Excerpts from Flash of the Sun
Saturday, October 15, 1960
It was a mix of cloudy and clear
skies over Geneva, Switzerland, that afternoon as William Bechtel strode
towards the restaurant for the rendezvous with the Camerounian. The Frenchman
whistled slightly under his breath and reached out for the knob of the entrance
door. He even adjusted the front collar of his jacket with his left hand as he
pulled the door open and walked inside.
A formally dressed
waitress in a blue apron approached him right away, even before he made up his
mind about which table to settle down at. She widened her smile at William Bechtel and then asked him if she could be of
service, flashing the menu suggestively at the same time. He assured her he
would look at the menu afterwards, and then, without asking for directions, he
headed for the table at the far corner of the restaurant.
He had been to the Plat
D’Argent before, on several occasions, actually. The one thing he liked the
most about the joint was the Chef’s daily menu. He had met the chef before, a
charming fellow with a broad smile and an effusive heart for those customers who
settled for his menu and enjoyed it. The fellow had elevated his cooking to the
level of art, and William Bechtel loved him for that. His respect for people
who showed a great deal of dedication to their careers was deep, especially
those who went about it without feigning things. For he, too, was proud of his
own career, and for that reason, he would accomplish any task that had to be
done. Has to be done, William Bechtel thought. He felt so because he was
determined not to fail in the task that he was out to accomplish that day.
William Bechtel looked
around him at the few customers in the room, musing on the fact that there were
just nine diners and carousers for a place he held in such high esteem.
Perhaps the long
drizzle of the morning has muddled life for the city's inhabitants. Or perhaps
it was just one of those days that things happen, he thought.
He even smiled mildly at
the reflection of the words, things happen, as he looked up from his
menu to find that the waitress, whose back-and-forth movement between the
kitchen and the tables had caught his attention, was finally approaching his
table.
“Monsieur, should I get
something for you now?” the waitress asked, probably surprised that he had been
sitting there all those minutes and holding the menu in his hands without
deciding on what to have.
“An aperitif will do for
now. I will have the meal later,” William Bechtel said and pointed to the menu.
“Thank you, Monsieur! I
will be back in a moment,” the waitress smiled as she jotted it down.
“That’s lovely of you,”
he smiled back.
“Thank you, Monsieur!”
she responded warmly, bowed a little and then turned around and walked away
with a faint smile still on her face.
He marveled at her
retreating figure, graced with those strides that you often see from models on
a catwalk. Her perfectly shaped hips were oscillating in a manner that made him
swallow some spittle without meaning to. She was new around, and William
Bechtel was certain she was offering far more than Plat D’Argent had on their
menu.
I am on a job; I
should keep my mind away from distractions, the Frenchman thought and then grunted. Besides,
it is about time a man my age starts giving up gracefully on some of the things
of youth, especially the cravings for a girl one could father or even
grandfather, he told himself.
He looked at his watch,
sucked his mouth and then nodded as if acknowledging something to himself. He
was expecting the Camerounian in half an hour, but based on his knowledge of
Africans when it came to keeping time for a rendezvous, he expected him to be
late. That was why he thought it could be three-quarters of an hour or even
more before the African showed up.
William Bechtel thought
back to his first encounter with Félix Moumié, the new UPC leader living in
exile in the independent African Republic of Guinea. When he first met Moumié
three months ago in the Ghanaian capital city of Accra, he had introduced himself
to the Camerounian partisan leader as a journalist and a friend of another
journalist who was a buddy of Charles Van Der Lanoitte, the Reuters
correspondent reporting France’s war against the UPC in the newly independent
Republic of Cameroun—former French Cameroun. He had worked his way into Félix
Moumié's confidence with ease, to the point where the Camerounian went on to
voice his admiration for his deep knowledge of the conflict. When the UPC
leader confided in him that he was glad he would be taking the Camerounian’s
side of the story to the Western media, he knew then that he had made his mark.
But William Bechtel knew
there was more about the UPC leader at stake here than the conflict in the
Republic of Cameroun that France had just allowed to become a member of the United Nations Organization (UNO). He
knew the Camerounian opposition leader was a far more dangerous element than
his predecessor, Ruben Um Nyobé. Félix Moumié was a highly educated man—a
medical doctor with proficiency in English, French, German and some Russian. He
also knew that the agitator was forcefully selling the UPC’s case to the Western
world far more effectively than any other African leader opposing colonial rule
or neocolonialism on the continent.
