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About Griffin daily news. (Griffin, Ga.) 1924-current | View Entire Issue (Aug. 18, 1977)
Page 10 — Griffin Daily News Thursday, August 18,1977 AP newsman writes about imprisonment in Central Africa Editor's Note — Michael Goldsmith, veteran AP foreign correspondent, was imprisoned for 30 days recently in the Central African Empire. He was arrested July 14 and released Aug. 14. This is a first-person account of his ordeal. By MICHAEL GOLDSMITH Associated Press Writer I recovered consciousness in a bare, windowless prison cell. I was handcuffed, dressed only in my underpants and covered with blood from open flesh wounds all over my body. For a long time I lay motionless, trying to limit the pain and to recall how I, a foreign correspondent of The Associ ated Press, had fallen into this situation. The memory returned only gradually. I remembered I was on assignment in the Central African Empire and had been arrested on what I assumed correctly was the previous day, accused of being a South African spy. On the evening of July 14, Bastille Day, I had been taken 70 miles from the capital, Bangui, to Berengo, the birth place and residence of Emperor Bokassa I, the former sergeant in the French colonial army who had proclaimed himself the hereditary ruler of his nation. I recalled how Bokassa, in blind fury at the supposed spy, struck me without warning with a heavy stick, knocking me to the ground and opening a gaping wound on the left side of my forehead. I remembered being kicked by Bokassa and his aides until I lost consciousness, and someone deliberately crushing my spectacles underfoot. I guessed I must have remained unconscious for at least 15 hours. I knew at once that it would be a long time before I could hope to regain my freedom. Bokassa could not easily allow the world to see the injuries he had inflicted on me. Bokassa and his police who arrested me somehow had to find a justification for the ill-treatment. For six days, I remained handcuffed and often with chains on my legs in the small cell where a rough concrete slab was the only furniture. Once a day, guards opened the heavy steel door to bring me some boiled manioc, an African staple root, and a mess can filled with brackish water. No one treated my injuries, which quickly became in fected. My body was covered with the bites of malaria mosquitoes. The sequel of a particularly vicious kick in the small of my back made every movement an agony. I had nothing on which to rest my aching head. During the frequent tropical rainstorms, I was bitterly cold, without blanket or cover of any kind. Apart from occasional jibes from an army major whom I later knew as Maj. Ngongo, the prison commander, no one spoke to me, interrogated me or gave me any kind of explanation. My requests to talk to someone in a responsible position or to a representative of the American Embassy drew only laughter from the guards. Every time the cell door was opened, half a dozen soldiers pointed cocked submachineguns at me. I was sustained by the hope that international pressure on my behalf was building up. The Deputy Chief of Mission at the U.S. Embassy, Grant Smith, had witnessed my arrest so at least the outside world knew. I had not disappeared without trace. Late on the sixth day, my situation abruptly improved. My handcuffs were removed for the first time, I was given two blankets and placed in a larger cell with a wooden plank for a bed. The following morning, a medical orderly cleaned my wounds and put six stitches in my head. And, astonishing luxury, I was brought a copious, European style meal from a nearby hotel. The medic came daily for ten days, gave me regular penicillin and anti-tetanus injections and may have saved my life. The good meals continued to come, once a day, until the end of my imprisonment. But as my health improved and the pain receded, the agonizing doubts over my future increased. Day after day, I was confronted with endless hours of inactivity, almost no one to talk to and certainly no one to give me any information about the fate in store for me. I soon made up my mind that I faced the likelihood of imprisonment until Bokassa’s coronation, scheduled for Dec. 4, when a general amnesty was likely. That made a total of 143 days. I carved a calendar on my cell wall, leaving space for the four months yet to come. Although never very strong in mathematics, I began filling in time with enormous calculations scratched on the walls. I divided telephone numbers by each other to 50 decimal points, then re-multiplied the fractions to test my accuracy. The guards decided my long rows of figures were some kind of magic and took away the small piece of plastic I used to scratch on the walls. I never realized before how slowly empty time moves. Thoughts of my family often led to increasingly panicky, self-pitying onslaughts of fear. What would I do if Coronation Day came and went and I was not released? A previous prisoner had carved a crucifix on one of the courtyard walls. On Aug. 11, to occupy time, I colored it with brick dust mixed with water. Maj. Ngongo saw my effort and ordered me returned to the punishment cell for “defacing” the prison. “That will teach you to harass us with your white man’s symbols,” he said to me. Unknown to me, though, my ordeal was at an end. Before Ngongo could carry out his threat, I was taken out of the cell and returned to Berengo. There I was informed that a pathetic message from my wife had softened Bokassa’s heart and I would be put on the next plane two days later. It was exactly four weeks since my arrest. Bokassa himself appeared and lectured me without interruption for two hours. 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