Bumps in Freedom Road

As urgent as the rumble of talking drums, the spirit of self-rule swept across Africa. The big white-dominated lands of southern Africa would soon look north on a solid girdle of independent black states stretching from the Atlantic to the Indian Ocean. In some parts of Middle Africa, colonialism was retreating in good order, leaving a promise, or at least hope, of peace in the transition to government by black men. In others, the process was jerky, confused and reluctant.

In Tanganyika, due south of Kenya, Britain's Governor Sir Richard Turnbull announced constitutional changes giving Africans virtual home rule by late next year. Elections in September will be broadened to include more than 500,000 voters (v. 60,000 currently eligible), and 50 of the 71 seats in the Legislative Council will be open to candidates of any race, with ten reserved for white and eleven for Asians and Arabs. Since they represent 98.6% of the population, Africans will easily win control of the Legislature, and dominate the elected executive, the Ministerial Council (Britain will retain Defense, Finance, Foreign Affairs and Justice).

Hero of Tanganyika's advance, black and white agree, is 38-year-old Julius Nyerere, a cheerful, toothbrush-mustached former schoolteacher whose fight for independence has made him Tanganyika's--and East Africa's--foremost African leader. "Uhuru!" (Freedom), screamed 5,000 of his supporters as they lifted Nyerere to their shoulders and draped him with garlands of flowers after the Governor's announcement in the Legislative Council. All that night, green-shirted members of his Tanganyika African National Union danced in the streets and sang party hymns. For once, colonial officials did not need to fear a fervent nationalist display, for Nyerere has won the confidence of most Tanganyika whites, who admire the patience and moderation with which he has conducted the campaign for self-government.

Although Edinburgh-educated Nyerere dislikes some parts of the new agreement with Britain, he has agreed to support it for four years before taking the next step, full African self-rule. He even insists that the civil service (2,800 whites, 300 Africans) remain predominantly British until Tanganyikans can be trained, and acknowledges the permanent right of Tanganyika's whites and Asians to have a minority share in government. Blessed with a sensible African leader in a territory with no large white settler population, Britain was happy to make Tanganyika its first testing ground for self-rule in East Africa. "Sooner or later we have to take the plunge with all our territories in Africa," said Lord Perth, Minister of State for Colonial Affairs. "We believe this will set a pattern for others."

In the Belgian Congo, young King Baudouin arrived on a hastily planned flight from Brussels to see for himself what could be salvaged from Belgium's tattered colonial policy. Until last week Minister of the Congo Auguste de Schrijver clung fiercely to the line that the Belgian Congo Africans must be content with local self-rule now, with a gradual transition to independence in 1964. His plans collapsed when Joseph Kasavubu's big Abako Party and other native groups announced a boycott of territorial elections, the first step in De Schrijver's plan for a slow evolution. As nervous Belgian officials sent wives and children off on "holidays"' in nearby Portuguese Angola, Abako's party organ Notre Kongo issued a warning of trouble to come. "The hour of testing has arrived. The aliens will try to install a new regime that will be no change from the old . . . They will kill if Congolese are not careful. From the 18th to the 31st of December, you will immediately go home every night. Don't sleep too deeply. If your leaders are arrested, abandon worldly goods and homes and become prisoners with your wives and children. We are determined to sacrifice everything if we do not acquire independence in January 1960."

The editorial was intended not only to shock the Belgians but to keep African voters away from the polls, since in rural elections so far, voters have been giving heavy support to a large moderate party which Kasavubu contemptuously considers a stooge for the Belgians.

Stunned by the tactics of the Congo leaders, De Schrijver told Parliament in Brussels that independence might be possible in 1960, after all. giving in to Kasavubu's demands for direct national elections early in the year. Hours after De Schrijver made his new offer, the 29-year-old King himself announced he was flying immediately to the Congo despite the objections of his ministers.

Landing at Stanleyville in the eastern Congo, he was greeted by mobs of black-shirted Africans shouting demands for independence. The King was jostled but kept smiling as the police used tear gas to control the crowd. That night, he broadcast an appeal to the nation: "I am trying, above all, to serve your own interests. The time has come to satisfy the legitimate aspirations of the Congolese, and at the same time avoid the disappointments of uncontrolled evolution . . . Belgium spontaneously and generously calls the Congo to a near independence." One reply, scrawled with chalk on a Stanleyville wall: "Vive le Rot Kasavubu, Au Revoir Baudouin."

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