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Comrade Tambo’s London Recruits (12A)
Directed by Gordon Main
IN the late 1960s and early ’70s Oliver Tambo, the exiled leader of the African National Congress, launched a recruitment drive for international young white people to take part in a covert mission to help in the fight against apartheid.
A recruiter was sent to the London School of Economics in London to sign up students to travel to South Africa to set off leaflet bombs in a co-ordinated attack informing black residents that the ANC was still up and running and battling on their behalf against the racist regime. The plan was to bring millions hope and to show that their plight was not forgotten.
Some of the real-life London recruits recount their extraordinary stories in director Gordon Main’s insightful and gripping documentary which was 10 years in the making. The film uses narrative fiction: reconstructions with actors playing the younger versions of these freedom fighters who relay eyewitness testimony as it was happening.
It seems like you are watching a nail-biting thriller rather than a documentary at times as you are given a blow-by-blow account of their mission in the run-up to the bombings. Many of these students were just 19 years old and idealistic with no real notion or concept of the consequences that could befall them if they were caught.
Two of them were in the midst of preparing the bombs in their hotel room when a housekeeper walked in on them surrounded by hundreds of leaflets and numerous detonators. The look of shock on the maid’s face was priceless. Another two were stopped by police and had ticking bombs in carrier bags on the back seat of their car. They told the cops they were lost tourists and, being white, the police believed them and let them go on their merry way.
I couldn’t help thinking that it was very fortunate that no-one was injured in the explosions but it was extremely brave of these teenagers to put their lives on the line for others. One explains how he was caught, and then tortured and beaten in custody which is harrowing to hear.
Their little-known but unbelievable role in the fight to end apartheid needs to be widely known and they should finally receive the recognition that they deserve.
On release via a grassroots “People’s Release” across the UK: see londonrecruits.com
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