S.A. Police Search For Strike Leader

Press, Volume C, Issue 29523, 26 May 1961, Page 13

S.A. Police Search For Strike Leader

(A Z Press Assn—Copyright)

LONDON, May 25.

The police sweep through South Africa which gaoled thousands of people concentrated yesterday on finding one man —Nelson Mandela.

He is the chief organiser of next week’s strike and show of strength by non-white workers as the Union withdraws from the Commonwealth, reported the “Daily Express.” From Monday, African and Indian workers and people of mixed blood in South Africa will stay away from their jobs for three days.

Nelson Mandela, aged 43. a hwy er, was not at home

when police knocked on his d r in Johannesburg yester-

He flits from house to house, and is using a different telephone every day to complete plans for Monday's walk-out.

Last night, he telephoned a J hannesburg newspaper and said: “Our Action Council met today, and instructed all areas to hit hard.”

The “Daily Express” said th • the council was able to r av its orders to major c -ies through secret chann Is. Its section leaders, like Mandela, slept each night in a different house.

In Durban, police found only one of the non-white < -gamsers they sought—Mrs Florence Mkize former s -cretary of the Women’s I cague of the banned African N.iional Congress, and now an office holder in the South African Federation of V. omen. Liter, she was remanded in c rody until June 5. charged v.h furthering the aim of a banned organisation. In Cape Town, the comm - der of the Western Cane F I ce (Colonel E. P. Muir), said that after reports of

activities among Africans at midnight in the African townships of Langa and Nyanga. helicopters had been hovering over the areas at night, training spotlights on houses, lanes, and dark areas. The “Daily Telegraph” reported that the South African police had arres'ed almost 10.000 people so far. Among those arrested yesterday were five former members of the African National Congress, including two women. and many Indians

In Durban, police found dynamite fuses in the house of an unnamed man whom they arrested and searched He was later taken to hospital with leg injuries. Police today continued their hunt for fugitive leaders of the strike, Reuters said.

In spite of the police raids and searches, thousands of "stav-at-home” pamphlets were distributed during the night in the African townships of New Brighton and Kwazakele. outside Port Elizabeth in the eastern Cape region.

Signed by the National Action Council, they said that if the Government “does not call a convention representa-

five of all the people, then the non-whites will go their own way.”

The Jahannesburg newspaper “Die Transvaler” reported that a railway ganger had thwarted a bid to blow up a section of railway line and prevent Africans going to work during the “stay-at-home.”

The newspaper quoted police as saying the ganger noticed an African with a suitcase on the line between Port Shepstone and Harding, in the Trankseian territories When he approached, the African made off, leaving behind a length of fuse with a detonator attached.

A police officer said last night that he believed that rumours that Africans had threatened to sabotage railway lines in African territories were being circulated to cause panic.

The South African Minister of the Interior (Senator Jan de Klerk) said in a statement yesterday that D. H. Kurzman. an American journalist of the Scripps-Howard newspaper group, was voluntarily leaving the country today after being declared a prohibited immigrant. Mr Kurzman later left Johannesburg by air for Salisbury.