But there was something
else about the whole thing that made William Bechtel very anxious. Félix Moumié
had successfully made powerful friends in the robust French Communist Party. He
was privy to information that the
energetic African even met that summer with Ernesto Che Guevara, the Argentine
international revolutionary and second-in-command in the new anti-American and
anti-Western government of Fidel Castro’s Cuba. Another thing that troubled
William Bechtel enormously was the fact that the Camerounian partisan leader
had successfully developed a special rapport with the bellicose Egyptian
president Gamel Abdel Nasser, the Pan-Africanist president of Ghana Kwame
Nkrumah, the stubborn nationalist Guinean head of state Sékou Touré and some of
the other leaders in the communist bloc who hoped to one day see Africa become
an economically united and politically integrated continent. The fact that
those leaders promised to increase their support for his partisan group made
William Bechtel even more nervous.
William Bechtel was also
certain the new UPC leader had what it takes to put the French Army in Cameroun
in disarray and even defeat the regime of their protégé, Ahmadou Ahidjo, in the
long run. There were even unconfirmed reports that Patrice Lumumba of Congo
Leopoldville had a meeting with Moumié and that the two resolved to formulate a
primary plan that would change the political landscape in the middle of Africa
and then take that part of the world out of the Western sphere of influence.
That particular piece of information convinced him that Félix Moumié was
another Che Guevara in the making, an opinion several of his superiors also
shared.
William Bechtel emptied
his glass of red wine and looked at his watch again for the umpteenth time. It
was now ten minutes to the rendezvous time, more than enough time to compose
himself before the Camerounian showed up. He thought about the red wine he had
just drunk and smiled. The Cameroonian would love it too. He was privy to
information on Félix Moumié that revealed the UPC leader’s love for a good
drink and his tendency to relax when having some level of alcohol coursing
through his system. That is the case with most politicians and
revolutionaries; he thought as if all they needed was a slight amount of
an intoxicant to make them feel truly important.
He tried to concentrate
on the plans for the impending meeting, conscious of the fact that he could not
afford not to win the Camerounian’s full trust. Just then, it crossed his mind
that the crowd in the restaurant was getting bigger. But he didn’t dwell on it
because a motion at the entrance caught his attention. A big black man was
ushering his way in, followed by Félix Moumié.
William Bechtel smiled at
the observation. Félix Moumié was no dummy. His decision to show up with some
support, someone who could keep an eye on things or even intervene physically
on his behalf, confirmed once again the resourcefulness of his mind. He had
seen the other guy before and knew of his activities. Jean-Martin Tchaptchet
was the President of the French section of the UPC. William Bechtel looked at
his watch as he rose from his seat to welcome the two men approaching his
table. It showed that it was six minutes before the meeting time. He extended
his right hand to the Camerounians. The men shook it, muttered greetings and
then Félix Moumié introduced his counterpart as a comrade and friend in France.
It crossed William
Bechtel’s mind that their handshakes were steady as he motioned Félix Moumié
and Jean-Martin Tchaptchet to the empty seats. Then he flipped his fingers and
even whistled for the attention of the waitresses. He asked his guests in a seemingly
relaxed manner to give their orders for something to drink and eat. However,
when the men hesitated, he suggested that they share a bottle of wine, the very
brand he was drinking before they walked in. Jean-Martin Tchaptchet looked at
Félix Moumié, who conceded with a headshake and
then added that they could have something to eat afterwards. Félix
Moumié asked for a glass of juice by the side and then brought his hands
together and rested them on the table. William Bechtel hid his joy with a
smile.
He filled up the three
glasses with the wine the tempting waitress brought, raised his glass to the
air for a toast and clinked the other two glasses as a sign of goodwill. The
men took a couple of sips and appeared relaxed minutes after ingesting the
drink.
William Bechtel spurred
the two Africans on with words of approval for their struggle and was amazed by
how quickly they picked up the bait. Now they were talking rapidly, seriously,
in above-normal tones and with a great deal of exertion as if that would
convince him to take their cause more seriously and transmit their messages
widely to the Western media. But he hardly listened to the points the
Camerounians were trying to make as he waited, waited, and waited. Then he
decided to reach for some documents in his file.
William Bechtel’s heart
was throbbing unusually fast when a guy in a checkered apron walked up to their
table and reported that someone was on the phone asking to speak with Dr. Félix-Roland Moumié. He noticed the puzzled
expression on the UPC leader’s face with the corner of an eye and felt relieved
when Félix Moumié told them that he would be back in a moment and then left for
the phone call.
Now alone with the other
Cameroonian, he placed the file of documents on the table and told Jean-Martin
Tchaptchet to move his seat closer to his and join him in taking a look at the
articles and other documents on their movement. Now he, too, was speaking
rapidly, grabbing Jean-Martin Tchaptchet’s attention in the process,
distracting him from everything else, and at the same time, he tossed a tiny
light green crystal into Félix Moumié’s glass of wine.
