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Press, Volume XCIX, Issue 29193, 2 May 1960, Page 17

At 7 a.m., I paused and ordered breakfast to be sent to my room. I had not finished the first page of my story when there was a knock at the-door. An assistant manager was there accompanied by two obviously plainclothes policemen. It was 7.10 a.m. "Mr Phillips?” asked the senior of the two. When I nodded, he said formally: "I have come to arrest you under the emergency regulations.” No Search Warrant His name was Head Constable M. H. Wessels, and he was accompanied by Detective Sergeant M. C. Swart. They entered my room and began searching. Under South Africa's emergency regulations, there was nothing to stop them. They needed no warrant. I was completely in ;heir power. Wessels sat at my desk, reading the story in the typewriter. Swart busied himself with a collection of pamphlets describing aspects of apartheid. Almost as an afterthought Wessels inquired if I had any firearms. He accepted my word that I was not armed.

My breakfast arrived, and my visitors urged me to eat it while they probed my files and belongings. Swart discovered a package containing Zulu beadwork I had bought for my daughter. He snorted derisively, “tourist stuff.” Occasionally the two men conversed in Afrikaans, successfully concealing from me what they were saying. They pounced almost gleefully on a small book, “The Anatomy of South African Misery.” that I had purchased in a Durban bookshop. They nodded gravely over other items they obviously considered subversive, such as an outline of the South African Liberal policy by the distinguished novelist, Alan Paton. Paton's views would fit into the Canadian scene somewhere between the Liberal and Cooperative Commonwealth Federation parties. Promise Of Message

My mind collected itself, and 1 demandeu permission to call the Canadian High Commissioner, James Hurley, at Pretoria. Wessels said Mr Hurley would be advised.

I asked for a receipt for the pamphlets, notes and papers they were seizing. Swart suggested 1 type out a list and they would sign it. After nearly an hour they were ready to depart, taking me with them.

At the hotel door I dallied over paying my hotel bill in the hope that some other correspondent might see my predicament. I asked the hall porter if 1 could buy cigarettes. With a gesture of sympathy he offered me one from his own pack while sending a bellboy out to purchase some.

The delay at the door enabled a Canadian Broadcasting Corporation correspondent. Donald Gordon. to discover my arrest and warn the High Commissioner before the South African Government informed him. Swart drove me in his grey Volkswagen. I had previously been warned never to drive in one of these cars through African locations. To the African they are a symbol of the Special Branch, and I would be apt to be mistaken for a policeman. The distance was less than half a mile. In heavy-handed Afrikaans humour that I scarcely appreciated, Swart said: “You choose your hotel well. It is very close to the gaol.” Durban gaol was built by British colonial authorities about 60 years ago. Its cream-with-green trim exterior is not forbidding. Wh a t was ominous was the slip of paoer Wessels produced as he rang for the doors to open. As I recall, it said: “Receive the body of Norman Phillips to be detained under the emergency regulations for as long as the Minister of Justice decides.” (To be continued.>