TheDemocraticRepublicofCongo

There is always something awful happening in Africa, it seems as if that wonderful continent is cursed with trouble. Currently there are terrible massacres, pillaging and rapes being inflicted on vast numbers of innocent people in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

There is always something undemocratic about any country that labels itself as Democratic. It’s also suspect and dangerous when countries change their name. I remember some visits to Zaire, now the Democratic Republic of Congo, and it doesn’t sound like anything has changed for the better. This is a personal story from my past of just how unpredictable and dangerous equatorial Africa can be.

It was in the mid 1970’s, I was line producer of a film called Shout at the Devil, being partly filmed in South Africa. We had a deal with a French airline UTA, and they routed their jets from Paris via Kinshasa, the hub of that country. I became used to stopping over in the then shanty type airport, or around the equator a bit, in the equally hot and humid Libreville, capital of another former colonial country, Gabon. Both were not fun places and I could fill a book with my experiences in Gabon, but we’ll focus on DR Congo.

On this particular trip I was with my wife and the airplane was scheduled to stop at Libreville, which was about half way down Africa, and, although an annoying interruption of our flight to Johannesburg, would give us the chance to stretch our legs. As we were descending the pilot announced that there had been a change of plan and we were diverting to Kinshasa. It didn’t make much difference to most of the passengers, but the man sitting one row ahead of us, and to our right in the first class cabin became very agitated. He was a black man, dressed smartly in a Saville Row suit, and I could see the perspiration break out on his face. He spoke quietly to the stewardess who smiled prettily and shrugged with Gallic dismissal that said, “what can I do about it?”
The plane touched down and I vividly remember that there was a change of normal arrangements. At that time, in those places it was unusual for all the passengers to disembark but on this occasion we were ordered to de-plane. We saw the sweating passenger say that he refused to alight but two men in uniform escorted him off a couple of minutes ahead of the rest of us.

I noticed that the man’s passport and personal possessions were still on his seat as we walked down the stairs of the plane. We felt the terrible suffocating heat hit us like a wet towel as we shuffled into the breezeblock building, which then served as the terminal. We entered an area where the ground staff handed us room temperature soft drinks and we sat on rickety wooden slated seats. Next to us, just a few yards away was a partition wall that finished a few feet shy of the ceiling, it was partially topped by some corrugated iron. You could see a single bulb light and, some half obscured shadows of people in the room were visible. We could certainly hear some raised voices that were muffled by the wall, that and the sound of the occasional punch and slap and the moans of a man in pain and discomfort.

No one did anything; to be honest we were all too scared of the armed guards who were watching us all too closely.

After a pause of about fifteen minutes we were instructed to return to the plane, which we did. Every passenger could hear the continuation of the beating of our fellow traveler. Back on the plane we noticed that the man’s personal possessions were still on his seat and we pointed this out to the cabin crew. We asked that they do something to get him back, after all wasn’t the captain responsible for his passengers. Our question was met with another of those Gallic shrugs and we were told to return to our seats, which, to my shame, I did. I don’t know what else I could have done, and I have no idea what happened to the man.

After the flight I did make an enquiry to the airline and initially they blandly told me they didn’t know anything about the incident. When I became a little more insistent they told me I had misunderstood and the passenger in question had simply changed his travel arrangements and had decided to stay in Zaire. Leaving his papers had been a mistake.

I have no idea what was really happening but I do know, for sure, that the man was a very reluctant visitor to Zaire and that his fate was terrifying.

The likelihood is that all sides of the political, tribal and racial equation are equally in the wrong. The central perception our Western leaders need to grasp is that these problems will continue to unravel because they are tribal and embedded in long and bitter historical disputes that transcend borders and nationalities. And, before we climb on our high horse of Western superiority let me remind my readers of our own tribal conflicts between Jews and Muslims in the Middle East and elsewhere, Christian and Muslim in the Sudan and elsewhere, Serb and Croat and Muslim and Christian in former Yugoslavia and, nearer to home, Protestant and Catholic in Northern Ireland. So, let’s not throw stones, and see if we can help.