He was still speaking
rapidly when Félix Moumié returned with a worried look on his face. The UPC
leader expressed surprise that the caller did not respond at all when he
started talking on the phone. William Bechtel dismissed it as a malfunctioning
of the telephone line, a joke, a possible mistake, or something else and then
went on to sift through the papers in the file, pointing out the gross
inconsistencies and fabrications that the different papers carried in their
stories about the UPC.
“It is sheer madness,”
William Bechtel cried, “Look at this. Quite the contrary to the information we
have been getting from Der Lanoitte,” he added and then started reading from it
in heavily accented English,
Four years ago, when rioting broke
out there, the Union des Populations Camerounaises—the nation's strongest
political party—was blamed for it, and outlawed. The U.P.C. then broke wide
open. A moderate, non-violent wing split away from the terrorist faction that
fled to the hills. Under a "national reconciliation" policy, more
than 650 convicted U.P.C. supporters received amnesty recently from the
government of Premier Ahmadou Ahidjo. But the terrorists, directed by Dr. Félix-Roland Moumié, an ingratiating and
crafty little physician, got no mercy: while entire villages were moved down to
roadside locations surrounded by stockades, French and Cameroonian patrols
flushed guerrillas from the emptied hills…Dr. Moumié himself fled the country
after the 1955 riots, turned up ultimately in Cairo, and with plenty of money
(from Russia and Red China, say his enemies) launched a campaign demanding
U.N.-supervised elections before the Cameroons became independent, on the
grounds that the present Legislative Assembly does not represent the will of
the people. His plea was turned down by the U.N. Moumié proclaimed:
"Freedom with violence is preferable to slavery without it," and his
followers started practicing what he preached.
“You see, even the Americans are
against you and your group. That piece is from the July 27, 1959, edition of Time. Time magazine has
another article about you that is even more damning. Please read this one with
me. I can even go ahead and translate it for you if your English isn’t good
enough; if you don’t mind, that is. Here it is:
“‘The
first of Africa's six new nations to get its independence in 1960 celebrated
its beginnings last week with half the country in a state of emergency… On the
morning of the first day of independence, terrorists killed five people in the
capital of Yaoundé…six months of struggle, 22 whites have died—more than were
killed in a similar period during the Mau war in Kenya... Responsible for most
of the slaughter are the exiled leaders of a dissident political party banned
in 1955, who are working to undermine 35-year-old Premier Ahmadou Ahidjo's
fledgling government. The party is led by Dr.
Félix-Roland Moumié, who has been issuing Czech pistols to Bamileké tribesmen.
Just back from Moscow, Moumié operates from his refuge in nearby really
independent Guinea. His followers hide in the hills or attack from across the
border in the neighboring British Cameroons...’”
William Bechtel read the entire
article, cocked his head, and then grinned at the two Africans. “Huh. What does
it say here? January 11, 1960 edition,”
he added and then whistled incongruously.
The meeting progressed in
a state of heightened anxiety. William Bechtel showed the two revolutionaries
more documents, took down notes, argued heatedly with them and barely ate the
food he ordered. All the while, he never lost sight of Félix Moumié’s glass of
wine, cursing under his breath each time the UPC leader ignored it and drank
from the other glass.
In a move that was
probably out of desperation, William Bechtel started talking excitedly in
feigned exaltation and then went on to
push the file towards Félix Moumié. He was still talking with increased vigor
seconds after when he made what apparently looked like an innocent gesture with
his hand, knocking the file off the table to the floor. He smiled and mumbled
incoherently, asking for pardon from the two Camerounians, giving his
sixty-four years of age as a factor. At the same time, he got up from his seat
in an agitated manner, knocking a chair over in the process and then surged
forward to assist the Africans in picking up the sheets of paper scattered on
the floor.
Now standing between
Jean-Martin Tchaptchet and the table, and with both UPCists bent over to pick
up the materials on the floor, the Frenchman brought his left hand over Félix
Moumié’s second glass of drink and let go of the little crystal held between his
thumb and index finger.
William Bechtel looked
around him to find that a few of the customers were casting curious glances at
their corner. He realized they were attracting some attention. But that was not
the list of his worries. He continued with his ploy and even smiled a little
when Félix Moumié drank from the second glass. But then the UPC leader picked
up the first glass of wine he had been ignoring and raised it to his lips.
Bechtel barely caught himself from knocking the glass out of the Camerounian’s
hand. A mild look of trepidation could be seen on his face as the UPC partisan
leader emptied his other glass of its contents.
