THE EDITOR, Sir:

In his column of May 4, Ian Boyne wrote the following: "I remember sitting close to Mugabe, the African freedom fighter, in the canteen of the then Agency for Public Information (now JIS) in the 1970s, when he was brought here by Michael Manley."

Mr Mugabe never visited the Agency for Public Information (API). I must state at the outset that I did work with Mr Boyne at API between the years 1978-82. No such meeting took place when I was there. I called 10 of my former colleagues to see if they remembered any such meeting before I went to work at API. Nine of the 10 told me no such meeting took place. One person very hazily remembered a meeting. I finally called the executive director who confirmed that Mr Mugabe never visited API. However, she said Joshua Nkomo did.

For the younger generation, I must point out that during the 1970s, there were two liberation movements out of Zimbabwe - the Zimbabwe African National Union (ZANU), which was and still is headed by Mugabe; and the Zimbabwe African Peoples' Union (ZAPU), which was headed by Nkomo, now deceased. In terms of Cold-War politics, which was very rife at the time, ZAPU was supported by the West, as well as by the Soviet Union, while ZANU was supported by the Chinese.

intricacies

That Mr Boyne is confusing the two leaders shows how little he knows about the intricacies of Southern African affairs and really begs the question as to why anyone should listen to him on this topic.

Mr Mugabe did visit Jamaica in 1979. There was a Non-Aligned Summit in Cuba, which both Mr Nkomo and Mr Mugabe attended. At the end, they both came to Jamaica for a one-day visit before going off to London to participate in the Lancaster House talks, which led to independence. It was there that the land issue was hammered out, which Mugabe complains of today. At the end of their visit to Jamaica, a press conference was held, which I attended but Mr Boyne did not. I can remember staying back after the conference to do an interview with him, which was published in the now defunct Daily News.

I am, etc.,

BEVERLEY HAMILTON

P.O. Box 368

Kingston 10

EDITORS NOTE: In response to a query from The Gleaner, Mr. Boyne gave this comment: "Though the event took place almost 30 years ago and my memory is not unerring, I have a vivid recollection of both Mugabe and Nkoma sitting at a table together. I have always felt it was at the API canteen. It might be that I have conflated two events and it was at the press conference I saw them. What is undeniable is that both men were here together. I suspect Ms Hamilton's main point is my ignorance of African affairs. The logic of how that is illustrated by my memory of where I saw the two men I leave for you to decide."