain of automatic wagons loaded with coal clattered by. The striking miners had produced the first fruits of their toil and of Nekam’s negotiations.
That same afternoon, a telegram was delivered to Sango. He tore it open with blackened hands. Nekam was peering over his shoulder.
COME BACK BY LORRY STOP YOU CAN GET FAST SERVICE FROM JIKAN TRANSPORT STOP REGARDS MCMASTER
‘You going back?’ Nekam said.