William Bechtel was
smiling warmly as he shook hands with the two Cameroonians and watched them
leave that evening with a feeling of relief. He knew the men were thinking that
they had won over a powerful journalist for their cause. But then, William
Bechtel wondered what their reaction would have been had they known otherwise.
He chuckled at the thought, adjusted his collar again, hailed an approaching
cab and then got in and slumped into the back seat.
William Bechtel, a
decorated soldier in the French Foreign Legion and a sophisticated agent of the
La Main Rouge (The Red Hand), the
covert, lethal branch of the Service de Documentation Extérieure et de
Contre-Espionnage (External Documentation and Counter-Espionage
Service―SDECE), better known as the French secret service, had every reason to
feel accomplished. His role might be considered murky, but the Frenchman
thought he was doing his job. He was living up to the purpose of La Main Rouge, which was created to
eliminate threats from anti-French elements, especially the Africans fighting
to take their Francophone lands out of the geo-political sphere of influence of
France.
William Bechtel
telephoned Paris that evening before he took a bath. His mood became pensive as
he cleansed himself, wondering why Jacques Foccart sounded so concerned about
the dosage he put in Félix Moumié’s drink. However, just before he fell into an
unconscious slumber, a thought crossed his mind, and he wondered how President
Charles De Gaulle would receive the news. The thought left him with a smile on
his face.
Renault's "princess"—the
1956 Renault Dauphine—made René Roccard proud, a feeling that millions of his
French compatriots also shared. So, when he bought a Dauphine sedan from the first
consignment that the auto manufacturer shipped to the United States of America,
his co-workers were not surprised at all. However, people started raising their
eyebrows when he made it a point of intoning stanzas of France’s national
anthem, La Marseillaise or honking
whenever he saw a Dauphine or drove past one.
The patriotic Frenchman
regarded the car as a testament to
France's recovery after its humiliating defeat and four-year occupation by
Germany during the Second World War.
However, the automobile
did not make René feel proud or concerned as he navigated the streets of New
York City that afternoon. The expression of grim determination on his face
relaxed a little only as he left East 48th Street behind him and joined the
crawl of traffic through Broadway. The Frenchman’s preoccupation with the
details of his self-assigned mission made him completely oblivious to the
skyscrapers on both sides of the road and even distracted him to the point
where he was just inches away from hitting the back bumper of the blue Ford
Fairlane sedan right in front of him when he stepped hard on the brake pedal.
The Renault Daphne jerked to a sudden stop, thrusting his body forward and
bringing his head close to hitting the steering wheel.
“Merde…merde, les
salopards!” René cursed and hit the steering wheel repeatedly. He only
stopped when the cars hooting from his rear alerted him that he was lagging
behind the flow of traffic.
The Frenchman moved the
car forward, in rhythm with the other vehicles in front of him and then looked
at his perspiring palms one after the other, sighed, and then narrowed his
eyelids. The contorted expression on his face only eased a little as he drove
into 1st Avenue/United Nations Plaza, steering the vehicle through a variety of
residential neighborhoods.
“Cette circulation est
agaçante,” he hissed under his breath.
True, he hadn’t
anticipated the heavy traffic at that hour of the day and never imagined the
temperature could hit ninety-seven degrees Fahrenheit that afternoon. Nothing
should mess up my plans, he thought.
René looked less agitated
when he parked the car in the Turtle Bay neighborhood, got out, opened the
trunk, and then pulled out a guitar case with hardly recognizable rifle parts
inside.
“La Bastringue” by the chansonnier Mary
Rose-Anne Bolduc crossed his mind for the first time the moment he shut the
trunk. However, he started humming the Quebecer’s song under his breath only
after he locked the driver's door and pocketed the key.
“You have a nice baby
there,” a voice with a distinct Boston accent sounded from behind René, sending
a chill up his spine.
The Frenchman froze for a
moment and then turned around with a
half-angry and half-surprised look on his face. “What did you just say?” he asked
with a sneer.
“It is a beautiful piece
of machinery. Oh yes! As a matter of fact, my wife is buying one tonight,” the
smiling American replied and then ran his hand on the hood of the Renault
Daphne as if caressing it.
“Thank you, Sir! Believe
me, your wife will love it,” René retorted, making no effort to disguise his
thick Gallic accent. Then he regarded the man for a moment with narrowed
eyelids before turning around and adding in a monotone, “Excuse me, Sir! I must
leave now.”
The Frenchman did not
even dart a look at the man he addressed the words to as he waved the American goodbye
and walked away. He hurried across the park with quick steps in the direction
of the Tudor City apartments, conscious of the growing dampness on the back of
his shirt.
“Ignore it,” he hissed.
