The Defiance Campaign Long Walk Original Manuscript (Image #123)

The msot spectacular rise in membership occured in the Eastern Cape where there was an increase of 50,000 the result of the excellent efforts of an active and resourceful team of men like James Njongwe, Robert Matji, Raymond Mhlaba, Gladwyn Tshume, Caleb Mayekiso, Wilton Mkwayi, Benson Ndimba, Milner Ntsangani, Alcot Gwentshe, Robert Mahlangeni, Appavoo and others. The whole campaign had been planned to develop in three phases. First there would be small selected batches of defiers taking the field in selected principal areas of the country. As the Campaign developed there would follow the next phase with increasingly larger batches of volunteers drawing in the masses directly into courting imprisonment. Finally we envisaged this phase leading to the spreading of the campaign and radiating into the hinterlands of the main centres and deep into the rural areas. In this too the Eastern Cape was the only region we succeeded in reaching the second phase of the campaign and where a fairly strong resistance movement in the rural areas also emerged. At one stage they succeeded in having a single batch of 500 volunteers take the field in East London. Local conditions in the Eastern Cape also facilitated the work of the organisation. For one thing here we dealt with a homogeneous group bound together by a common historical background, tradition and language. The pass system was not strictly enforced and political functionaries were able to move about with comparative ease. Finally the security police in the area were not as powerful, experienced and efficiently organised as on the Witswatersrand and police surveillance was less sharp. The publication of the correspondance between the ANC and Malan immediately made the