No title {Arrest} Long Walk Original Manuscript (Image #501)

My arrest was greeted with wild rumours and a number of innocent persons were mentioned in this connection. Some blamed my Durban host, a suggestion which I promptly rejected. He is a respected figure in the movement and well known for his un equivocal opposition to apartheid an attitute which he consistently maintained long after my arrest. I am indebted to him and his family for looking after me so well during my stay in Durban and consider it a grave injustice that he should be suspected of such a mean crime. Several others were mentioned and even today, 14 years after that event, people maintain that they know the identity of the man who betrayed me. The most popular story in the press was that I had been betrayed by leftist elements in the movement who were shocked by my strong nationalist sentiments to which I gave utterance when I returned from abroad, and who felt that I should be immediatly removed from the scene. Indeed, many people were disturbed and even shocked when I indicated in my report that the ANC was not projecteing the proper image in Africa, that the ANC appeared to be speaking not for the African people but for all the population groups in the country, and at the suggestion that we should take note of this and allow the ANC to play its proper role of being first and foremost an organisation fighting for the advancement and welfare of the African people. In spite of the fact that the report was unanimously accepted by the Working Committee of the ANC, and despite the cautious and detailed manner in which I pointed out the views of African leaders whom I had met, I gained the impression that the other population groups in the Congress Movement were very worried about the new line.