René increased his pace
as he approached the apartment block directly opposite the impressive complex
that is the United Nations Headquarters, situated right across First Avenue. He
even covered the remaining twenty yards to the apartment door with half-running
steps.
“What am I doing to myself?” he mumbled,
mindful of his panting and the slight trembling of his hands.
The Frenchman pulled out
the bunch of keys from his back pocket, picked out an inconspicuous silver key,
unlocked the entrance door, and then pushed it open. He was muttering a torrent
of curses under his breath as he stepped inside Giuseppe Matteotti’s
two-bedroom apartment. Then he locked the door behind him and hurried to the
casement window.
It was only a month ago
that he made the Italian painter’s acquaintance in a bar, got his invitation to
his apartment to see his paintings and then decided to copy the painter’s key
after he told him he would be away in his old country for half a year.
René took less than three
minutes to assemble the sniper rifle and
then set aside fifteen minutes for his high level of adrenaline to subside
while he waited for his target. But the target did not show up until
forty-three minutes later, exiting the United Nations building with a crowd. But
he never stayed for more than a second or two in the crosshairs of René’s rifle
scope, a development that agitated the Frenchman even further.
And even though the
target was sporting a beard, René was certain it was Ruben Um Nyobè, the
energetic six-foot leader of “The Union of the Populations of the Cameroons
(UPC)”, the civic-nationalist political party that morphed into the Cameroonian
Underground Organization by taking up arms against France in French Cameroun following
its banned by the French Trusteeship administration in 1955 over its eight-year
campaign for the reunification and independence of French Cameroun and British
Cameroons. To René, the French Camerounian was an irritant, a virus against
French interest in Africa that needed to be eliminated. Observing him talk and
gesture to the five men and a lone woman around him with an air of confidence
and a smile on his face triggered a flow of bile up René’s throat. He swallowed
it back and licked his lips.
René’s heart skipped a
beat when the diplomats started walking with the French Camerounian away from
the building. His cardiac turmoil was followed by an ache in his stiffened
trigger finger as he focused his aim and waited for the moment to deliver the shot
that would avenge the death of his brother. However, just as he was about to
press the trigger, his target stopped, held the shoulder of one of the foreign
diplomats and then moved away. The unexpected movement made René gasp without intending to. Now, his view of the
target was almost completely blocked by the burly diplomat, a development that
infuriated him even further, leaving his nerves more overwrought than before.
The Frenchman bit his lip as he watched the other diplomats encircle the target
and walk with him to the waiting car. Then the gray sedan drove away seconds
after the French Camerounian got in.
The rage that swept over
René made him quiver for a moment before he buckled under the weight of his
failure, slumped to the floor, and then rolled over. He hit his thighs with
both fists, emitting a series of grunts that seemed to give a peculiar rhyme to
the vocal manifestation of his tribulation. The Frenchman hardly knew what he
was doing when he leaned backwards on the wall and closed his eyes, muttering
barely audible curses as he banged the back of his head on the partition.
René Roccard’s lip
movement stopped for a moment, followed by a deep frown, an unconscious facial
movement that created a look of extreme rage on his face. Then, without even
opening his eyes, he nodded to himself several times as if acknowledging an
inner voice. Yes, it was his inner voice all right. He would try again for the
third time, and if the next attempt should turn out to be unsuccessful too, then
and only then would he make the journey to French Cameroun and finish the job
there.
René closed his eyes
again and tried to shake off the haunting Monday, January 6, 1958, headline in the New York Times, but it
kept imposing itself on his mind.
France Sends Troops to
Crush Red-Led Uprising in Cameroons; Acts to Prevent New 'Algeria' in African
Territory Where Rebels Burned 60 Villages.
“Les idiots, les
imbéciles!” he growled and pulled his hair, “The rebellion in our
Cameroun isn’t different from the one in Algeria. That’s why Marc is dead,”
He mumbled with quivering lips, ruffled his hair, and then closed his eyes.
A moment of silence
ensued before he buried his head in his hands and started weeping. His weeping subsided
into a snivel hardly a minute after, following shortly by a humming sound of the
World War II song "La Complainte du
Partisan" (The Complaint of the Partisan―"The Partisan").
Still, he did not stop shedding tears until he came to the end of the first stanza, when he growled the lyric “… I took my gun and vanished.”
René was angry with
himself when he went to bed that night and woke up the next morning feeling dejected.
He was still feeling grumpy as he brushed when he stopped suddenly for no
apparent reason, then started humming "La
Complainte du Partisan". He crooned
the partisan song to the end again and again as he took a shower and ate
breakfast. The song must have had a palliative effect on him that morning
because he looked more solemn than sad when he sat behind his office desk that
morning. However, that emotion did not last for long because news from Paris
reporting General Charles De Gaulle’s return to power in France reached the
consulate hardly an hour after he got there. The afternoon report brought a
genuine smile to his face for the first time that week.
**************
The month of May 1958 is remembered
in the annals of French History as the month of the second and most important
Algiers Putsch—an attempt launched from the capital of French Algeria to
overthrow the reigning government in Paris.
This was after the French
populace grew tired of governments that were plagued by recurrent cabinet
crises that, in turn, increased the misgivings of the French Army and the
French settlers in the colonies, especially in Algeria. The plotted revolt of
these French soldiers was a culmination of years of political instability
originating from the shortcomings of the parliamentary system of the French
Fourth Republic, which saw twenty prime ministers govern France within eleven
years, the vast majority of them coming from parties on the left of the
political spectrum.
Following years of
chafing against the incompetence of different French governments to quell the
rebellions in Algeria and French Cameroun, the army became convinced that even
the current right-wing government of the ethnic German and Alsace-born Pierre
Eugène Jean Pflimlin was about to act out of
political expediency and order another precipitated pullout from the
territories, just like the previous center-left government of Pierre Mendès
France left French Indochina in 1954, thereby sacrificing French honor in the
process.
That was why, from the
balconies in Algiers in Algeria and Yaoundé in French Cameroun to the corridors of power in France itself, patriotic
voices were heard calling for the return to power of General Charles De Gaulle.
The cry for the return of the towering French warrior and statesman to the
political scene carried with it a fervor that was almost religious in nature.
The people had every
reason to seek political salvation from their hero of the Second World War. It
was Charles De Gaulle who saved French honor during the four years that Germany
occupied France, but then surprised the
nation by resigning from public office in 1946 as his own way of decrying the
weaknesses of the French Fourth Republic, its constitution, and the
parliamentary system of government. Now, he was vindicated.
Just like millions of
discontented and despondent French citizens, René Roccard regarded the French
legend as their only hope in rallying the French nation again. He saw the general
as the only person capable of giving a sense of direction to France’s
relationship with its evolving territories and colonies, and saw the general as
the only French figure capable of making France highly respectable in its engagements
with the rest of the changing world. What is more, René was convinced that
France was entering a new era in its history, a phase that would allow patriots
like him to accomplish their self-assigned missions for the fatherland and be
acknowledged at the same time as French
heroes who saved France from irrelevance.
They said Ruben Um Nyobé radiated
unusual confidence that did not reflect his level of exposure to the known
world controlled by the major powers. Some of the men of power exercising
direction over the destiny of colonial Africa aptly admitted with some degree
of awe that Ruben Um Nyobé, the leader of the banned Union of the Peoples of
Cameroon, otherwise known as the UPC, was a well-read man. A few of them even
talked of his poignant wit, holding that the French Camerounian leader also
possessed the great ability to grasp details like a high-functioning vacuum
cleaner, and pointing out that he had what it takes to be a successful
politician anywhere in the world.
True the Cameroonian
interacted with his people deeply and in a manner that some of his enemies and
opponents claimed smacked of populism, true he was engaging even with those who
were committed to preventing him from realizing his political dreams, and true
he was an altruist. But even Ruben's most virulent critics all agreed that he
was neither a populist, a con politician
nor an advocate of discrimination. Ruben considered himself a leader with the
common touch and an all-embracing vision to move his people to a better future.
The steel-nerved Ruben’s
evolution over the past decade as the head of a trade union that championed the
interest of the workers of French Cameroun, to that of the leader of a
political movement committed to rallying
the forces of the former German colony towards reunification and independence,
had taken a toll on him. That was because the arduous task of galvanizing the
populations of British Cameroons and French Cameroun, of working against
Britain and France in their visions of control of a future post-independence
Africa, and of being a good father and husband, was proving to be far more
challenging than he had anticipated.
As he walked the
footpaths of the Bassa forest that bright September afternoon, Ruben looked
neither charismatic nor imposing. In fact, the expression on his face was that
of a worried man caught in a death trap. His eyelids shook again, repeatedly,
as if a vibrator was triggering them. The trembling always left him with a
premonition of trouble, an intuitive feeling he did not like, but one that had
been plaguing him for over a week now. It made him grumpy to the point where he
started snapping at his fighters for no apparent reason or for the slightest of
mistakes or infractions. Also, he could not stop himself from constantly
dwelling on the past, to the vision of a
future reunited Cameroon that he and other close top officials of the UPC
weaved. That future New Cameroon was expected to be at peace with itself and
the rest of the world.
Ruben was convinced that
they had done a great job harnessing the resources of the land, that they had
cultivated a sense of common purpose among the various groups in both the
French-speaking and the English-speaking populations of the partitioned former
German colony of Kamerun, and that they were winning over foreign friends to
their cause. But then, France lost Indochina, surrendered the task of fighting
communists and nationalists in that part of Asia to the Americans and then
turned its eyes to the nascent African civic-nationalism with a determination
to quell it that rivaled the ferocity of the Roman Army in its campaign to
defeat Spartacus and his slave revolt against Rome. Reacting to fears that the
UPC would reunite French Cameroun and British Cameroons and then lead it and
other French colonies away from its control, the weakened French government
panicked and banned the party on false grounds that it harbored Marxist
objectives.
Ruben shut and opened his
eyes in rapid succession as if to ward off depressing thoughts. Still, the
worries persisted. Those ten years of laying the foundation for a reunited and
independent Cameroon involved winning the overwhelming support of both the
French Camerounian and British Cameroonian peoples, a task that kept him away
from his family most of the time and that subjected him to a great deal of
deprivation. It was a sacrifice for the future, the UPC hierarchy had reasoned.
But now, all their efforts and sacrifices were being washed away by the
irresponsible and irrational action of Roland Pré, the right-wing Frenchman who
banned the UPC on July 13, 1955. That was seven months after he was made the
High Commissioner of French Cameroun, and in effect the chief administrator of
the United Nations Trust territory. The UPC’s ban occurred five months before
elections for seats in the new Assemblée Législative du Cameroun Français (ALCAM),
otherwise known as the Legislative Assembly of French Cameroun. The UPC’s
confinement to the shadows of politics in French Cameroun was all the more
disheartening because they had been looking forward to winning more than seventy percent of the legislative seats.
The UPC leader’s thoughts
drifted again to the trembling of his eyelids. He muttered a sigh under his
breath and shook his head warily. The trembling of his eyelids wasn’t the only
thing that worried him so much. The onset of insomnia and the discomfort that
came with it had added more irritation to his edgy nerves. Flashbacks of those
sleepless nights when the brief moments of slumber were interrupted by
terrifying dreams that never failed to leave him soaked in his own
perspiration, were not comforting at all. His vivid memory of one of those
nights brought a sigh to his lips. For the past couple of days now, everything
around him seemed to be having an eeriness that he found strange to his senses,
to the point where he even had to seek the help of a local doctor about it,
fearing that he was losing his mind.
"You need a lot of
rest, you need some sleep and some time off from the worries of the destiny of
this land," the doctor had told him.
But what did the
physician know, living off the sifted information the French system was
providing to the local population and the rest of the world about the French
Army’s fight against the UPC liberation movement? How could the doctor even
expect him to sleep when his people were being massacred every day, and when
they were being forced to flee their homes and live a desolate existence in the
heart of the forest? Furthermore, how could his mind be at rest when Félix
Moumié, Ernest Ouandie, Abel Kingue and most of his other assistants had to
flee to British Southern Cameroon, leaving him virtually alone in the arduous
task of continuing the insurrection in that part of French Cameroun where the
French had concentrated their forces with the sole purpose of killing the
cherished dream of reunification, independence,
and a New Cameroon?
As he trod the footpath
with his close lieutenants in front and behind him, Um Nyobé’s mind started to
wander again—this time, to his 1956 appearance at the United Nations where he
had presented the motion for immediate reunification and independence of French
Cameroun and British Cameroons. However, another French Camerounian unknown to
the political circles in the territory also appeared at the assembly hall that
day led by the French ambassador to the United Nations who, it turned out, had
made arrangements for the unknown entity to speak after him. The position the
man postulated was so shocking that he found himself trembling in suppressed
rage. However, when he found out afterwards that his French Camerounian
counterpart was groomed, coached, and paid by the French to deliver their
version of events in the UN Trust Territory of French Cameroun; he was more
awed than surprised.
Hiyopot, as Ruben had
referred to the man afterwards, had countered and contradicted all his claims;
and without blinking an eye, the comprador had looked in his direction and
declared to the assembly that he, Ruben Um Nyobé, was not even of Cameroonian
descent, and for that reason above everything else, he, Ruben Um Nyobé, had no
right to be there speaking on behalf of the peoples of the territories of
French Cameroun or British Cameroons that came out of the former German colony
of Kamerun.
He remembered how
flabbergasted he was by Hiyopot’s speech until a female delegate from Romania
turned to him, smiled, and then told him in a voice that brought some relief to
his soul. “Mr. Um Nyobé, do not worry
about the things he just said. Every country has its smart and its less smart.
In Rumania, we have our useful idiots too."
Still, that betrayal from
his compatriot did not stop him from continuing with his mission to sensitize
world leaders about the plight of the peoples of both French Cameroun and
British Cameroons. He knew he was carrying a tough message to sell to the rest
of the world that France was doing everything within its power to carry out its
plot to retain control of French Cameroun while giving the world the impression
that it had granted that part of the former German colony the independence its
people wanted.
“Where exactly are we
supposed to meet them?” Samuel Ngembus, the UPC lieutenant two persons behind
Ruben interrupted his thoughts with the question, directing it at nobody in
particular, even though he was referring to the local Bassa government official
playing the role of broker in the preliminary talks between Ruben Um Nyobé and
representatives of the government of the new French Camerounian Prime Minister
Ahmadou Ahidjo.
“We are almost there,”
Elvis Biyick, the other lieutenant at the head of the squad responded without
even looking back at Samuel.
Ruben looked at Elvis in
front of him, then at Samuel behind him and then grunted. Both men were
clutching their Kalashnikovs tightly and appeared as alert as desert foxes. He
nodded mildly in approval even as he strained his ears for any sound from the
nearby bushes.
Nothing! Nothing!
Nothing!
Still, no worrying sound
disturbed the eeriness of the forest for about ten minutes before he thought he
heard something. He was about to mention his suspicions to Elvis when he
realized that Elvis had stopped, his eyes wide in their sockets in a momentary
gaze of dread that instantaneously turned into a look of dawning realization
not unmixed with fury.
“Ambush! We are being
ambushed,” Elvis screamed, broke the line, ran towards Ruben, and pushed him
down to the side of the footpath, over into the overgrown bush. The shootings
started the moment he screamed the word ambush. It was an assorted mix of
rattling sounds of gunfire from rifles, crackles from pistols and deafening
explosions from grenades and other explosives. He thought he even heard sounds
from a machine gun. And they appeared to be coming from every direction.
Screams, agonizing cries, the barking of orders, imploration for help, and shouts
of surrender were all intermingled in the deafening noise hanging all around
him as he crawled with his belly, grabbed a fallen pistol, and crouched behind
a tree trunk.
Ruben must have taken
cover behind the trunk for about five minutes, and he was still trying to
figure out the directions the enemy firings were coming from when a hand tapped
him on the back and whispered into his ears.
“There is an opening over
there. We can make a run for it. Now, let’s go,” Samuel hissed.
Ruben was still trying to
put his thoughts together when a bullet missed his head by an inch and
splintered the trunk that he had crouched behind, sending pieces of wood up in
the air. The miss was followed seconds after by another and then a third.
“Let’s go now,” Samuel
screamed and got up to his feet.
Samuel started shooting
into the thick forest as they made the run, seemingly at nowhere but making an impact even though. They
were less than five yards away from the huge mahogany tree they were hoping to
crouch behind for shelter when it dawned on Samuel that the intensity of the
assault had abated. Just then, a bullet hit him on his right shoulder. He stifled
his scream, but a series of bullets caught him in the torso, forcing his weapon
out of his hands. Ruben was about to head to the right when the shootings
stopped abruptly as if someone ordered it.
“You are completely
surrounded. Drop your weapons now. I repeat drop your weapons now and save your
lives―” a voice sounded from a megaphone, stopping Ruben in his tracks.
An overwhelming feeling
of tiredness swept over Ruben. He looked at his wounded leg, shut his eyes for
a couple of seconds and then opened them again and stared wearily at Samuel who
was now on his knees with a dreary and death look on his face. He nodded
slightly and then turned around and looked dejectedly at his other fighters.
Most of his men appeared dead and two of them were agonizing in pain on the
footpath. One of the men had been hit so badly that his stomach had split open,
and he was trying to hold his bowels in his hands.
Ruben dropped his pistol
and raised his hands in the air, gripped by the anger of betrayal so that he
unconsciously bit his lower lip so hard that he even tasted his own blood. He
was still trying to make sense of the whole purpose of the betrayal when he
heard a series of spurting sounds behind him, sounds that were followed by
gasps from Samuel as he fell to the ground.
Ruben started turning
around to see who the shooter was when a bullet hit him. This was followed by
another bullet to his back and then another and another. He buckled to his
knees and fell flat on his face, the black faces of his native soldiers and the
white French officer by his side stamped in his memory even as he tried to make
a connection. The veil finally moved away, allowing him to make the association
just before he let out his last breath. He had seen the face of René before, in
the American city of New York. He even tried to smile at the realization just
before he took his last breath. The haunt was over, or so he thought.
Culled by Janvier
T. Chando, author of Flash of the Sun
Janvier Tchouteu is the author of Triple Agent, Double Cross
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